"Sinterklaas & Zwarte Piet (black face)" Racism & Slavery

Post Reply New Topic

The Low Countries the heartland of early Protestantism? I dare say the eastern midlands of Germany (Saxony and Thuringia) has a better claim. In fact, it was the birth place of the Christmas tree.

Last edited by Kraichgauer on 04 Dec 2020, 9:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Joe Biden a racist? Huh? You do know that Biden has had a long and friendly relationship with African Americans, was the VP for the first black President, and has chosen an African American as his VP, don't you?

The low countries werent the fountainhead of Protestantism.

John Huss (A Slav, in what is now the Czech Republic) got burned at the stake for spouting all of the ideas that were a century later reinvented by Luther who escaped that fate and sparked the Reformation from Germany.

But today Protestantism dominates in northwest europe in countries that surround the North Sea. So in that accidental sense you could say that the Netherlands are in the middle/heart of Protestant Europe. But they didnt invent Protestantism. But the Dutch did invent free thinking and tolerance (were able to put both Protestantism and Catholicism aside and tolerate free thinking) during the centuries of the Reformation. And thus made many intellectual advances. And they attracted thinkers from around Europe including Jews like Spinoza who were fleeing persecution elsewhere.

@Kraichgauer

In my post that you did quote i explain why Biden is not as good as the most people think he is.
Deep-State media simple refuse to show all sides of the story.
Your claim that Obama was a black president is not right.
Obama is as much white as black.

By the way, the evolution tells that all humans, every single human is out of Africa. Even in a time when the word Africa was not yet used.

True love is colorblind.

What the heck is your point?

We all know humans came out of Africa. And yes race is a bs concept. But that doesnt make Biden a racist, or ...whatever the heck your point is.

About Obama being half White. DUDE...were talking about the USA. In an American context there is no "half white". In the segregation era South if you were 15 sixteenths White and one sixteenth Black you were legally defined as being as being a n****r. Dont forget the "one drop{of blood} rule" when speaking of the US.

Baseball star Roy Campanella had a Black mom and an Italian dad, but he was forced to play in the Negro leagues because half Black was..."Black" in America. He joined the major leagues only when Jackie Robinson finally broke the color barrier in 1947 when the Robinson was hired by the Brooklyn Dodgers- (ending the era of the Negro leagues). Obama being elected POTUS is the Oval Office equivalent of Campanella being allowed in the big leagues.

Sinterklaas has passed away, he recently died of corona. Unfortunately, this is not a joke.
Actor Bram van der Vlugt who played Sinterklaas for 25 years for Dutch television.
He turned 86 years old.

Next Sunday the bishop will return with his boat, all the way from Spain.
However, many Sinterklaas entrances will not take place or will take place in an adapted form because of corona.
Zwarte Piet is disappearing step by step in the parades, the disappearance of Zwarte Piet from people's heads will take a long time.

Zwarte Piet is basically the Dutch equivalent of Knecht Ruprecht, English:Servant Ruprecht (that figure has originally been inspired by Wotan/Odin also in looks), Krampus and so forth. It’s basically the same tale, similar traditions, just different characters and designs.
Knecht Ruprecht:





Krampus:




I don’t have anything against the Dutch Sinterklaas celebration. While I haven’t been to the Netherlands on that particular day people just seem to be having a good time and it appears like an inclusive celebration nowadays that isn’t so much celebrated out of religiosity much less to glorify colonialism or whatever.

I also don’t see why the Dutch should get rid of Zwarte Piet. If black make-up really bothers you that much then keep the character without the black make-up… Solved!

The city of Amsterdam is doing that by the way which I am sure you already know:




If anything my problem would be celebrating a Christian bishop actually and the religious aspect, not so much the characters Zwarte Piet or Knecht Ruprecht for that matter. But heck, choose your battles it is said and this isn't the battle I've chosen.

And as far as racism is concerned, I find this guy’s facial expression a lot more racist than the character Zwarte Piet.

I mean he looks at the black guy as though he’s just stepped into a pile of s**t. Like black Sinterklaas grosses him out or whatever. Seriously, what’s wrong with him!? I doubt that most people dressed up as Zwarte Piet would look at black people like that.

As a dutchman I was rather protective over my favourite childhood holiday and the figures associated with it. But nowadays I'm rather in favour for the non-blackface, soot-smeared face variation of the character to get rid of the racist overtones. But we shouldn't get rid of him altogether.

I still don't like the anti-Zwarte Piet demonstrators and never did, though. They just get a kick out of going to the public events to ruin childrens' day. If they actually cared about doing the right thing they wouldn't do that. They're bloody pathetic.

Pro and contra Zwarte Piet in Staphorst.
Photo is from some days ago.

It would seem the Dutch have no real problems. The are desperate for something to get upset about.

In my world there exist no Dutch people.

The skin color of people is an essential existence, it is nature and not nurture.

Treating people differently/inferiorly based on skin color is a big 'real problem' .

That's interesting.
So, how do you call the people living in the Kingdom of Netherlands, using Dutch as their first language?

After all, someone's place of living is something very physical, living within certain culture and certain political system makes a lot of difference to one's life and languages are something definitely interfering with our social contacts.

All of the above are way more "essentially" meaningful than what we consider "race", by the way. The concept of race could be completely deconstructed, leaving only appearance remaining. Does anyone accept or reject you based on your eye color? Does anyone get offended when you dye your hair? Some day (I hope), skin color will be just like these.

There is 1 country in my world, and that nature-based country encompasses the entire planet earth. I call the inhabitants of this nature-based land humans/people/sapiens.

Kingdom of Netherlands is not a country, kingdom of netherlands is a nurture-based occupying power, as there are many nurture-based occupying powers in my country. I don't have a passport, and the various occupying powers prevent me from having free access to every corner of my country. The occupying system on earth is in fact a form of apartheid.

I can think away the nurture-based dividing lines. I can't do the naturally based dividing lines like skin color, hair color, or eye color. Therefore, I think it is a good thing that the nature-based dividing line of Zwarte Piet is objectionable.

Pitty you didn't quote the second and third sentence from my response, that was a response to MaxE about 'real problems'

So, I understand, you decided to ignore existing political systems and cultures, believing all and every are oppressive?

Erehwon is saying that if there were no political national boundries then we would have peace. The world would be one. And like that. Or I THINK that what he is always saying.

And its a not unrespectable opinion to favor world govt. over having the world divided up into 200 sovereign states each with armed forces glaring at each other over petty boundary lines.

But he keeps repeating the point in this thread (and in other threads he starts) in an incomplete, and out-of-context way that confuses the reader. Like saying things like "this tree was photographed in Scotland, but Scotland isnt a real place...its part of the world..blah blah" that just comes off as silly and inane.

Even if there were a world govt you would still need local subdivision govts. And the Netherlands, and Scotland, and Borneo, and Iowa, would still exist as regions (whether they were local poltical units or not) with their own local flora, fauna, and local human cultures. So it will still be important to id a photo you post as coming from Borneo, or Iowa, etc to give context.