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The face-painting subject was beaten to death in another thread, which now I can't find. The point is, in light of the historical negativity of blackface, any type of facepainting - whether blackface, whiteface, fuschiaface, or whatever - is offensive and unnecessary for costumes. If you're dressing up as the Supremes, you don't need to paint your skin - the big wigs, sequined gowns, and singing "Stop in the Name of Love" will enable others to figure out the costume. The guy at UVA could have done his preppy/WASP costume nicely with just the upturned polo collar and the other accoutrements (in fact, it might have been more ironic without the white paint). As one poster in the previous thread pointed out, her Halloween costume with the tall blue wig, green dress, and giant pearls was enough - she didn't have to paint herself yellow to be recognized as Marge Simpson. Leave off the paint so we can concentrate the race dialogue on more productive topics.
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