(April 26, 2009 at 1:46 pm)bozo Wrote: Maybe you should try going out for a day in a black working class area, Brixton maybe, and meet and greet the black people with a cheery " hiya golliwog , how you doin? ".Erm...did you miss the point of my post? I said that in today's culture, people know that the golliwog doll isn't a representation of an black person. Since it isn't a representation of an actual black person, why would I go and call them it?
I'm sure you would find it ever so easy to ask them to " rationalise " their response to you.
Comparing a black person to a golliwog doll is, I agree, racist and offensive. Having a golliwog doll as a doll is not.
I think our disagreement is simply a result of our upbringing. You were brought up in a racist time, and so you still have a mindset based on that era (i.e. that you wouldn't ever want to go back to those days). Me, having grown up in an environment that focused on equality, am far more inclined to see things for what they actually are (dolls as dolls) instead of what a previous mindset might have envisioned in them. I think I can say this for most of the people in my generation. I doubt any of my black friends find golliwogs offensive, or even racist jokes.
