| preciousjeni |
03-07-2004 11:08 AM |
Re: Re: Slightly off topic... but it's an interesting debate
Quote:
Originally posted by starang21
either way, does this have anything to with the issue at hand? and no, BET does not take care of it...and yes, the mainstream media is SEVERELY unbalanced and unreflective of the american demographic. but as it is, this has nothing to do with the bigotry of these pikes.
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I beg to differ. I believe that when you are living as a white person with white privilege, you really never have to be fully exposed to the pain of the minority population - or perhaps, you can just ignore it because you don't see it everyday. Starang21, if these men had really understood what blackface represents, perhaps they would have thought better of their actions. But they have no reason to do any research!
Quote:
"Come listen all you galls and boys,
I'm going to sing a little song,
My name is Jim Crow.
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about I jump Jim Crow."
These words are from the song, "Jim Crow," as it appeared in sheet music written by Thomas Dartmouth "Daddy" Rice. Rice, a struggling "actor" (he did short solo skits between play scenes) at the Park Theater in New York, happened upon a Black person singing the above song...it is clear that in 1828 Rice appeared on stage as "Jim Crow" -- an exaggerated, highly stereotypical Black character...Rice, a White man, was one of the first performers to wear blackface makeup -- his skin was darkened with burnt cork. His Jim Crow song-and-dance routine was an astounding success that took him from Louisville to Cincinnati to Pittsburg to Philadelphia and finally to New York in 1832. He then performed to great acclaim in London and Dublin. By then "Jim Crow" was a stock character in minstrel shows, along with counterparts Jim Dandy and Zip Coon. Rice's subsequent blackface characters were Sambos, Coons, and Dandies. White audiences were receptive to the portrayals of Blacks as singing, dancing, grinning fools.
By 1838, the term "Jim Crow" was being used as a collective racial epithet for Blacks, not as offensive as nigger, but as offensive as coon or darkie. Obviously, the popularity of minstrel shows aided the spread of Jim Crow as a racial slur. This use of the term did not last past a half century. By the end of the 19th Century, the words Jim Crow were less likely to be used to derisively describe Blacks; instead, the phrase Jim Crow was being used to describe laws and customs which oppressed Blacks.
The minstrel show was one of the first native forms of American entertainment, and Rice was rightly regarded as the "Father of American minstrelsy"...Rice, and his imitators, by their stereotypical depictions of Blacks, helped to popularize the belief that Blacks were lazy, stupid, inherently less human, and unworthy of integration. During the years that Blacks were being victimized by lynch mobs, they were also victimized by the racist caricatures propagated through novels, sheet music, theatrical plays, and minstrel shows. Ironically, years later when Blacks replaced White minstrels, the Blacks also "blackened" their faces, thereby pretending to be Whites pretending to be Blacks. They, too, performed the Coon Shows which dehumanized Blacks and helped establish the desirability of racial segregation.
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