Digital Blackface

[steve_bank]

Yes there are ligering racial issues, but are blacks manufacturing racial issues?

The civil rights movement was about an enforced cultural, social, and physical boundaries by whites. It seems like blacks are dooing the same. Holistically back colleges. Their is an HBC basketball legume that is playing on TV.

The refrain I hear in the media from blacks is something like I want to be around peole who look like me. From whites that would be called racism.

Italian, Indian, Chinese and Mexican food is a common part of culture. I grew up with Jewish Yiddish slang as part of the lexicon. Mexican terms are part of the American culture.

So now blacks are upset with whites using Black slang?

Sometimes I think blacks are becoming their own worse enemy. Thy want ace acceptance yet are obsessed with seeing themselves as not white.

At this point if anything s holding themselves back it is attitude. Are blacks creating their own 'separate but equal'?

If I were a paolician or public figure I'd probably get crucified in the media fo saying that.

What's 'digital blackface?' And why is it wrong when White people use it? | CNN

If you're White and you've posted a GIF or meme of a Black person to express a strong emotion, you may be guilty of wearing 'digital blackface' -- a modern-day term for an insidious form of racism.

www.cnn.com

Maybe you shared that viral video of Kimberly “Sweet Brown” Wilkins telling a reporter after narrowly escaping an apartment fire, “Ain’t nobody got time for that!”

Perhaps you posted that meme of supermodel Tyra Banks exploding in anger on “America’s Next Top Model” (“I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you!”). Or maybe you’ve simply posted popular GIFs, such as the one of NBA great Michael Jordan crying, or of drag queen RuPaul declaring, “Guuuurl…”

If you’re Black and you’ve shared such images online, you get a pass. But if you’re White, you may have inadvertently perpetuated one of the most insidious forms of contemporary racism.

You may be wearing “digital blackface.”
What is digital blackface?

Digital blackface is a practice where White people co-opt online expressions of Black imagery, slang, catchphrases or culture to convey comic relief or express emotions.

These expressions, what one commentator calls racialized reactions, are mainstays in Twitter feeds, TikTok videos and Instagram reels, and are among the most popular Internet memes.

Digital blackface involves White people play-acting at being Black, says Lauren Michele Jackson, an author and cultural critic, in an essay for Teen Vogue. Jackson says the Internet thrives on White people laughing at exaggerated displays of Blackness, reflecting a tendency among some to see “Black people as walking hyperbole.”

 

[Jayjay]

 

[repoman]

this has been a thread before I think.

Digital hickface is also a minor thing to, since earnest hicks also cut through pretenses.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I can see the argument. It can play a number of ways. 1) reaction is perfect for emotion and people laughing at subject. 2) reaction is hyperbole and people laughing at reaction.

I suppose we need to categorize this as "blacks need to shut up" because the OP feels it is clearly ridiculous, even if someone suggests it isn't.

You call someone a "retard" the likely impression is you aren't meaning to insult people with Downs Syndrome. But it comes across poorly. How is this different?

The other angle is African Americans can take pride that they are so good at art and culture that white people steal so much of their stuff.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

They want ace acceptance ...

... the Internet thrives on White people laughing at exaggerated displays of Blackness, ...

Do you presume that all reasonable people feel accepted when other people laugh at exaggerated displays of them?

 

[Politesse]

Yes there are ligering racial issues, but are blacks manufacturing racial issues?

The civil rights movement was about an enforced cultural, social, and physical boundaries by whites. It seems like blacks are dooing the same. Holistically back colleges. Their is an HBC basketball legume that is playing on TV.

The refrain I hear in the media from blacks is something like I want to be around peole who look like me. From whites that would be called racism.

Italian, Indian, Chinese and Mexican food is a common part of culture. I grew up with Jewish Yiddish slang as part of the lexicon. Mexican terms are part of the American culture.

So now blacks are upset with whites using Black slang?

Sometimes I think blacks are becoming their own worse enemy. Thy want ace acceptance yet are obsessed with seeing themselves as not white.

At this point if anything s holding themselves back it is attitude. Are blacks creating their own 'separate but equal'?

If I were a paolician or public figure I'd probably get crucified in the media fo saying that.

What's 'digital blackface?' And why is it wrong when White people use it? | CNN

If you're White and you've posted a GIF or meme of a Black person to express a strong emotion, you may be guilty of wearing 'digital blackface' -- a modern-day term for an insidious form of racism.

www.cnn.com

Maybe you shared that viral video of Kimberly “Sweet Brown” Wilkins telling a reporter after narrowly escaping an apartment fire, “Ain’t nobody got time for that!”

Perhaps you posted that meme of supermodel Tyra Banks exploding in anger on “America’s Next Top Model” (“I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you!”). Or maybe you’ve simply posted popular GIFs, such as the one of NBA great Michael Jordan crying, or of drag queen RuPaul declaring, “Guuuurl…”

If you’re Black and you’ve shared such images online, you get a pass. But if you’re White, you may have inadvertently perpetuated one of the most insidious forms of contemporary racism.

You may be wearing “digital blackface.”
What is digital blackface?

Digital blackface is a practice where White people co-opt online expressions of Black imagery, slang, catchphrases or culture to convey comic relief or express emotions.

These expressions, what one commentator calls racialized reactions, are mainstays in Twitter feeds, TikTok videos and Instagram reels, and are among the most popular Internet memes.

Digital blackface involves White people play-acting at being Black, says Lauren Michele Jackson, an author and cultural critic, in an essay for Teen Vogue. Jackson says the Internet thrives on White people laughing at exaggerated displays of Blackness, reflecting a tendency among some to see “Black people as walking hyperbole.”

Your post, whining about how blacks are their own worst enemies, sounds way the hell more racist than the article you linked to.

Jackson makes clear that it's a specific trend she's highlighting, wherein racial stereotyping is used to express thoughts and feelings American whites feel uncomfortable expressing with their own faces. Ie., exactly the same form of entertainment that the minstrel show phenomenon was engaging in, just with new technology. If you have a problem with the old blackface, it's not unreasonable to oject to new forms of the genre as well.

Per the author:

If you’re still not sure how to define digital blackface, Jackson offers a guide. She says it “includes displays of emotion stereotyped as excessive: so happy, so sassy, so ghetto, so loud… our dial is on 10 all the time — rarely are black characters afforded subtle traits or feelings.”

Many White people choose images of Black people when it comes to expressing exaggerated emotions on social media – a burden that Black people didn’t ask for, she says.

“We are your sass, your nonchalance, your fury, your delight, your annoyance, your happy dance, your diva, your shade, your ‘yaas’ moments,” Jackson writes. “The weight of reaction GIFing, period, rests on our shoulders.”

Using Black bodies to express the "inexpressible" was always the point of the minstrel shows, etc. Observe the following clip from back in the day, in which the characters explore what they love and miss about the then-dying minstrel show scene:



Why do white people like Mr Bones? Because he makes the jokes, holds the opinions, that would be inappropriate for a person of "good breeding" to espouse. Black identity was literally being worn as a mask.

And the exact same thing happens to Sweet Brown. I agree, and do not think that calling out racist behaviors makes you a racist. Engaging in racist behaviors makes you a racist.

 

[repoman]

To me there is somehow more of a no nonsense feel that happens often in memes with black people. Can't explain it. Found this one a minute ago.

 

[thebeave]

My prediction for the future:

White people will succumb to the demands of the SJWs and stop using black memes so they don't come across as racist, but then in a few years a new generation of SJWs will come along and say, "Hey, you ever notice white people only use other white people in their memes? I didn't know whites could be so racist!".

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Could a white man do what Eddie Murphy does?

 

[laughing dog]

'''''''

So now blacks are upset with whites using Black slang?

Sometimes I think blacks are becoming their own worse enemy. Thy want ace acceptance yet are obsessed with seeing themselves as not white.

Black people are not white. It is not race acceptance to think that they are. Acceptance means accepting people as they are, not as they are not. Hence your observation is literally nonsensical.

As to the rest of your OP, I find life is much easier on the mind if one does automatically assume someone on the internet necessarily speaks for everyone else in a demographic group.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

My prediction for the future:

White people will succumb to the demands of the SJWs and stop using black memes so they don't come across as racist, but then in a few years a new generation of SJWs will come along and say, "Hey, you ever notice white people only use other white people in their memes? I didn't know whites could be so racist!".

You left out conservative wokes telling black people they are their own worst enemy: "First, the blacks want acceptance, then, they point out racial stereotypes in memes. How dare they!"

So, what is your prediction for what the conservative wokes will be doing in the future? I predict it will be creating new draconian legislation involving race using some kind of conservative woke alt facts that Socialism has gone too far while ignoring nuance and actual reality-based evidence. Further, that there will be new words in the lexicon used to insult The Left and finger point while this institutional power of conservative whiteness is consolidated, whitewashed, and promoted through laws.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Yes there are ligering racial issues, but are blacks manufacturing racial issues?

The civil rights movement was about an enforced cultural, social, and physical boundaries by whites. It seems like blacks are dooing the same. Holistically back colleges. Their is an HBC basketball legume that is playing on TV.

The refrain I hear in the media from blacks is something like I want to be around peole who look like me. From whites that would be called racism.

Italian, Indian, Chinese and Mexican food is a common part of culture. I grew up with Jewish Yiddish slang as part of the lexicon. Mexican terms are part of the American culture.

So now blacks are upset with whites using Black slang?

Sometimes I think blacks are becoming their own worse enemy. Thy want ace acceptance yet are obsessed with seeing themselves as not white.

At this point if anything s holding themselves back it is attitude. Are blacks creating their own 'separate but equal'?

I think there's something to your point here. As your food examples show it's possible to be inclusive and yet retain an identity. Languagewise--I have spent basically my whole life close enough to the Mexican border that some very elementary Spanish has contaminated the language. Comprehension would be 100% if I said "adios" rather than "goodbye"--I hadn't even thought about it until a Skype with someone from Australia some years ago where "adios" wasn't understood.

Incorporating it is acceptance, not racism!

(But I must object about "Chinese" food--it almost certainly is not. Few of those dishes will be on the menu if you're actually in China.)

 

[Jarhyn]

Yes there are ligering racial issues, but are blacks manufacturing racial issues?

The civil rights movement was about an enforced cultural, social, and physical boundaries by whites. It seems like blacks are dooing the same. Holistically back colleges. Their is an HBC basketball legume that is playing on TV.

The refrain I hear in the media from blacks is something like I want to be around peole who look like me. From whites that would be called racism.

Italian, Indian, Chinese and Mexican food is a common part of culture. I grew up with Jewish Yiddish slang as part of the lexicon. Mexican terms are part of the American culture.

So now blacks are upset with whites using Black slang?

Sometimes I think blacks are becoming their own worse enemy. Thy want ace acceptance yet are obsessed with seeing themselves as not white.

At this point if anything s holding themselves back it is attitude. Are blacks creating their own 'separate but equal'?

I think there's something to your point here. As your food examples show it's possible to be inclusive and yet retain an identity. Languagewise--I have spent basically my whole life close enough to the Mexican border that some very elementary Spanish has contaminated the language. Comprehension would be 100% if I said "adios" rather than "goodbye"--I hadn't even thought about it until a Skype with someone from Australia some years ago where "adios" wasn't understood.

Incorporating it is acceptance, not racism!

(But I must object about "Chinese" food--it almost certainly is not. Few of those dishes will be on the menu if you're actually in China.)

This is why clever diners with international tastes and domestic pocketbooks know that if you want to locate good and authentic Chinese food, you have to find a "Szechuan" restaurant, not a "Chinese" one.

Search for one on any university with a large Chinese contingent.

Legendary Spice is particularly good if you ever find yourself in the Twin Cities, located predictably just off the main University of Minnesota campus.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

(But I must object about "Chinese" food--it almost certainly is not. Few of those dishes will be on the menu if you're actually in China.)

This is why clever diners with international tastes and domestic pocketbooks know that if you want to locate good and authentic Chinese food, you have to find a "Szechuan" restaurant, not a "Chinese" one.

Search for one on any university with a large Chinese contingent.

Legendary Spice is particularly good if you ever find yourself in the Twin Cities, located predictably just off the main University of Minnesota campus.

We'll have to try that if she gets a craving for the food from home.

One thing she has found to be totally reliable is stuff in the menu with no English translation--but, obviously, you can't search by that. The first day she encountered that was agony for her--she knew it was the authentic stuff she hadn't eaten in something like a decade, but we were hundreds of miles from home and wouldn't be back and thus she could have only one dish of the many she wanted.

 

[Jarhyn]

So actually on the subject of Digital Blackface, I do actually recall an ongoing situation that I probably should not have trolled quite as persistently involving white 18-24 year olds roleplaying as black hoodlums on Second Life.

They had their own region set up and everything, complete with a fucked up guy who had a pack of what I can only assume we're 18-24 year olds roleplaying as 16 year old girls who were supposed to be their daughters.

You can rest assured that wealthy-ish young white guys are out there roleplaying being R. Kelly.

It's the cringiest of cringe.

That's what the topic reminds me of, though, those idiotic young adults in their make believe ghetto grooming make-believe little girls.

I can't say they should be jailed for it, because it was all consenting adults, but it WAS fucking disgusting. I feel gross just for having become aware of it.

I'm pretty sure they banned "explicit" interactions with child-form avatars and possibly altogether banned them in adult areas? Granted, I don't see how that could be controlled or stopped effectively, either.

But yes, there is such a thing as Digital Blackface. Probably several such things as It stands to show if I can pull one off the top of my head, there are probably more.

 

[ZiprHead]