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According to News24, the University of Pretoria students, who are facing disciplinary action, covered themselves in brown paint and stuffed pillows under their skirts to make themselves look like they have big bums.
Blackface is recognizably racist and unacceptable, and yet these women, and many (other white people) who have since expressed their views, genuinely don’t seem to get why.
Local Afrikaans celebrity and self-proclaimed activist Steve Hofmeyr attempted to start the Twitter hashtag #RacismSchmacism, in which, in true Steve Hofmeyr style, he tries to justify this racist act by listing other racist acts.
(Of course, Steve Hofmeyr supporting anything should by default suggest it’s horrifically, offensively racist, but moving on...)
SA musician Chris Chameleon has joined in to express his outrage that people have dared to express outrage, rather than, you know, knowing their place and letting privileged, racist mocking to occur without complaint.
#nofun #nohumour #nofreedom #nochillin' #nocarefree #noinnocence #nofoolingaround #noparties #nofancydress #noteasing #nostudents no thanks
— Chris Chameleon (@chrischameleon) August 6, 2014
It all seems to revolve around this attitude:
What’s so wrong with a bit of fancy dress?
What’s so wrong about white, privileged students who belong to a country with a history of systematic oppression of black people and other non-white races, mocking the very people who have most felt and are still feeling the lingering effects of apartheid?
What’s so wrong about women who, due to factors they have no control over, have had access to resources, support, and education opportunities that helped them become students in a University; mocking women who, due to factors they have no control over, did not have the same opportunities and have had to become domestic workers just to get by?
What’s so wrong about well-off people making fun of people who are less well-off?
What’s so wrong about white women turning a black woman’s appearance into a caricature?
In a world where beauty is so thoroughly anglicized and whitewashed, dark-skinned women feel a constant pressure to try look as close to white as possible, what’s so wrong with white women actively mocking the bodies of black women?
What’s so wrong with privileged white women, in South Africa, in this world, with this world’s history and historical treatment of black people, treating black women as comedic, a joke, a funny fancy dress?
It should be glaringly obvious what’s wrong.
Blackface, especially in this country, especially with our history, says, louder than words:
We think you’re a novelty. We think you’re a joke. We do not consider you’re worthy of respect. We do not think your feelings matter, or need to be considered. We do not view you as our equals.
Even now, we view you as beneath us. We view you as our entertainment, our slaves, our toys, to mock and imitate while you clean up for us.
If we upset you, if we hurt you, if oppress you, tough. We will tell you to "get over it". We will tell you it's "just a joke", because we consider everything, even bad jokes, more valuable than your thoughts, than your emotions, than your well-being, and than you.
If you dare to complain, we will remind you of that as loudly and offensively as we can.
There really is a mind-numbing obliviousness that comes with privilege, and this reaction, this wide-eyed “what’s the big problem?” response, is the perfect example of that.
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