Talking of Golliwogs.. . .. .

[WinkyWinkola]

I was a bit taken aback when I was looking for a dolly for my DD's birthday and I came across this:

{[https://ssl3.lon.gb.securedata.net/rosablue.com/dolls.htm It's the Mimi doll]]

I made an enquiry about the size of the lovely dolls on this site and also about the Mimi doll. I just felt it was a total caricature of the black slave especially when you can get her dress embroidered with Every Day is Wash Day .

The response to my enquiry was:

Mimi doubled as a student and our live-in nanny when we lived in Cape Town in the 80s.

She was very much part of the family when Penelope started to make her dolls. The whole family was still all living under the same roof then and each of us provided a name for at least one of her prototypes. Which is they all take their names after one of us.

Mimi liked the doll then and it while I understand the sensibility in Britain over the "golliwog" image, that is not what it means to us and we would be loathe to discontinue it.

Am I being over sensitive to find this doll offensive and not buy from the site as a result? Their other dolls are lovely.

who is 'them' i assumed that Penelope was the mans partner?

I thought Penelope was the man's partner and the person who started (and is still) making the dolls.
You really seem to work hard at finding the bad in things, Dittany.

The doll simply looks like a black washerwoman i.e. a servant.

None of the other white dolls on there are dressed as washerwomen. Why not? Did they only have black servants?

To say it's based on someone you know is hardly a means of justifying it.

I don't think I'd buy that doll as I wouldn't want to convey a message of black women being servants.

I'm not calling the owner of the site racist nor the woman who makes the dolls. They sound like courageous, inspirational people.

I'm just not comfortable with the connotations that doll portrays.

(A nanny is an employee just as a maid is - you can call them both servants).

dittany, his email makes more sense than yours have to me. He has said that they are NOT based on a racist stereotype - thats just your opinion. Why are you so determined to make this into something it isnt? I agree with this:

I have noticed, on my time on MN, that there is a hard-core of posters who literally foam at the mouth whenever the subject of 'racism' is raised.

They are cynical, unpleasant, and hysterical. They will brook no argument. They are right, in a wild-eyed evangelical, rather sinister way, of course. There can be no reasoned debate. If you query them, you are by default, a racist.

agree almummy

I cant take the credit for that "piece of crap", it was a previous poster although I wish I could because it sums up what I feel a lot of the time when reading and contributing to posts regarding race on MN. Not a "tactic" Dittany nothing pre meditated behind it - I just found it utterly relevant when reading your posts. You do not seem to allow a reasoned argument on this subject. You read the EMail posted by cheesesarnie, yet you dont address any of the content, you just disregard it by saying it "makes no sense" and then follow it up with well they are not selling any of the dolls anyway. Why not add "So there" on the end of it. The person who is unwittingly on the other side of this debate has offered you some information but you just dismiss it. Fitting perfectly into the piece of crap description I quoted IMO.

I think all the nannys on mumsnet will be abit annoyed to be classed as servants no matter what colour they are. Would it mean that a white person couldn't employ a black woman to care for her children in case it was seen as trying to make a black person a slave to the white person?? Slavery was a terrible issue that lasted many years but to use a black doll dressed as a washer woman as a tool to raise this sort of debate about slavery and racism is just plain bonkers. People can either choose to buy the doll or not. At that price I wouldn't buy it.

Penelope is his wife

so he calls his wife a "girl" - and the nanny who the doll is based on a "woman"

And I have to say - I can't believe that any white woman (or man) who was brave enough to take part in a vigil to mark the death of Biko would be making dolls using a "racial stereotype" in mind.....

Jeez, Dittany, you're a barrel of laughs, aren't you!

Dittany, could you tell me what does not make sense to you in that EMail because I have to be honest I didnt really struggle with understanding it at all?

It appears to me from the EMail that the maker of the dolls is someone who put her money where her mouth is and therefore is entitled to offer an opinion. Surely by your reckoning then we shouldnt be listening to your opinion either? Seeing as you are not "the woman it was based on or any of the countless other black women who were forced to work as domestic servants for white people during apartheid."

Out of interest my FIL is Welsh and addresses me as "girl" as in "Are you alright Girl?". Would you find that offensive?

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Dittany, just because I do not agree with you, there is no need to be rude.

A nanny is not a servant - not in the context you are trying to put on this issue.

"The person to ask if that doll is offensive isn't the maker (as if they'd agree that what they were doing was racist), it's the woman it was based on or any of the countless other black women who were forced to work as domestic servants for white people during apartheid. It's not that hard to understand".

Well, as the nanny was living under the same roof as them when they started making the dolls, she must have known about them.

You are assuming that the people making the dolls are white, racist, and supporters of apartheid.

Lots of students pay their way through university by working.

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I like to have a night out (or in) with the girls.......

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I'd LOVE to go out dancin..............

the doll is here

Winky, I entirely agree with you.

the paternalistic mimi was our nanny and we all loved her, our black servant...

I think the combination of the doll, who reminds me of one of those Little Black Sambo type books, and the website's condscending explanation is not good.
I would boycot them

they,ve started a blog about it mentioning mumsnet by the way- cashing in on their notoriety. prbably hope they'll get more press.....