To think this product at The Range/Wilko is just plain racist?

[GardenNope]

I've been complaining about this range of products since I saw them in my local store a few weeks ago.

I keep getting fobbed off with no response, or 'we aim to provide products for all tastes'.

This just seems to me like a blatant racist stereotype of Polynesian culture. But the company doesn't seem to agree at all. Am I losing my mind here because it seems very blatantly wrong to me?

https://www.wilko.com/en-uk/single-solar-tiki-water-sports-ornament-in-assorted-styles/p/8087004

Why how many uk Wilkos are based in Hawaii? 😂

I tend to agreed. We are a Irish family. Not sure I'd want someone telling me leprechauns are offensive. That's for individuals in my family to decide for themselves ( I don't think anyone thinks this deeply in our family).

I think if someone says it's inappropriate to them as they have skin in the game you just respect it without lecturing how they should feel.

Is a Hannya mask racist?

Or a Venetian mask?

They are not a depiction of a person they are depictions of gods/demons etc... They aren't meant to look like 'real' people and its not 'stereotyping' anyone looks.

The racism is coming from people being offended and speaking out about something they haven't even spent 2 seconds to learn about. Silencing/Banning stuff you don't understand is offense and ignorance isn't really an excuse with a internet at your fingertips.

Take your guide from if people of that culture are offended not just ideas you made up because you lack knowledge of the origins of something.

In what way were you plagued by gollies?

Mother was a jam addict. Put Robertson's finest on everything. All to collect those little tokens for the pin badges. House was full of them.

It isn't meant to represent an actual person though is it? It's not the same as 'blacking up you mention , which is horrendous. It's a tiki mask caricature .
I think a lot if people are offended by things that they believe is offensive to a particular people/race, however those people often don't feel offended by it themselves..

Edit, BTW it's bloody awful!

But that is how Polynesian itself art depicts people! You may see it as “gollywog” style but it is not. Maybe you should reflect on your own assumptions.

It is a ceremonial Tiki mask.

Can you show me tiki masks in a similar pose e.g. drunk in a rubber ring? Because I'm unaware of that particularly ceremonial use.

It's ugly as fuck but not racist by any manner of means.

Exactly this because most of them keep banging on about how they don't look human and they're stereotyping Polynesian people - how many times will they ignore posters telling them (correctly) that these are not representative of Polynesian people?!

The great offended are indeed the ones being racist as they're clearly marching through life thinking that Polynesian people were at some point ridiculed by white people for looking like Tiki masks! This never happened - this is not comparable to gollywogs or black face. It's just not the same thing.

Tiki masks are hand-carved wooden masks that, in their original intent, were used to stand in for deities, protect their users from evil spirits or even increase the mask wearers' fertility and luck. So kind of like the Polynesian version of a lucky shamrock or a lucky horseshoe. Or a rabbits foot or an amulet or a lucky sixpence in a brides shoe. I could go on but there's really no point is there?

@SatansBobbleheadedDashboardOrnament no, they're indoor ornaments. I struggle to believe anyone would steal those monstrosities!

You would be surprised. I once sold a Betty Boop coffee table for an amazing profit.

So I think the plastic figure I'm seeing is supposed to be a person paddling a kayak; with a 'wooden' mask as a head instead of a proper human head. So it represents some monstrous mask-person. With solar lights for eyes.

Is it racist? Erm maybe.. I've no idea but who tf dreams up such fucking ugly things anyway?
It's definitely a crime against taste.

@pinotgrigeeeeo How do you know the gnomes are French. What if they are made in China. Or just British because they're in Asda. Then that's a terrible cultural misappropriation of the gnomes, for pretending to be French. And actually they probably are made in China, so surely it's racist for them not to look Chinese? Their culture is being wiped from their existence.

Isn’t it one of those masks? Cannot for the life of me remember what they’re called but there’s one in Crash Bandicoot and some in a Spongebob episode.

Tiki mask!!

I don’t think anyone is disagreeing with you that it’s tat and a bastardization. They’re disagreeing with your initial assumption that this was intended to be a caricature of a Polynesian person, which it isn’t, and was therefore racist.

Actual people from Polynesian backgrounds tend to be more concerned about antique artworks and Tiki pillaged by colonisers in centuries and decades past being kept from their rightful homeland than about plastic tat.

100% … everything is offensive these days to people virtue signaling on behalf of others who have not been consulted. Stupid white people “saving” the world.
Now a Sombrero is racist, apparently. You can go to Mexico- 100% buy a locally made in Mexico big hat, buy it from a Mexican person in a Mexican shop. Wear it on a sunny day at the beach in Brighton and be called racist.

It's not exactly racist but I'm not sure if it shows respect to Polynesian culture? For all we know it could be lazily based on a deity of high importance. When Disney made Moana they included tribal council leaders every step of production to ensure it represented their culture correctly. A friend whose currently in Hawaii is working on a major production there and they also run everything past tribal councils to ensure it was correctly in alignment with their beliefs and culture and not just the stereotypes. Their histories are not written but documented in art and stories passed down so this little guy could be really offensive. Maybe that deity was the lord of skies and having him in a boat is like an FU 🫣

Why? Genuine question?

You can buy a Tiki hut designed to make a garden bar, and you can buy Tiki garden ornaments and such like, to adorn these garden bars, in most garden centres. Wilko has clearly just put the beach bar spin on these particular ornaments.

It's not racist. It's just ugly. Who buys that shit?

Racist to whom? Who is it poking fun at?

Are you Polynesian, or a white person complaining on their behalf?