Obviously Halloween is quite the perfect time for racist costumes and blackface (Racewire also did an article on that) and my sister, who goes to Northwestern University, shared an open letter from one student to the NU community in the DailyNorthwestern. They wrote in response to some students wearing blackface and attempts to give them some historical grounding in her explanation of why blackface is racist and unacceptable. Let me repeat.. THEY HAD TO EXPLAIN THAT BLACKFACE IS RACIST AND UNACCEPTABLE. How folks don't figure things like that out for themselves... Anyway here's an excerpt:
Northwestern community: It is time we realize the significance of our actions. It is time every person becomes conscious of the effects his or her behavior has on an entire community of people. I am writing about the incessant and continuous racialized demonstrations of authority and dominance presented by the entire NU community and our society at large.
The most recent incident, the cause for this letter, was on the night of Oct. 31, Halloween, when certain white members of the NU community dressed up as black people. In an attempt to resemble a black person, someone painted his entire body black.
If you do not know the history of these actions, all you need to know is one word to understand the disgusting behavior this person embodied — that word is blackface. Blackface has, surprisingly enough, been on this campus before. Two years ago, a very similar incident occurred, pointing to the lack of insight of the people in the NU community to make a conscious movement toward combating race problems.
The full article is here. What upset me the most are the comments in response to the piece - but that's becoming a trend with on-line journalism, as well.
This reminds me of this one time when my friend Ruby was invited to a ridiculously racist costume party and the party-thrower just couldn't figure out what he was doing wrong..
