I actually laughed when I saw Gucci’s ad for their turtle Black-faced sweater. I was scrolling down my instagram page because you know, NO ONE watches the news anymore for actual news, and then BOOM!!!! OUTRAGE: Black Twitter goes off on Gucci for racist clothing. The comments of so many people distraught by this insensitive ad; “How did Gucci think they could get away with this?” and questions of the like. Black Twitter voiced a boycott for all Black People to stop buying Gucci brands in solidarity and anyone who was caught wearing or purchasing this brand would be considered an Uncle Tom. For those of you that do not know, being called an Uncle Tom by another Black person, that is a really hurtful accusation. Undisputed World Champion Boxer Floyd Mayweather, Jr spent $200,000 in the Gucci store to prove to his audience that he is not a follower of the Black Revolution against anti-blackness in clothing. Dapper Dan, even had a meeting with the CEO of Gucci with other Black Designers to figure out how to make amends for this stunt. If you remember, last semester I wrote a piece about Dapper Dan and that he is currently one of Gucci’s top designers and yes, he is a Black man. Among all this chaos of outrage and reparations, the one thing that I actually managed to ask was “The ‘Hood actually can afford Gucci, like that?” Me being a broke full time college student with two jobs, an internship and now a child, could not even fathom going into the Gucci store to even window shop. And then, I also pondered over all this pain that was being expressed via social media. It was something I really tried to figure out because I too, am a Black man but I did not feel anything by it. It was another “DUH” moment for me.
During the era of the Donald Trump Regime we could always count on good ol’ racism to peek its head to stir things up. Then again, the history of global colonization teaches that racism has been part of the culture long before Columbus sailed the Ocean blue. In essence, I guess I am desensitized by all the racist shit that has been a part of my life long before I was conceived.
Though they are now banned, cartoons we grew up on, were all a huge minstrel shows creating caricatures to make fun of the Jewish, Indians and those of Middle Eastern countries, the Chinese, the Japanese, Native Americans and of course, Black people. Cartoons such as The Looney Tunes, Tom and Jerry, Popeye the Sailor Man and everything Disney has built their franchises at the expense of people of color. In the culture of Blackface, it focuses on creating exaggerated stereotypes of Black people that puts them (we/us) in a negative light. This also includes anime shows such as Dragon Ball’s Mr. Popo and Pokemon’s Jinx. Yeah, racism exists in Japan too. In fact, anti-blackness in the Asian community is something vicious, but that’s for another article. Click this link to see these ads for bleaching creams to see what I’m talking about.
The Smithsonian noted the words of Dale Cockrell who said “that poor and working-class whites who felt “squeezed politically, economically, and socially from the top, but also from the bottom, invented minstrelsy” as a way of expressing the oppression that marked being members of the majority, but outside of the white norm. In the 1830’s minstrel shows were performed in New York City by white performers who used shoe polish to blacken their faces. They would wear tattered clothes and attempt to mock the dialect of slaves. These performances characterized Black people as lazy, violent, superstitious, ignorant, cowardly, hyper-sexual, and as thieves. The most famous was Thomas Dartmouth Rice, the Father of Minstrelsy’s character, Jim Crow and as you know, the rest is history.
All in all, though it is a hurtful history, I think what saddens me is how normal it was/is. Yes, I was offended by Gucci’s ad, however, I always knew something was not right each time I heard Tom and Jerry’s Mammy or each time Jinx pops out of a random character’s Pokeball or whenever Mr. Popo rides his magic carpet and smiled showing his one top tooth and that Sambo looking character off of One Punch Man and …well… you get the idea. It is a different type of offense where I do not feel rage. I shrug it off or laugh at it because it is literally all over the place. It is like being taking hard drugs for so such a long time that you have to continuously raise up the dosage to even feel a tingle. This has ALWAYS been part of the culture of the globe and it appears we pick and choose when to be “group offended” when in fact, everyone has been taking stabs on all platforms. I do not know when I became desensitized to this. I do not know when I could find humor in a picture that historically systematically oppresses and destroys communities of people that look like me and makes mockery of our culture. I do know that it is not right or healthy to even feel like this.Gucci’s ad is wrong but if we are boycotting Gucci, I believe we need to boycott the powers that allowed Gucci and other platforms to do this to us. I do not have the true answers. I do not know how to combat this, but I do hope I was able to give some insight to what this was. And now, some Blackface from our favorite Anime shows. #StayWoke #ItsJustACartoon #OrIsItReally?
– W.I.B.
The Junction Journal 