To be shocked with what I found in mothercare

[Lehman]

Im from the uk but have recently moved to Brisbane. I was pleased to find they have mothercare over here but shocked to find they are selling gollie dolls. I thought they stopped doing these years ago.

Aw tethersand don't you want to play anymore? Actually I'm off to stick some pins in my voodoo doll . Byeee.

I am glad you like my posts Mirry.

If you do you will have noticed that I feel very strongly about racisim. Having five black kids an all.

Its not funny. Its not a joke.

As I mentioned previously, my OH is very laid back, he doesnt talk much about the crap he has put up with over the years. I am very aware of his views on Golliwogs though. Growing up as a black kid in the 70s he didnt experience those dear little gollies in quite the same way you did.

I wouldnt have on in my house. They do not hark back to simpler, gentler times. They are a reminder of how it was once acceptable to lampoon and insult people because of the colour of their skin.

Mrsdevere, will you allow me to stand and applaud you?

You may kitty
Petals strewn at my feet would also be nice.

Mrsdevere-Done and done.

oh fgs.

So because a few people feel strongly about a subject and some others feel strongly about a subject and then they dont agree and then some agree with the others and then the others agree with the others....

We are bullies?

Get a grip.

Done and done refers to to the PP applauding me and then strewing petals at my feet btw.

Because that was done in all seriousness wasnt it?

I think you are reading what you want to read.

Funny how those who perhaps have the better arguments are the ones called bullies hey?

And you do realise that none of us actually know each other. We didnt have a meeting and then decide we were all going to get together on this thread.

No one decided what the other one would say and none of us knew when coming on this thread who would agree with who?

How fucking ironic to talk about bullying on a thread about Golliwogs.

And your 'feel free to jump on this thread' passive agressive preempting any response from anyone who doesnt agree with you, speaks volumes to me.

Translated 'I have had my little rant but anyone who comes on after to disagree with me is only doing it because they are ranty and a bit bonker and a bully'

Hang on- are we saying burning crosses are racist now?

I think we should be told.

Oh MrsdeVere I trust me I have very stong views on racism - being black myself- and I have seen rasicm both aimed at me and from members of my own family towards other races of people. My uncle owes a shop, the shop next door is owed by an Indian Man, very lovely man. My uncle still refers to it as the Pakki shop next door. No matter how many times he is told he will still do it, because he is a rasict.

You say how ironic bullying on a post about golliwogs!!!!

This post started as a thread about golli dolls and someones shock that they are still sold. Yes they are horrible, yes they were made to take the piss out of black people, yes yes yes yes on your point there I agree.

All mirry2 was trying to say is that there are different problems with all races. Have you never in your life told a Paddy and Mick joke - or laughed at one??????

Does that make you a Racist?

I have many friends who owned these dolls in the past but I am not hung up about it. You say you have 5 black children, how would you feel if they were German and used a reference to the war to win an agruement with a Jewish person. Would you be proud of them????

You never mentioned the burning cross but tethersend you should be ashammed of yourself.

I never thought I would see anyone use a ref to a horrible part of my hertitage just to win an arguement on mumsnet. As said racism comes in many forms.

well i've never told a paddy or mick joke, i honestly thought they went out with the ark, but you do realise that the Irish aren't a race?

actually chatty, the more i read your post the more baffled i am.

Ashamed? Oh no.

If golliwogs can be referred to in all seriousness as harmless relics of a bygone era, then why not burning crosses?

Because it's all the same as not liking garlic, right?

Right?

aitchtwo - Trust me my DP is Irish and they are still around. Irish prop a bad example about races should maybe have gone with a different one, prop that DP is Irish that made me put that.

tethersend - you said in a PP that you do not blame children who owned them in the past, that what my friends are. Children who had them - grew up and are lovely people. On a day out to the seaside one of said friend DC 3yo was playing on the 2p slot machines and won a keyring of one. He was very happy with it showing everyone it to say what he had won. Very tense moment when he showed it to me saying look chatty what I got.

Friend took him to get crisps took it off him to give him the crisps and dropped it in the nearest bin.

Most people today will agree with you that they were used to mock black and they wouldn't own one now.

but that was central to mirry's point, chatty, so it was a good example of what she was saying (which didn't make a great deal of sense either). black people living in scotland, ireland, sweden or wherever might experience racism, it's really not going to be because historically, white crofters might have worn a tartan hat.

really, i'm scottish myself. we're not a race. we have experienced periods of oppression, but they are not represented by the recent invention of tourist 'jimmy hats'. i wouldn't much like grotesque subsistence farmer dolls designed to take the piss out of the ethnic cleansing that was the clearances, though. thankfully, if someone did bother to create them at the time, they didn't catch on. but someone did invent the golliwog, and sadly it is still with us, and mirry is mistaken in seeking to discount that as somehow irrelevant or unimportant.

I had a Gollie as a child that was second hand and passed down. I loved him, more than any Barbie doll. I'm not a raving racist now and can see that Gollies are viewed as unacceptable. I did love Gollie though (my mum still keeps him in a drawer as my nan knitted him) I think people forget that they were very easy to knit with spare wool and for very poor people my mums age group (78) sometimes they were the only dolls they had!

I think like Mirry I am just not very good at putting what I feel into words. During these posts people have posted links about the dolls and the history and what they really mean and I have learnt something from them also. Can we remember that years ago these websites were not available. Google was still an age away. No one had access to the knowledge of what level of distress these dolls could cause unless you were told by your family. People lived in ignorance by no fault of their own. People still choose to live in ignorance, which is sad.

Sorry should have said some people in last bit - do not mean all people live in ignorance still.

No I havent told an Irish joke and no I wouldnt laugh at one.
I dont understand your point about German children and the war.

No one has bullied anyone on here.

We are grown ups posting independantly of each other.

Bullying is NOT disagreeing
Bullying is NOT a one off arguement
Bullying is NOT several people with the same degree of power as each other telling each other they are wrong.

What we have here is a group of people determined that Gollies benign and those who object are being silly and even racist

Then we have a group of people who refuse to agree with that point of view and are pointing out that they do NOT think that Gollies are jolly little rag dollies with no negative connatations.

Explain how that is bullying?

ohno I dont think anyone has said that having a golly as a child turns you in a racist, raving or otherwise.

Its no easier to knit a gollywog than it is to knit any other kind of doll btw.

I have knitted several for my children. I have knitted them brown dolls with beautiful hair. Much nicer than a lampoon of what black people were supposed to look like IMO.

ABSOLUTELY agree, chatty, that many people don't know the heritage of gollies. i certainly didn't, i thought he was just a doll from the jam maker, and i thought he was great. i enjoyed treating him a lot nicer than blyton's gollies were treated by that little shit noddy.

but now, thanks to increased awareness, the internet and a more multicultural society, i know that no, they're not 'just a doll', so i certainly wouldn't give one to my kids. and i would think anyone that did was being, in this day and age, wilfully ignorant and i'd presume that stemmed from a basic feeling of racism at some level.

I agree with you aitch but back in the 1970's I wouldn't have even equated a gollie with being anything to do with black people (lead very VERY sheltered rural life). Just wanted to mention how I did love him even though now he is hidden in a drawer. My mum has knitted a pink and yellow 'Dollie' for my DD, it looks remarkably similar except for the colour.