Thursday, October 08, 2009

Only in Australia. . .

. . . could a group of guys go on television in blackface and subsequently argue that the skit didn't have any racial implications - the logic being that if the perpetrators don't find it offensive, then it's not (and hey - they did it back in '89 and people loved it. . .). Given Australia's own humble origin, I'd think its people would be more sympathetic to culturally sensitive issues. However, it seems that approximately 75% of the population didn't see anything particularly racist about this shtick. Fair enough - it probably wasn't intended to be racist - yet it still managed to offend nonetheless, and anyone with 75% of a brain could have seen that coming. Australia continues to have an image problem in this department. Just when the tourism boards make progress in branding the nation as a friendly, open and diverse environment, some clowns step-up and do something stupid.

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