The tradition of 'zwarte Piet' has not the same meaning here that 'black face' has for Americans- It has a different background and goes centuries back...
For the vast majority of Dutch people it was not connected to any kind of racism. It had lost its connection to slavery and the character was adopted as part of a fairytale, but of course there was a connection.
By exposing it and giving much publicity to it, we now have to redefine the 'zwarte Piet' and so we do.
'Zwarte Piet' always climbs through chimneys to deliver presents to children, so that is why they are black and now they are played by people with strikes of black in the face instead of totaly black.
Like Bart I am not against Americans at all, but against Trumps behaviour and decisions as a President and before.
When you state that "the US are legions ahead of Europe when it comes to accepting people of different races" i cannot agree.
We have no Klu Klux Klan, we have no cops that shoot black people in the back - without even a penalty. Europe has always been crowded with very different cultures that have to live together.
Yes there are problems with some nations of Europe that are so Christian they are afraid of moslims entering their country...
It is certainly not optimal, but not worse than the US. Living in Amsterdam I can say we are with a hundred and more nationalities and we accept all gendertypes.
Which is the driver for Brexit, except there is not a whole lot Christian about Britain.
As I kinda suggested earlier on in this thread, racism is one thing, but xenophobia quite another.
Back in the day, British tv used to show a musical programme called the
Black and White Minstrel Show. It consisted of some singers wearing what is today called blackface makeup. They sang sweet, gentle songs that pleased the majority of people watching, and I am pretty sure nobody gave race a thought: it was just a sentimental reference to twenties and thirties music and clubs etc. Viewers were left with a soporific feel-good factor that went well with the Ovaltine.
Race started to become promoted as ooh! and wow! with the advent of another tv show (the name of which I forget) where an old guy plays a low-class white character who is blatantly racist but is usually shown up as being very ignorant. My take on this is simple: race became an issue because some people in the public eye thought it would be a good idea and titillate viewers and raise viewing figures. What catches the public eye on tv ends up being part of the culture, way more widespread than before the promotion on air.
As for xenophobia: almost all of the organized crime that takes place on this island appears to be run by gypsy group's, Romanians and now also Russians. I am sure my watch thief was eastern European. The problem facing Britain re. these kinds of Europeans - or any other, for that matter - is that there seem to be no stiff penalties in place. Any foreign person caught and convicted of crime should face immediate deportation, regardless of circumstances, dependents or any other sob story attached. Problem solved.
There is also no doubt that different ethnic groups tend to take over neighbourhoods, forcing house prices lower simply because people other than the new group don't want to live next door to the new lot. Rightly or wrongly, you can't fight reality and how people feel, though you might and probably do legislate about how, in an ideal world, you might like them to behave.
Fear of Moslems is based as much on fear of religious massacre as anything else, something both real and in the news daily. This does not imply that all Moslems are likey to turn around and shoot you or blow you up, but the fear has been implanted by the acts of those who do and will. Shit sticks, as they say. That more Moslems get killed by Moslems than does any other type of person is small comfort for those non-Muslims who do get killed in trains, at concerts, in clubs, at work. The logic that drives the fear and hatred for them is simple: if they are not here they cannot harm us. That's hard to refute! If matters were taken in hand by the non-violent ones, the radicals shamed and hoofed out, that would be a very powerful statement to the people in whose land they live. You may well be born in a country, but that doesn't mean you share its values. And that regardless of background.
