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.

Do you think your cousin is a racist person? Because if you don't think so and she really isn't, you are lending this picture a meaning that was never there to begin with.

Would you go around with tape on you eyes speaking in a Chinese accent?

No but If by some miracle I had been able to fit into any of the beautiful cheongsams in the tourist shops in Beijing which our official guide would it be racist to buy and wear one simply because they were beautiful ?

Blacking up is wrong but you and Greyhound seem to be suggesting appropriating anything not of one's own culture is wrong.

I bought DD a beautiful outfit in China. I will let her wear it. It is very traditional and Chinese people were buying them for their children (and everyone in China saw DD's picture and agreed she would look lovely in it ). I don't see that as cultural appropriation. I wouldn't necessarily see buying a traditional Japanese outfit and wearing it as cultural appropriation.

'Dressing up as a Rastafarian' even without blacking up I would worry about and wearing a 'costume' rather than just clothes people would buy themselves starts to veer into dodgy territory. Wearing a First Nations headdress... I know a lot of First Nations people who would object and, this is important, I don't make the rules, they do. It's their culture. Stolen, abused, battered by colonialism. I'm not going to be another white person making decisions about their culture. They say 'don't wear it'. I don't.

Dressing up as a person to mock stereotypical characteristics is being racist.
But we don't know that the woman in the OP was mocking anyone. She was simply dressed as a Rasta and had makeup to match. It could equally be a tribute rather than mockery. It was a fancy dress party ffs.

Let me ask this of those who think it was racist.
I've performed as a Japanese woman in The Mikado. Full dress and makeup including exaggerated slitty eyes and too much yellow slap. It's performed regularly all over the world, by amateurs and by professionals in the most prestigious opera houses. It's full of comments about the Japanese that could be called 'mocking'.
Is The Mikado racist?

That's awful, Owl, my late sister had cerebral palsy and the same happened to her :(

Hearing about your daughter makes me want to weep.

Quite a few people do seem to have a problem with The Mikado actually, or at least a traditional staging of it.

:) Katisha.
Did you NC for that?

No it's been my mn name since about 2007

Terry - the outfit sounds gorgeous. No more racist than buying a tartan dress in Scotland.

Er, yeah, SallyingForth, many people think the Mikado is racist. I'm amazed you didn't know that.

Blacking up to pretend to be any old black person would be seen by most people as racist. It's a question of its history, it's association, and it's reductionism.

Still, if you're happy to black up and go out like that to a party in a predominantly black area, go ahead. It would be hilarious.

Tbh I hate The Mikado.

Some people just cannot keep up eith world changing so fast.

40 or 50 years ago people travelled less, their towns and cities weren't as multicultural as they are now, the idea that a woman could be Prime minister or a black man President of the USA were almost unthinkable.

The world has changed a lot, and certain things are simply no linger acceptable as people should really know better.

How would anyone who says blacking up is fine feel if they were eye to eye with a group of Jamaicans? Or Nigerians? Would they really not feel embarrassed somehow?

All these foreign influences and mixing of foreign cultures mean we can no longer treat other ethnicities as "exotic" or "strange", we should all have gotten over that by now.

We have not lived in an all-white Britain for a long time now.

Yes, I think the Mikado is racist but I guess it is of its time.

"Ah, 'tis Katisha. The maid of whom I told you."

I haven't personally heard of any such criticism. Do you think it's different when played by Japanese rather than English or American?

www.japansociety.org.uk/2217/the-chichibu-mikado/

Well Greyhound that means the racists include the many Japanese who enjoy its gentle humour.

Here's an interesting article about a recent production of the Mikado, SallyingForth.

"Would you go around with tape on you eyes speaking in a Chinese accent?

No but If by some miracle I had been able to fit into any of the beautiful cheongsams in the tourist shops in Beijing which our official guide would it be racist to buy and wear one simply because they were beautiful ?

Blacking up is wrong but you and Greyhound seem to be suggesting appropriating anything not of one's own culture is wrong."

Sorry if that is how I have come across. Do I think it is wrong to wear a sari? No. Do I think it is wrong to wear a kilt? No.

Do I think it is wrong to wear a turban, black up, and speak in an exaggerated Indian accent at a party whilst carrying a naan bread? Yes.

You're being ridiculous. It sounds like you have too much time on your hands.

WHAT ABOUT-ITUS

People have been saying the mikado, when performed with yellow face, is racist for years

It was banned in Japan for many years, wasn't it?

I wouldn't find you dressed in Mikado costume offensive, however, if you were a white woman and you came to a party in casual dress, except that you have made your skin yellow, or stuck tape on your eyes, and said, "I'm a Japanese woman" - I would think you were actually mad.

How do people not know the history of 'blacking up' and how offensive black people find it? Or do they just not care?

I'm starting to wonder if we 'be just stumbled onto a thread full of racists

Sallyingforth

www.jacl.org/ JACL (Japanese American Citizens League) Objects to Usage of Yellowface and Stereotypes in Seattle Production of The Mikado

blog.angryasianman.com/2014/07/real-life-yellowface-now-playing-in.html Angry Asian Man

blogs.seattletimes.com/opinionnw/2014/08/19/mikado-yellowface-debate-at-seattle-repertory-theatre-forum/ "The column sparked a national debate — community groups like the JACL spoke out against the show, protesters demonstrated outside most of the shows"

blogs.seattletimes.com/opinionnw/2014/07/25/mikado-yellowface-race/ A small group of protesters demonstrated outside the shows last weekend with signs saying: “My culture is not a costume,” “Yellowface in your face — not OK,” and “Titipu isn’t real. Bainbridge internment was.”

The Mikado,’ yellowface: All the coverage

But I'm sure none of that matters. As long as you don't think it's racist. And you enjoy it. Who gives a shit about the people who are offended by it, right?

"The many Japanese" - I must admit, I worked for a Japanese theatre company many years back and I remember the feeling about The Mikado was it was racist.

Do I think it is wrong to wear a turban, black up, and speak in an exaggerated Indian accent at a party whilst carrying a naan bread?

Yes. I agree wholeheartedly. But

Do I think it is wrong to wear a turban, black up (without the other things) at a fancy dress party?
No.

We do not know how the woman in the OP was behaving. It may have been entirely respectful.

I imagine OP has no more time on her hands than you, madamemuddle. She is on mumsnet, you are on mumsnet...