Why is comparing Womanface to Blackface offensive?

BBC woman's hour is talking drag today. Starts 10.00 Radio 4

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000b5kb

No references to the KKK, which makes me wonder when this association with "blackface" became more prominent than "the Minstrels" in the USA?

I've also not had much luck coming up with anything really substantial about this. I'm starting to wonder if it really is such a prominent association.

QuantumEntanglement this discussion is happening because different people have different understandings of terms and have been using them in different ways.

My feeling is that in the UK "blackface" conjures up the grotesquery of the exaggerated features of "blackface Minstrels", hence the use of "woman face" to refer to the grotesquery of the exaggerated features of drag queens.

Some people seem to agree and also to agree that in the UK it has been more usual to refer to the "Minstrel practice" as "blacking up".

The issue is not whether "blackface" and "blacking up" refer to different things, although it is certainly arguable that they can and do in different places at different times, but that in the USA the term "blackface" as well as the practice has a specific resonance that relates to the KKK.

This has recently been brought to the attention of white UK feminists and I suspect that it will not be just on Mumsnet that women are thinking and talking about how we got to this place and how, individually, we respond.

Blackened Faces: Histories and terms

I am not an academic. I am a white woman who has only lived in the UK and I have only my personal experience and internet-ferreting to go on. I am doing my best to understand these issues, how they seem to have changed during my lifetime and in particular the last 25 years (reference to 1994 documentary below).

To pick up the points about history of "blackface" and "blacking up" first, before having a think about the suggestions for alternatives to "woman face" . . .

As well as confusion and misunderstandings caused by terms having different meanings and resonances in different places and at different times, there are also misinterpretations of different reasons why faces and bodies might, involuntary or deliberately, be "blackened". I hope it helps to mention some of these. They illustrate other cross-cultural misunderstandings relating to the terms "blacking up" and "blackface", as well as different traditions that had and have nothing to do with mimicking, mocking or inciting violence against black people.

This point is neatly illustrated by the fact that if you enter "Blacking up" into Wikipedia Search the page re-directs to the page on "Blackface", which is headed by a warning that:

"The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject." (NB. There are no historical references to the KKK employing blackface.)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackface

Nevertheless, that Wikipedia "Blackface" page contains examples of traditions in different parts of the world where people in the past and/or now blacken faces for reasons that have nothing to do with mimicking, mocking or inciting violence against black people.

(I keep emphasising that point to remind that this is not a simple issue, not to deny that other examples are clearly racist.)

eg. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackface#United_Kingdom

Most often the practice had everything to do with disguise for concealment or protection against identification, particularly at night, and masks were a fancier alternative. I do not know if people in those places now or in the past referred or refer to those practices as either "blacking up" or "black face". Maybe someone else can shed light on that?

Black Act 1723

Wikipedia (part of the Blackface in the UK section):

"From 1723–1823, it was a criminal offence to blacken one's face in some circumstances, with a punishment of death. The Black Act was passed at a time of economic downturn that led to heightened social tensions, and in response to a series of raids by two groups of poachers who blackened their faces to prevent identification. Blackening one's face with soot, lampblack, boot polish or coal dust was a traditional form of disguise, or masking, especially at night when poaching."

I did not know about the Black Act 1723 before looking into this issue but I did know about the practice of blackening faces for disguise or concealment. Who does not? Soldiers camouflaging faces is an obvious example.

"The Black Act 1723 (9 Geo. 1 c. 22) was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain passed in 1723 in response to a series of raids by two groups of poachers, known as the Blacks. It was expanded over the years. It greatly strengthened the criminal code. It specified over 200 capital crimes, many with intensified punishment."

To continue to read how if you were poor you should choose death by starvation or capital punishment:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Act_1723

I also did know all about the Rebecca Rioters because we covered them in History at school. Would people at the time have talked, in Welsh or English, about the Rebecca Rioters "cross-dressing" and "blacking up" before they attacked toll booths and turnpikes? The "Daughters of Rebecca" feature in historical re-enactments. How should we talk about them in that context? (Not rhetorical questions.) I am guessing people would feel comfortable referring to them as "cross-dressing" but less so, if aware of this debate, as "blacking up".

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Riots

SIR LENNY HENRY

QuantumEntanglement Gobsmacked that anyone in the UK could think a reference to Lenny Henry "gratuitous" in the context of this discussion and the "Black and White Minstrels". Also surprised that this was not, as I imagined, common knowledge. Lenny Henry was on Radio 4 within the last couple of weeks talking about the experience and is on record many times discussing this. If his perspective is not important enough to mention then I do not know whose is.

Lenny Henry made a documentary with his new film company in 1994 that, I would suggest, is essential viewing. There are sections that cover "blackface" from both the UK and USA perspective, including interviews with black men and women in their 70's, 80's and 90's who performed as "blackface Minstrels" with Josephine Baker.

I could not find it on the BBC website (it was screened as an episode of the South Bank Show) but there is a copy on YouTube:

"Darker Than Me: Exploring The Roots of African-American Comedy (1994)"

"Lenny Henry produced and hosted Darker Than Me, a one hour documentary for British TV which unearthed the roots of black American comedy in white racism. Features interviews with David Alan Grier, Cleo Hayes, Lenny Henry, Robin Montague, Paul Mooney, Thea Vidale, Keenen Ivory Wayans. Original airdate: February 6, 1994."

I re-watched it. No references to the KKK, which makes me wonder when this association with "blackface" became more prominent than "the Minstrels" in the USA? I had another root around the internet, without any luck.

As mentioned already, the only references on the Wikipedia Page are to current scandals. This would suggest that it is not only white feminists in the UK who are unaware of the link. Maybe the US trans activists (mostly white?) yelling, "Racist!" at a small group of women in the UK for using the term "Woman face" could turn their attention to educating a wider audience?

ALTERNATIVES TO "WOMAN FACE"?

Alternatives suggested by 2BthatUnnoticed

• Womanning-up (as in "blacking up")
• LARP-ing as women (Live Action Role Play)
• macho ma'ams
• body snatchers
• pantomine dames

Thank you for the suggestions - much appreciated!

Womanning-up - As mentioned, already in use to contrast with "manning-up"

LARPing as women - I do not know enough about LARP to know whether this "works" but I have seen it being used - and had to look up "LARPing"! When I looked it up, it made sense.

Macho Ma'ams - I have seen this used very recently and wondered if it was a reference to the "Call me Ma'am!" video?

Body snatchers - never seen this used. I can imagine it working well with reference to proposals to use discarded organs from "sex change surgery" for others moving in the opposite direction and for detransition surgical reversals.

Pantomime Dames - this one does not work for me personally because Pantomime Dames are already a real life and very specific phenomenon.

------

I will not use it now, because of what I have been told about the term "blackface" in relation to the KKK, but I have to confess that if that was not in the equation then it is difficult to think of a more appropriate term than "Woman Face".

I don't know that it's wrong, when trying to get a sense of how some idea or behaviour was thought of historically, to look at how people at the time behaved and responded to it. It's a standard approach in historical research.

It was said that ‘UK B & W Minstrels weren’t doing ‘blackface’ just ‘blacking up’. They are the same thing!

Have you read the whole thread? This whole discussion is about the differences in language and what the actual terms mean for people in different countries and how 'blacking up' to British people doesn't mean exactly the same as 'blackface' does to American people.

And the gratuitous mention of Lenny Henry? That wasn’t suggesting ‘oh and he’s black so that makes it ok’ was it?

That wasn't how I read @MoleSmokes's post. I don't think that's what she meant at all.

Nobody on here has said that.

The implication was exactly that. It was said that ‘UK B & W Minstrels weren’t doing ‘blackface’ just ‘blacking up’.
They are the same thing!
And the gratuitous mention of Lenny Henry? That wasn’t suggesting ‘oh and he’s black so that makes it ok’ was it? Give over.

I prefer the term blackfishing for women darkening their skin, dying their hair, wearing dark coloured contact lenses, applying contouring makeup, and dressing to appear as if they were mixed or black.

I think drag is drag and should not be changed to womanface similar to blackface or anything similar to do with racial discrimination. It is it’s own term. Having its own term doesn’t mean we cannot highlight and address the sexist issues with it. There is no need to appropriate the terms relating to racial discrimination to accomplish raising awareness or addressing issues of sex discrimination.

Good question. If UK people say "blacking up," would it work to say "womaning up?"

I think there is a problem that just as British people have assumed that 'blackface' was the American term for 'blacking up', Americans might assume that 'blacking up' is just the British term for 'blackface', so it would still be just as offensive.

I think we just need to get away from the comparison altogether, because the motivations of men who portray themselves as women are mostly very different from the motivations of white people impersonating black people.

And saying it was ok because Lenny Henry was on the B&W Minstrel show?

Nobody on here has said that.

*Slave trade not trade slave

Blacking up and blackface are the same thing - darkening the skin in order to parody black people. Why are people arguing that ‘blacking up’ is somehow ‘more benign’ because ‘we didn’t have slavery in the UK, innit?’ (some might want to read some history about where the trade slave started - clue: it wasn’t the USA). Pack it in.

And saying it was ok because Lenny Henry was on the B&W Minstrel show? No. Really. Just fucking stop it. It wasn’t ok, we don’t get to justify systemic racism in light entertainment on 70s tv because black entertainers were more or less coerced into being complicit if they wanted to be entertainers on 70s tv. What the fuck were they supposed to do about it? Lenny Henry was a teenager, he just wanted to be a comedian and impressionist, we don’t get to point to him now and say ‘well he went along with it’ as if that were a situation of his own choosing or making.

Right now, I’m here: if black women say they find ‘womanface’ problematic then maybe they have a point and maybe I should listen to them and find some other way of expressing the concept of men appropriating female presentation. If it costs me nothing to do that and means life’s a tiny bit more pleasant for them then why wouldn’t I?

I don't think womaning up alone works, as it's sometimes used as 'man up' ie be brave. Maybe x individual is womaning up like blacking up, to draw the comparison. But it's clunky.

When anyway did we even start using the term "black face" in the UK in common parlance, as opposed to academic discourse and "woke speak"? The "Black & White Minstrels Show" featured white men who "blacked up" (apart from Lenny Henry, of course) not white men who "did black face".

I actually thought "blackface" was specifically a US term, similar (giving a trivial example) to how "diaper" is used in the US and "nappy" in the UK (I am not in or from the UK or US).

In a specifically UK context, "blacking up" may have been offensive and demeaning, the way drag can be to women. It may have contributed to racist attitudes, indirectly making racist violence more permissible.

But - unlike in the US - it seems there was no direct, causative link between "blacking up" and severe, systemic oppression of black people, including slavery, rape and murder. Did the UK pass laws to enable white men to rape black women and sell the resulting babies as chattels? Did white people lynch black people in popular public spectacles, and photograph their bodies for post cards?

For many outside the UK, the specific term "Blackface" evokes all of this.

At least 148 Black women were lynched during that era. E.g. Laura Nelson (pictured in the Twitter thread) who was raped before being hanged alongside her young son. She had her 3yo daughter with her too, whom she set down on the ground before she was hanged. They were near a river at the time and I would have been stressing that my toddler would fall into the water and drown. No one knows what happened to Mrs Nelson's toddler or her newborn baby.

This human tragedy is what "Blackface" evokes for many outside the UK - whereas British women are thinking of the Black & White Minstrels. So I think there has been a huge linguistic and cross cultural misunderstanding here. Full credit to those on both sides who have tried to resolve it.

The main criticism in the Twitter threads is specifically about white women who are "GC RadFems" in the UK. I wonder if a large part of the reason for that is that we have imported the term "black face" from the USA thinking that it is equivalent to "blacking up" when it does not have the same meaning or resonances.

I think this is right.

Unfortunately this has given TRAs in the US ammunition to push the "GC = right wing racist!" falsehood. Both black and white feminists in the US are trying to combat this.

The black women in the USA objecting to "woman face" must know what it is we are getting at when we use that term. I am genuinely interested to know what term they would use instead. It might be another term that does not "travel" well but it would be useful to know.

Good question. If UK people say "blacking up," would it work to say "womaning up?"

Other ideas I've seen:

[MN we are not talking necessarily about actual trans people here - but a particular small group of persons who may not even be trans - hence this comment is within the guidelines]:

• LARP-ing as women (Live Action Role Play)
• macho ma'ams
• body snatchers
• pantomine dames

Thanks nettie434

Thanks for those screenshots of Tituba's tweets 2BeThatUnnoticed . I don't think I saw those ones before - but I definitely did see ones where she uses the abbreviation "Hx".

I had to look it up and thought that it looked "medical", like "Rx" (rehabilitation). If anyone else is baffled, Hx = "history" or "medical history"

Thinking about possible alternatives to "woman face" (I haven't come up with one) and the earlier discussions in this thread about the history of drag vs what is happening now with drag, ie. another recent "appropriation" by Queerdom.

As well as the "drag kids" phenomenon, there are appalling subversions like the UK drag "JonBenét Patricia Ramsey impersonator" (screenshots).

"JonBenét Patricia Ramsey (August 6, 1990 – December 25, 1996) was an American child beauty queen who was killed at the age of 6 in her family's home in Boulder, Colorado. A lengthy handwritten ransom note was found in the house.

Her father John found the girl's body in the basement of their house about eight hours after she had been reported missing.

She sustained a broken skull from a blow to the head and had been strangled; a garrote was found tied around her neck. The autopsy report stated that the official cause of death was "asphyxia by strangulation associated with craniocerebral trauma."

Her death was ruled a homicide.

The case generated nationwide public and media interest, in part because her mother Patsy Ramsey (herself a former beauty queen) had entered JonBenét into a series of child beauty pageants. The crime is still unsolved and remains an open investigation with the Boulder Police Department."

continues at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_JonBenét_Ramsey

I am sure a lot of people involved with drag must be appalled by what is going on in the name of "drag" these days.

When anyway did we even start using the term "black face" in the UK in common parlance, as opposed to academic discourse and "woke speak"? The "Black & White Minstrels Show" featured white men who "blacked up" (apart from Lenny Henry, of course) not white men who "did black face".

I just thought that 'black face' was American for 'blacking up' - just a linguistic difference. This thread has taught me quite a lot. And I didn't know that Lenny Henry had appeared on the Black and White Minstrel show.

The main criticism in the Twitter threads is specifically about white women who are "GC RadFems" in the UK. I wonder if a large part of the reason for that is that we have imported the term "black face" from the USA thinking that it is equivalent to "blacking up" when it does not have the same meaning or resonances.

This is certainly what I thought. Whilst the Black and White Minstrel show was obviously racist, I had no idea that minstrel shows in the US were connected with lynchings.

The black women in the USA objecting to "woman face" must know what it is we are getting at when we use that term. I am genuinely interested to know what term they would use instead. It might be another term that does not "travel" well but it would be useful to know.

I agree. We need a word for this.

Tituba did a thread explaining why WF / BF is offensive to black women (it is linked on page one).

She also thought TRAs would use this against GC, and she was right.

Thanks Molesmokes. I really enjoyed reading your post and the articles you linked.

Typo and clarification!

"Two countries divided by a common language" not "counties"!

"why not a male Pantomime Dame Fairy Godmother??"

Another UK white women here. I have read the very informative Twitter threads by black women (all USA?) as well as this thread (mainly UK white women?).

I am happy not to use the term "Woman Face".

From reading the Twitter threads, it seems as if the explicit purpose of KKK "black face" is different to what is going on with drag, OTT TW "whore face" (did someone call it that in this thread earlier?), etc.

This does also seem to be partly a case of "Two counties divided by a common language" and partly different histories and traditions, eg. all the fulminating in the USA "Bible Belt" press about the "trans immorality" of the new Cinderella film with a black, male Fairy Godmother - that foaming at the mouth looks bonkers from a UK perspective. A Cinderella Panto without a female Prince and male Pantomime Dames playing the "Ugly Sisters" would be weird, so why not a Pantomime Fairy Godmother??

When anyway did we even start using the term "black face" in the UK in common parlance, as opposed to academic discourse and "woke speak"? The "Black & White Minstrels Show" featured white men who "blacked up" (apart from Lenny Henry, of course) not white men who "did black face".

If "black face" means what the KKK were doing then the Minstrels weren't "doing black face" when they were "blacking up" to do their "Minstrel parody". I am not suggesting that what they did was inoffensive, only that it was not done with the purpose of inciting lynchings, which is the key message repeated over and over again in the Twitter threads.

The first time I came across the term "black face" was earlier this year. It was in an article about the poet in Arizona who wanted a restaurant to remove an old photo of Welsh miners black with coal dust. He said that even though he knew what the photo depicted it made him "feel unwelcome" - because "black face".

Having read those Twitter threads about the KKK "black face" I now have some sympathy for that reaction. At the time I thought he was an ignorant, pompous jerk. Now I wonder if it was an involuntary visceral reaction rather than the intellectual one I supposed. My thoughts still go to the fact that those could have been the same miners who became friends with Paul Robeson when they welcomed him to The Valleys. That some of them could well have been black under the coal dust.

www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jul/02/how-paul-robeson-found-political-voice-in-welsh-valleys

Also, that if white women in the UK are capable of understanding the objections that black women in the USA have to the term "woman face" that they might recognise that our use of the term was/is unwittingly offensive rather than racist. Also that there are other sensitivities and historical resonances that they do not experience or do not feel as strongly as white women in the UK. Class is an obvious one.

Not to derail (please) but as has already been mentioned there are also historical ethnic (and religious) differences underpinning oppressions, persecutions and atrocities in the UK. Has anyone got a better explanation for the continuing bullying, ridiculing and physical assaults of children with ginger hair by other kids than the fact that they represent the vestiges of an indigenous population of the UK? The negative stereotypes of the Welsh, another indigenous people of the "Celtic Fringe", as sneaky, thieving, dishonest types? The Irish, in living memory grouped with "Blacks and Dogs" as unwelcome in boarding houses? (Damn! This is inviting derailing but you get the picture.)

I am not having a go at the English BTW - it was all the fault of those damned Normans! Oh - and the Saxons. Vikings, anyone? Meanwhile the Barbary Pirates were raiding coastal village for slaves but as they did not hang around they are a side show to the mainly but not exclusively white melting pot.

Anyway, I get the thing about "black face" and "woman face" in the USA context. The main criticism in the Twitter threads is specifically about white women who are "GC RadFems" in the UK. I wonder if a large part of the reason for that is that we have imported the term "black face" from the USA thinking that it is equivalent to "blacking up" when it does not have the same meaning or resonances. (In which case, the same issues should apply to "yellow face".)

I will confess that the first Twitter thread I came across was not the one with all the awful images of lynchings and my reading of that first one was that it was an attempt by TRAs to undermine UK GC RadFems. One of the Twitter threads linked to this discussion on Mumsnet. When I followed it here I was further reassured by the posts from regular Mumsnetters that this really is "a thing" and not just got up to be divisive or diss UK GC RadFems.

The black women in the USA objecting to "woman face" must know what it is we are getting at when we use that term. I am genuinely interested to know what term they would use instead. It might be another term that does not "travel" well but it would be useful to know.

---

ps. I looked for the story about the photo of the Welsh miners in the Arizona restaurant and found a "follow-up" article that is very relevant to understanding the issue of "black face". Interesting to see that the article talks about a "visceral reaction", that the UK academics asked to comment on the photo talk about "blacking up" rather than "black face" and that the majority of white people (USA) who responded to the original article did not get the issue being raised. Not only that but the author was sent horrible insults and threats! Vile.

eu.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-best-reads/2019/02/15/photo-coal-miners-drives-debate-over-blackface/2875921002/

Relying on chaotic's reading of the thread.

Agree with you on all but can not agree on 4 - NEVER! because women are asked to listen to others but nobody listens to women.

I've read this whole thread (OK skimmed some of it) and it seems to me that the main arguments against the comparison are:

1. Blackface was used to portray Black people as subhuman in their intellect and personalities. White people would wear blackface and then behave like people who are so stupid they have no real personality and are just things to be enslaved. (Whereas "womanface" does not)

1. Blackface was used to portray Black people as hyper-sexual (whereas "womanface" is not).

1. Blackface was used to portray Black people as violent, dangerous criminals (whereas womanface is not).

1. Even if the comparison is valid, we should not use it because may Black women have told us it is hurtful to them due to their particular history and experience.

I am confused why anyone would suggest that 1 and 2 hold. Of course men put on false breasts and high voices and act subhuman, stupid and hyper-sexual. They do this is drag shows and they do it in real life, too.

As for 3, well I would argue that that is absolutely happening, and in a more insidious way that just dressing up and acting out criminality in a film or play. Men are putting on false breasts and other "womanly" features (or using drugs to grow their own) and then IN REAL LIFE murdering and raping women, with the result that those crimes are being recorded AS WOMEN'S CRIMES.

The blackface equivalent would be if a white man painted his face black, then murdered or raped somebody and it was therefore recorded as a black person's crime! This, thank God, never happened (as far as I'm aware) but it is happening to women right now.

However I think objection 4 is worth considering. I'll risk bringing in yet another analogy ... As a Jew, I feel really upset when people compare Israel to Nazi Germany. But some of my friends do it, and people who I otherwise think are nice people who don't want to offend, who would never want to be anti-semitic or any kind of racist. They are very angry about the actions of the Israeli state and to their mind the analogy holds. But I have a visceral reaction to it due to being born into a family that was virtually wiped out, and growing up with the grief and terror of it in the very core of my being.

Any amount of arguing that really Israel is like Nazi Germany in this or that way would not make it any less painful for me to hear. So I find myself saying "Please could you not? I object to a lot of what Israel do too, and I'm more than happy to discuss it, but surely you can find another way to express it?"

Just like the women saying "please don't use the blackface analogy, because it hurts".

I also agree with the pp saying that porn is even more comparable. Porn portrays women as subhumans who have no autonomy, self-respect or even care for their own body or mind. Perfect objects for enslavement. They are even represented as enjoying torture, or being too stupid to know the different between enjoyment and humiliation.

I know, I'm sorry.

Difficult to express unless we've got the right reference points established. Communication is hard; we keep trying. Sorry if I'm going across as a dick; it's not intentional.

There just really is something awfully exciting about the way people notice autocorrect is out to get them; it's a pertinent mirror to the Otherised experience being discussed.

The parallel quality each 'side' divines from the hyphen-face construction is represented in living English at the upper end as 'cunt' and the lower end as 'dick.' We miss it on this side because of the way 'cunt' operates in English-English.

They say intersection, we hear dichotomy. That's all I'm saying really.

I don't really know what comments you're responding to, so none of that makes a lot of sense to me.

Back up Goose - flip it and put the weakforce back in, go quantum.

Identity-vector differential bias is what's going on.

You accidentally express this is between "American female (black)" and "Peoplelike (me)" through your sentence construction.

The ephemeral 'they' considers it differently.

Goose's unconscious linguistic choice to verbally condense the American out is a sign of real-world racism-experience demonstrating goose's weaker position along one axis.

Calling it cultural imperialism makes us all disidentify with it so we can't see it, is what's happening. The capacity to differentially experience guiltcomplex is polarised across different axes; it only hits self-awareness in up to five at a time. Different cultures, different fives.

Basically the English pick up racialised bias via the screen. We pick up american-male-pattern bias.

Flip to see the parallels processing. Locate the parallel in the hell of the German brothel.

By a roundabout route, England is reminding America that it's Germany's fault too, and America is blaming the wrong parent. England assumes America will infer from the transmission that America is having a massive teenage tantrum to hide from the reality that black isn't really what makes good/bad happen and America hasn't the maturity to see what it's doing. Really it's a living language evolving problem.

I surmise guilt-complex 're WW2 is very real, but more detectable at one remove. It's harder to spot unless the observer is able to identify with both the weaker and the stronger variations.

Also the religion-guilt-complex function is at play; black-American-woman triggers our anti-white-man defence systems because the slaves incorporate the master to survive and we can see it in the religious/spirit aspect of the language barrier. White English woman rejects the inferred presence of her father in the language she receives through the screen.

You can follow the evolution of male-bias in the auto correct function. People are always pointing it out. Look at the bottom of your screens.

I'm not sure of my thoughts on this entirely and I confess I haven't read the whole thread yet. However, I think that any comparison of 'different differences' can be potentially insulting as it glosses over some of the nuances which may appear unimportant to outsiders, but are actually deeply significant to the minority group in question. The Twitter thread on the KKK film being a good example

I'm late to this thread but it's been interesting. 2B I think I share your views on it.