"Elves," he said. "They're just so silly. I now have 6-8 black men as helpers." |
You don't seem to realise how stupid you come off to me when you point to the "blackface" aspect of the Zwarte Piet tradition in my posts: especially when there is a link to SOMEBODY READING THE STORY, where he says.
In France and Germany gifts are exchanged on Christmas Eve, while in the Netherlands the children open their presents on December 5, in celebration of St. Nicholas Day. It sounded sort of quaint until I spoke to a man named Oscar, who filled me in on a few of the details as we walked from my hotel to the Amsterdam train station...
Then, of course, you've got the six to eight former slaves who could potentially go off at any moment. This, I think, is the greatest difference between us and the Dutch. While a certain segment of our population might be perfectly happy with the arrangement, if you told the average white American that six to eight nameless black men would be sneaking into his house in the middle of the night, he would barricade the doors and arm himself with whatever he could get his hands on.Not to mention I say things like:
OK, this is a tradition that needs to be experienced in person, but this comes pretty close to what it is like. It usually comes as a surprise for the non-Dutch/Flemish when they first encounter it (I know it did me).and
As Sinterklaas is coming to town this weekend: here is a description of a tradition that I experienced live and in person when I lived in Belgium. I was walking down the street in Antwerp to run into two men in blackface (and this was after Vlaams Bloc won the election). I decided to keep my wisearse comments to myself.Now, would the neo-nazi Vlaams Bloc be upset if my comments were approving? Seriously, How stupid are you people?
and I have a label to the post: 6 to 8 Black men
Anyway, had you bothered to LISTEN to the story, you would have heard:
Oscar finished his story just as we arrived at the station. He was a polite and interesting guy very good company, but when he offered to wait until my train arrived I begged off, claiming I had some calls to make. Sitting alone in the vast, vibrant terminal, surrounded by thousands of polite, seemingly interesting Dutch people, I couldn’t help but feel second rate. Yes, the Netherlands was a small country, but it had six to eight black men and a really good bedtime story. Being a fairly competitive person, I felt jealous, then bitter. I was edging toward hostile when I remembered the blind hunter tramping off alone into the Michigan forest. He may bag a deer, or he may happily shoot a camper in the stomach. He may find his way back to the car, or he may wander around for a week or two before stumbling through your back door. We don’t know for sure, but in pinning that license to his chest, he inspires the sort of narrative that ultimately makes me proud to be an American.Consider yourselves willfully ignorant if not seriously DUMB for having missed a lot of what was going on.
Take another bow for making fools of yourselves! You deserve it.
Wow, Laci! More name calling and insulting of intelligence! And what do you back it up with? Nuance! Nuance of what you really meant and little things that you think change the fact that you spent many posts sharing the charming Minstrel shows of the European continent--including even some actual musical minstrel shows!
ReplyDeleteHow are we supposed to take your obsession with men in blackface as any less of a microaggression than stupid comments about Santa by Megan Kelly? And your explanations as anything other than spin just like anything she or Faux News said after that?
So, are we supposed to feel better because you're really supporting blackface, but rather trying to ironically perpetuate the stereotype of black men as dangerous? Big improvement there, Poochie! You don't encourage dressing up as black men, instead you believe in warning people to be afraid of scary black men.
ReplyDeleteMaybe for April 20th you can commemorate the Holocaust by trying to link pro gun people to Nazis and kick of a week of posts about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and pictures of big nosed Jews with sharp teeth, all to try and scare us about the Jewish threat...Ironically of course.
All I got from this Laci is that you are an elitist Asshole is that what you were going for?
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments since you confirm what I said in this post that you have no idea what is going on here.
ReplyDeleteKeep up the good work of proving me right in my comments about your inability to understand basic English.
Again, thank you very much.
Oh poor deluded Poochie... We do get what you're going on with. We just aren't blighted little racists like you--we get neither humor nor fright from the notion of Santa being more intimidating if he had 6-8 black men with him. We just see these posts as the possibly intoxicated ravings of an increasingly unstable British ex-pat who has some deep seated issues with race that make it so that he can't see people as just people.
DeleteAs for our comments trolling you for your love of "blackface" or "minstrel shows," well, you can't really blame us if, after a lifetime of being on the receiving end we decide to turn some lessons from Rules for Radicals back on you socialists.
Who really cares about Black Peter and the racist Dutch?
ReplyDeleteI thought that Laci enjoyed it for the gay appeal. Cute guys in satin. Fun dancing.
Of course Black Peter is a condemnation of African men. What else could it possibly mean? Black Peter for the bad children. Sinter Klaas for the good children. It's a travesty that the Dutch still cling to this tradition. Black lawn jockeys disappeared from La Jolla in 1964. Join the civilized world. Fucking xenophobes.
You should have framed this as some kind of rant against the supposedly enlightened Dutch people continuing to sanction this type of racial hatred and ridicule. Remember, one of the surest signs of racism is making a big joke out of it all.