Santa Claus was a Black Man!

December 13, 2020 at 11:27 pm · Filed under Advertising, Affiliates, America, American Capitalism, Anonymous® Radio Show, Christmas / Hanukkah, Climate Change, Educational, Europe, Feedback, Health & Wellness, Healthy Living, History, Holland, Interactive, Italiano, Malcolm X, Mother's Day, Nutrition, Our Planet, Personal Growth, Politically INcorrect, Poverty, PROMOTIONS!, Propaganda, Racism, Religious Right, Republican'ts, Show Sponsors, Sunday Series®, TravelTime®, Weird Shit, X-mas and tagged: 1God1Jesus, Black Christmas, Bullshit, Censorship, CHANGE, Christmas, Climate Change, Coca-Cola, Dutch, God, GREED, Idiots, Internet Filtering, Jesus Christ!!!, Love, Merry Christmas!, Parenting, Photography, Rednecks, Republicans, Santa Claus, Slavery, Social Networking, Sweden, Taser, Television, Twitter, VIP

“Santa comes in many different colors.”

Black Santas can be controversial — and that’s because of white supremacy, expert explains…

Let’s start with history: Who was St. Nick?

According to numerous sources, the original St. Nicholas was a brown-skinned, third century inhabitant of what is present-day Turkey. He was born into wealth, ultimately known for both his fierce generosity and devotion to Christianity, and was eventually named Bishop of Myra, becoming widely recognized as the patron saint of children.

Centuries after his death, his bones “were stolen by Italian sailors during the 11th century” who took them to Italy, when the related figure of “Sinterklaas” was born nearby, in the Netherlands.

Eventually, the Dutch colonized what is now known as New York City, bringing with them the idea of St. Nick, who received a makeover. As poet and novelist Ishmael Reed once put it: “Just as Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King Jr. have been toned down for popular consumption, the smiling rosy-cheeked overweight white man in red suit is an American invention. Modifying Clement Moore’s rendition of a rotund Santa Claus, the great abolitionist illustrator Thomas Nast dressed him in a red suit for the 1863 Harper’s Weekly,” an image, Reed argued, that “covers up the real Nicholas.”

The new image was further perpetuated — and solidified — when Coca-Cola commissioned illustrator Haddon Sundblom to paint Santa for Christmas advertisements in 1931, bringing the jolly, white, rotund Santa image to its most massive audience yet.

A Roma child stands in front of a shelter bearing an image of Santa Claus as advertised by Coca-Cola — which is largely credited with popularizing the modern-day image of him as a jolly white man, seen all over the world. (Photo: Armend Nimani/AFP via Getty Images)

DiAngelo explains this transformation again within the context of white supremacy, and the white impulse to want to own anything seen as desirable. That’s regarding not only icons such as Santa, but even public spaces, “such as Central Park, … neighborhoods, and certainly in cultural figures. Santa is a fictitious figure, but Jesus and Mary are actual historical figures — and they were not white. We rendered them in our own image as white [as a] stand-in for ‘ideal’ or ‘human,’ and everyone else is a deficient deviation from that ideal.”

Despite inspiring America’s version of Santa Claus, Sinterklaas has been the topic of much heated, ongoing debate, because instead of being assisted by elves, this version of the gift giver is equipped with “Black Petes” — what many have interpreted as slaves. It’s a common, modern tradition, in fact, for the Dutch to celebrate these assistants in full-on blackface, claiming to be covered in chimney soot (although their clothes remain clean), prompting Google and Facebook to take a stance against such imagery just a few months ago.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-5&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1335289791680835585&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fca.news.yahoo.com%2Fslap-face-arizona-hospital-fires-160537298.html&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

How does white supremacy play a role?

Notes DiAngelo, “White supremacy is a highly descriptive, sociological term for the society we live in, which certainly includes extremists that we would think of as wearing white hoods, but it also describes the norm — a culture that positions white people as the center and as the ultimate representation of what it means to be human.” She points to highly revered images, such as Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel painting, which depict angels as white and devils as Black, as further evidence.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-6&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1268798930885783553&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fca.news.yahoo.com%2Fslap-face-arizona-hospital-fires-160537298.html&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550pxhttps://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-7&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1336683378159087619&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fca.news.yahoo.com%2Fslap-face-arizona-hospital-fires-160537298.html&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

“The irony,” she notes, is “on the one hand, white people insist that ‘we don’t see color’ — and then we lose our minds when Santa is not the color that he’s ‘supposed’ to be.” Similar controversies have come about with announcements that remakes of children’s classics, like Annie and The Little Mermaid,would star Black girls.

“Given that most white people live segregated lives, I think it’s really important — not just for Black children to see themselves reflected in valuable symbols, but it’s really important for white children to see it too,” says DiAngelo. Unfortunately, Black Santas are few and far between, making up just 3 percent of American professional Santas, according to a 2016 report, which is troubling, as “research shows that positive representation of role models — one kids can look at and relate to — can go a long way in helping children have a better self-image.”

The big picture

Attempting to understand how young children are psychologically affected by racism started in the 1940s, with Mamie and Kenneth Clark’s famous Doll Test, which found that Black children overwhelmingly “favored the white doll when asked which doll was the nice doll.” This experiment has since been re-created — with similar results and more recent studies showing that not much has changed.

Researchers have also found that by age 5, “Black and Hispanic children show no preference toward their own group,” while “white kids remain strongly biased in favor of whiteness.” Furthermore, “children have already learned to associate some groups with higher status, or more positive value, than others” by the start of kindergarten — and pushing white-only Santa imagery can only add fuel to that fire.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-8&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1281575670469066753&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fca.news.yahoo.com%2Fslap-face-arizona-hospital-fires-160537298.html&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Pointing to such studies, DiAngelo says, “There is research that shows that as early as 3 and 4 years old, children understand that it’s better to be white in society. They don’t miss that message, so that’s another really important reason why all children should be exposed to a whole range of representations.” This lack of representation, she explains, causes issues on a global scale.

“We have exported ‘Christmas’ and ‘Santa’ worldwide,” she says, recalling a trip to Thailand a few years ago, where she noticed that “Christmas representations were everywhere,” but none that resembled the local people. No matter the location, “when the ideal is always represented as white, we have also exported the white supremacy worldwide,” says DiAngelo. “Our cultural icons are everywhere, and that has an impact there too.”

In order to prepare our children for the real world, DiAngelo says, parents need to get real about the world around them — whether it be by embracing inclusivity or historical accuracy. “I was raised Catholic, [and although] I can’t really use Catholic iconography anymore, I do look for Black Marys — the Black Madonna — and they exist. In Mexico and some other countries, you can find Black Madonnas, including nearly 500 depictions in Europe, which are probably more realistic at the same time,” she notes. “So we are capable of adjusting and accommodating for the reality of the world we live in.”

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