In Australia, Blackface Is Still Only Slightly Offensive
Last night an Australian variety show aired a skit with five white men in blackface performing as the Jackson 5. And the audience cheered! Thank goodness Harry Connick Jr was there to be the voice of reason.
The show was a live reunion special for Hey Hey, It’s Saturday, a popular and long-running program down under that was cancelled a decade ago. During their Red Faces segment, six doctors performed a choreographed number in blackface and afro wigs pretending to be the Jackson 5. Thankfully, one of the judges hit the gong shortly into the number.
But what did the crowd do when they stopped the music. They booed! Harry Connick Jr, one of the guest judges gave the team a zero score and the judge who gonged gave them a one, even though the crowd was roaring to give them a 10! One female judge gave them a 7 out of 10 because she is apparently ignorant or, because she’s a sweet female sitting between two men judging a singing competition she thought she was Paula Abdul and took a handful of pill before the broadcast, so she didn’t know better.
The amazing thing is that, as the show tells us, in 1989, the same group doing a very similar act won the competition! So, in 20 years, we’ve gone from this offensive form of comedy being wildly popular to being still popular with the masses, even though some people know better. In America, blackface is one of those things that you can only show if you’re talking about how awful it is because, well, it is pretty awful. Sure, there are culture differences, but it’s not like they don’t have black folks in Australia who would get pissed off by this.
Luckily, they gave Connick some time at the end of the show to say that he wouldn’t have done the show if he knew there was going to be such an act. “[Americans] have spent so much time trying to not make black people not look like buffoons, that when we see something like that we really take it to heart.” Wow, an American is being the voice of cultural sensitivity? Australia must be really messed up.
Comments (AU Comments | US Comments)
Hypocritical yanks!
Martin Lawrence makes a movie made up as a White Chick. Dave Chappelle did the same. Chris Rock became a millionaire degrading white folk
One rule for some ….
Ir didn’t degrade MJ in anyway, in fact the opposite it was a tribute to him
Yep,
Racist in the US. Not racist in Australia. Why?
I guess Australians just aren’t as sophisticated about race as Americans.
Hell, we’re so unsophisticated we never had many great and noble American social institutions. e.g Slavery.
Hmm, what’s the minimum wage in the U.S.? Who are the people most likely to be on that wage? Ah such sophistication.
Get over it Seppos, I know where I’d prefer to be living.
Cringe worthy yes, racist NO!
They were not white en, they were actually ethnic men….
Sorry but just because Americans think it is wrong does not mean the rest of the world has to think so as well….
Australia is not messed up, nor was the skit degrading to blacks, more a send up of the Jackson five…
As soon as I saw the headline, I thought “I bet this happened on Hey Hey”. I didn’t even watch the show.
They had another part last week where the female co-host said hello to various countries using the different languages of those countries and when she got to South Africa, she made a series of clicking noises with her tongue. Classy!
While we are at it, your post is pretty offensive to Australian’s, so lets not be hypocrites here. thanks!
I totally agree Christian – it was an embarrassment to Australians.
Christian you live in a John Howard fantasy land if you don’t think the skit was horribly racist.
oh my goodness, ‘Tim’ responded well, but we all have our own opinions on how we took the skit.
I personally thought it was not rasict because it was a send up of the Jackson 5 and MJ, not in the best taste as it was a pretty crap skit.
No one used the word ‘nigger’ or anything derogatory against black people, didn’t portray anyone as a slave or baboon.
I think the bad reactions are over the top to this, so lets be reasonable to the context it was used in.
The issue that you have discovered is that Australians are not as raciest as Americans.
You see here we don’t pretend not to be raciest so we can be seen as saints. While some racism does exist, most Australians would have found the skit funny, not because the participants had blacked their faces but because it was a comedic take of a well known act.
If you asked most Australians was it in bad taste, they would probably tell you a little because it was so close after Michael’s passing.
So what you are saying is in the USA you could do a funny skit imitating a band from the past as long as the band wasn’t African American or Mexican or Women or …! what about Russian or English or even Australian is that OK.
You see here in Australia we are not that raciest as to think we are actually putting someone down because we imitate their look while doing a comedy act.
What is raciest is where supposed comedians like Michael Richards refers to his African American countrymen using an offensive term. I would have been the first to leave that performance.
Don’t be misguided most Australians had the utmost respect for Michael and his brothers (though we ain’t so keen on the father), And the guys doing the skit would not have been doing it to make fun of someones race.
But you tell me how would you do a comedic skit of a band who’s members are African American. I mean if you don’t black your face are you obviously avoiding the issue and would still offend someone. So maybe you just avoid the issue and pick a white band to do a comedic routine about. You see in Australia that decision would be a raciest one. You just ruled someone out because of their skin colour.
So I suppose in Australia we might have to modify our behavior until raciest country’s like USA catch up.
Regards Tim
Was there not a skit on SNL recently with a white person pretending to be Obama?
How on earth is that any different?
An open message to US readers from a mortified Australian:
Please, please, PLEASE do not think this show (or some of the responses to this blog) is in any way representative of every Australian’s views and values. There were many – perhaps most – of us here who cringed along with Harry.
Only an idiot doesn’t realise that blackface went out about 50 years ago due to its offensiveness. Most intelligent Australians understand this.
Hey Hey It’s Saturday died for good reasons. It has ridden a wave of nostalgia for 2 return specials, but with any luck it will not be back permantently.
So please spare a thought for the sane majority down here.
Thanks,
Mike
As an Australian, I have to say the whole thing was rather offensive.
While the performers clearly didn’t set out to vilify anybody, their ignorance of the gesture they were making was the big part of what made it so appalling. If you don’t get WHY something is offensive; don’t try to be edgy with it, just accept that you don’t understand & move on.
I think what’s been worse is the hordes of morons trying to defend the sketch, or throwing around terms like “PC”.
There is NOTHING “PC” about calling out racist bullshit like this. Harry Connick Jr absolutely did the right thing & while I don’t believe the people who are “up in arms” about this are painting the entire country as racists, they do make us look like idiots.
I’m an aussie and I would like to think that I am educated and enlightened (read I have a tertiary education, read books and have best friends who are not whities). I watched this last night and while i cringed when i saw a lame act come on the stage, i didn’t click that it was ‘blackface’ until they showed the look on connick’s face. i understand the connotations, i don’t think anyone is unaware of what blackface means/meant, but i dont think in the australian context that this was in any way racist. i absolutely understand how it is racist from the american context, but i honestly believe that in this country the idea of impersonating another culture or ‘colour’ does not hold the same malicious vibe as it does in a country where the history is built ont he backs of imported african slaves. yes we have issues of racism and issues with our ‘black’ aborigines but i think we also have an attitude that takes things and people on their merits – this was about the jackson 5, not about any old african americans running around waving their hands in the air yelling ‘massa, massa!’ if you can’t black up to impersonate a black person then the world has gone mad. maybe the answer is we all keep to ourselves, make no more jokes about anyone that looks different, no more mixing of cultures. lets just pretend we dont look different and we dont have different accents and blindly ignore allthe amazing differences that make our world so exciting and engaging. how utterly ridiculous.
So tell me is this clip Harry Connick Jnr using the stereotype of another race for comedy?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooKaCbMvaZ0
The most offensive thing on the entire program was Harry Connick Junior butchering a Billy Joel classic
No talent hack
Interesting you should bring that up Timbo (great name by the way). I said the same thing to my Wife during his performance. It was like he couldn’t be stuffed and didn’t want to be there.
Look, not all these guys were white. The guy with his face painted white is an Indian and at least two others were Lebanese, but, because these guys did something that offended you, you assumed that they must be white. You were wrong. It’s akin to hearing about a car jacking and assuming the offender must have been a black man. You fell into that trap and are therefore no better than the people you are trying to criticise. Racist biggot!
Jacquie Macdonald was a known supporter of Joh Bjelke-Peterson, so that explains the 7 out of 10.
The problem is that “politically correct” has become such a perjorative term that it has given bigots an all-purpose defence for their bigotry.
The guys who did the skit probably don’t see themselves as racist but it is the polite, genteel, small “r” racism that is hardest for some people to identify in themselves. If something you say or do offends someone, even if it wasn’t your intention, then you apologise, learn something hopefully and make sure you don’t do it again.
Had I seen it, my expression would have been similar to Harry Connick Jr’s.
I think that the article above is VERY ignorant. Sure, the skit might have been in bad taste, but this writer is so off the mark in his criticism.
It was a noble gesture for Daryl to sort out the situation on air, but as the writer noted, the audience clapped the act. Over 2 million people watched the show live on TV. Surely this reaction shows that Australians have not been exposed to the ‘Blackface’ connotations which Connick Jnr was privvy to during his upbringing.
To say that Australia is ‘messed up’ for applauding men dressed up as the Jackson Five in a harmless skit, donating their prize to charity no less, indicates that the writer has no finger on the pulse of Australia’s way of thinking – as I saw the show live – and not at one stage thought about ‘blackface’ and have only found out about it today after subsequent research. If as a university doctorate educated person, I am not aware of blackface, I doubt most of the rest of the country would either. We aren’t messed up, it’s called cultural differences.
the words that come to mind when I think of the so-called “Jackson Jive” is Jack Ass.
I don’t think they were trying to be offensive so much as they were being insensitive. Then again, Australia is different than the US.