Is It Racist?

I have to start by removing the curse that I placed upon my Secret Santa on Sunday. It turns out that she was just off sick and had not forgotten to buy me anything so sorry about that Secret Santa.

So today’s discussion is about Racism. A co-worker is holding a themed fancy dress New Years Eve party. The theme is Hollywood Greats and Motown Stars. Hollywood Greats are no real problem because there are so many of them and most of them are white (have your own rasicm debate about that), no, the problems start when you try and dress as a Motown Star as nearly all of them are black, except for Kiki Dee (the first white woman to sign to Motown fact fans) and most of her friends aren’t. So are question was this, is it racist to “black up” in order to celebrate your hero’s work? If you are not racist but want to dress up as Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross & The Supremes (not all at the same time obviously) because you love them and want to pay tribute to them do you suddenly become racist as you apply a dark brown make-up to your face? I’m pretty sure that the answer is yes because most people will receive the gesture as racist. Discuss.

The score so far, Palestinian dead 380, Israeli dead 4.

The border is closed, by both Israel and Egypt, and so it has become like shooting fish in a barrel. It is a slaughter and only America can make it stop. Israel is not trying to stop the rocket attacks as it claims. A BBC reporter today saw 4 rockets fired from Gaza in about a 45 minute period and, despite troops just over the border and planes and helicopters patrolling the airspace above, it took 10 minutes for a retaliation rocket strike at just one of the sites and the other 3 were not hit in the following ½ an hour. Instead they bomb a University. One air strike killed two sisters, the eldest aged 11, riding in a donkey cart in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, Palestinian medical sources said. The UN has called for an investigation into the attacks, which are causing heavy civilian casualties. It says at least 62 of the Palestinians killed so far were women and children. Richard Falk - the UN special rapporteur for human rights in the Palestinian territories - said the international community must put more pressure on Israel to end its assault. "Israel is committing a shocking series of atrocities by using modern weaponry against a defenceless population - attacking a population that has been enduring a severe blockade for many months," Mr Falk said in a BBC interview.

This last part was taken from the BBC website.