To report friend to FB for photo of her blacked up?

[Greyhound]

I'm really shocked - cousin of mine has pic of herself on Facebook blacked up. She is white. The picture is of her at a fancy dress party - she has covered her face in dark brown stage make up and is wearing an "Afro" wig and Rastafarian style striped hat.

Her husband is also blacked up.

I know a couple of older people originally from the Caribbean who refer to themselves as Coloured. I'm not going to stop them, and tell them they're racist. They can call themselves whatever they like. I also don't want to use that word myself and their GC certainly wouldn't refer to themselves in that way. Your family black up and everyone's happy? Great. I wouldn't expect that to go down the same way everywhere.

"Please don't presume to tell me what's in my heart. I refuse to treat people differently because of their skin colour and that's how we are bringing up our kids with all their cousins of all colours"

Again, this is commendable and exactly how I have been brought up, and am bringing up my family. And that is one of the reasons why I find blacking up so offensive.

So a thread about someone blacking up - perhaps unwisely but not with any ill intent by the sounds of it - runs to 16 pages so far, whereas a thread discussing responsibility for the appalling and deliberate sexual abuse of over a thousand children runs to eight

Interesting ...

Montegomongoose, you've made many people here look an idiot. Thank you for being the voice of reason.

Buffy, why don't you hop over to the Rotheram thread and voice your fury at what has been happening there, instead of venting your feminist spleen at this trifling stuff. Young white working-class girls are being gang raped largely by muslim men. I haven't seen your contribution in any of the discourse surrounding that horror.

That is me you are quoting Urbane. Tory voting me, so perhaps not the leftie you thought you were getting.

Sadly I don't agree that we are all rubbing along okay in the UK, there are race and religious issues left right and centre. BNP and UKIP are gaining votes, and blacks and ethnic minorities are under represented consistently in the workplace and more senior jobs.

But you carry on thinking everything is tickety boo and lets keep our fingers crossed shall we.

other people don't have that luxury

We all have choices in what we teach our children.

In my family, we are descended from black slaves, white slaves, white slave owners and my Trini cousins have Indian ancestry.

I like most of them.

If we had to take into account everyone's potential for offence based on their racial profile and potential for social and economic opression we wouldn't open our mouths.

Which means we'd be so busy formulating responses that we'd totally miss the chance to just damn well talk to someone.

And in my family, that's the biggest sin.

Puzzled, I've said it before and I'll say it again: The liberal left are deafening in their silence over this one..and we all know why.

Urbane, excellent post.

No no Montego I am suggesting no one blacks up. This is quite easy to do, and indeed an accidental blacking up would be very unusual.

Therefore there is no need to "take into account everyone's potential for offence based on their racial profile and potential for social and economic oppression" just a need to not black up.

Marrrrvellous post MagnificentMaleficent!

all that PC focus
referred to by fistoffives is known as the Equality Act I believe.

We all have choices in what we teach our children.

I would say that choice is taken out of your hands, when you have race riots in your city, people vandalising your property and your child coming home saying, 'X wouldn't let me play because he said my skin was dirty'.

In our family, we also teach love and the only thing you judge is a persons character. but we'd be remiss in our responsibility to also teach the reality of the society we live in and challenge what is clearly wrong.

One person not finding it offensive doesn't make it ok.
Lots of people don't find racist words offensive but it's not ok to use them.

You only have to look back 30 years to see people minstrelling on national tv. Why do you want to do that now? We know the negative affect it has on RL people of colour. There is no need so why do it? If something influences society into normalising racist stereotypes even more then isn't that something we should avoid? Don't you think the welfare of everyone in society is worth more than you thinking it's funny to dress up? I'm not saying ban it I'm saying use your head.

Pistol, you have NO idea what Buffy is doing! She is actually pretty much responsible for me and my DH, and following on from that our extended families, identifying with feminism and as a result going out there to assist women and their children. She really is brilliant, along with LRD, Just and others. You ridicule her because you are not like her.

What have YOU done to inspire people??

And who are YOU to tell people where to go and what to do?? You have shot yourself in the foot right there!

A face? Really!?

Thanks for that.

you've made many people here look an idiot

That wasn't my intention!

i do live in the real world. I just think there's enough bitterness and hatred without me contributing.

I've experienced plenty of prejudice based in my gender, skin colour, religion, choice of sandwich filling...

I've learned to forgive and refuse to engage; I'd rather be with the many positive people I've met on my travels.

I was an arsy argumentative young woman, now I'm old and have lots of peace and forgiveness in my heart, life is much sweeter.

Yes, Pepper, a face, because you seem just a bit too weird for my liking.

The vehemence expressed by some of you about drag is interesting. I have never in the slightest found drag acts offensive. Not particularly interesting (actually not interesting at all apart from Taylor Mac whose consideration of gender politics and patriarchal family structure done with considerable humour and empathy and which I found thought provoking and enjoyable) but offensive no . I really don't get that the parody of femininity represented by drag acts has any bearing on me at all.

I've never gone, as it doesn't appeal at all, but The Ladyboys of Bangkok will have just completed another 3 week run , as they do every year, at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
What is interesting is that not so long ago a poster who was concerned about her husband' s desire to be more out and more flamboyant in his cross dressing was almost unanimously shot down in flames for being narrow minded. At least one poster posted a link and recommendation to a cross-dressing cabaret act Andrew O'Neil.

Phaedrals Andrew o'neill (who's a stand up comedian not a cabaret act) is a transvestite not a drag queen. He wears those clothes in life not just on stage. Drag is a crude over the top stereotype of a woman that puts women in a negative light to be mocked. Transvestism is simply a way

How disingenuous you are. I don't recall Harris, Savile et al choosing their rape victims according to their being white. This is not simply about penises and power. It is about predominantly Pakistani gangs grooming white lower-class girls. Open your eyes.

Posted too soon
Transvestism is a way in which people feel more comfortable and don't want to be confined by gender norms. Completely different.

My dad worked in Nepal and India and brought back clothes from those countries for me to wear. It is very possible that some of those clothes, pieces of jewellery were part of a culture that should not be stolen from - I was ignorant

If your father paid a fair market price for these items to a willing seller how are these items "stolen" ? I raised this before but from that comment you do seem to be suggesting that wearing anything which did not originate from one's own culture (however that is defined) is wrong.