Racist Halloween costumes in Allston
By adamg - Wed, 11/01/2006 - 10:45am.
W.A. Hurd writes:
... [W]hen I step outside my door and see a white guy dressed in an afro and a dashiki, I realize how far we still have to go. Especially since the guy he was with (of course, also white) was wearing the Flava Flav oversized clock. I don't have any great words of wisdom to add other than these: That's not okay. Not even close. It's racist. You might think it's funny and charming, and I'm certain that your all white fraternity thinks it is, but it's racist. I don't care if you listen to rap and took an African American studies course. It's racist. ...
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Shat about if the dude is just dressed up as Flava-Flav because he likes the show "Flavor of Love?" What if the guy in the fro wig and dashiki was just dressed as a general 70s dude? As long as they're not smeared with brown paint (which I've seen, and which I don't think is in good taste), I guess I wouldn't really see it as racist.
Did white guys wear dashikis in the '70s?
Not that I recall, and I spent most of that decade perfectly sober and not stoned. I had a couple of college roommates with Jewfros, but the closest they ever got to a dashiki was using their bedsheets as togas for an "Animal House" party (well, one of them, at any rate).
Nat X
Was he Nat X from SNL? That is who I picture.
The deciding factor for me is...
...that the guys were presumably dressed up as a specific individual. One was recognizable as Flavor Flav by the observer, and the other was presumably patterened after a particular character of some sort.
I don't think dressing specifically as Flavor Flav is racist. I would consider dressing as "a Black man" quite offensive and racist.
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