Zwarte piet - Racist?

[Baskingner]

Hello everyone, i know i am a little late with this but i wanted to hear opinions about a certain topic.
In the Netherlands (and belgium) there is a "festival" at 5 december. A white male called Sinterklaas gives all the little children presents for not being naughty that year (its very similair to santa clause in a way). The good man arrives two weeks earlier, he comes all the way from spain and the whole country eats "pepernoten" (peppernuts literally translated, there is no pepper in it and it arent actually nuts) until the day he leaves at 6 december. Its mainly a children thing, because ofcourse the parents buy the actual presents and the guy dresses as sinterklaas lives 2 streets away from amsterdam harbour where he arrives on a boat.

[Image: post-51681-0-41443600-1410707721.jpg]

Like i said its mainly a children thing but the last 2 years there has been some discussion around it, because ofcourse Sinterklaas cant give every child a present on his own, he needs help with that.                           
He gets this help from hundreds and hundreds of "zwarte pieten" or "black pieten" in english. Like the name says those are black people who come along on his boat from spain and do the actual work. They pack all the presents and deliver them to the children trough the chimney. The last two years a lot of (mainly black people) find "zwarte piet" now a racist character, They are reminded to the times of slavery by zwarte piet and think its a inhumane and medieval thing to celebrate. In the beginning there wasnt a lot of attention for these people because they were a very small minority but their group is on the rise. This year there were already protests against zwarte piet and some actual fist fights about it. 

I posted this to hear some more opinions about it, as a "foreigner" to this festival i think you'll have a less biased opinion on this. Is it actually a racist in your opinion? Should this be changed because a minority doesnt like it?
Personally i dont think it should be removed, i understand why people could see it as racist but this is something that has been celebrated for such a long time for the children.

Eager to hear some opinions!

[Jan]

No it's not racist, it's an old and loved tradition. Though I don't really see the use of posting it here, all people from other countires won't have an idea what you're talking about.

[Baskingner]

No it's not racist, it's an old and loved tradition. Though I don't really see the use of posting it here, all people from other countires won't have an idea what you're talking about.

I agree it will be hard to understand, but the main concept is pretty clear. I've seen other people giving their opinion on this and although other countries arent familiar with this i feel they still can give their opinion on this in a less biased way dutch people can. If they dont understand it and my post was a waste of time it was still worth a try in my opinion.

[aviator]

I don't find it racist.
It's subjective and down to an individual's interpretation.

[Bowiii]

I don't find this racist personally.
Same as avi mentions pretty much..

[dig]

Personally I do not, however I believe I can see why some may take offense to it.
The following are the 'Origins' of 'Zwarte piet' taken from wikipedia

Spoiler :

[Image: bab647818d0b07e1b2144fc5a14b872e.png]

However it seems to me that there is no real intention to offend here in comparison to say..
Blackface, which not only had the intention of offending African-Americans, but mocking and making fun of them
for the sake of comedy. This of course was a big problem around the time prior to Martin Luther King.
And I have to admit, there are some stark similiarities between 'Blackface' and 'Zwarte Piet'
EXAMPLE:

Spoiler :

[Image: afcb7d6d5b97b39f1affa71b748ed3aa.png]

The primary offense is that this person is meant to be a servant, and this person just so happens to be of dark complexion, and this person
just happens to originate from a time period in which slavery was practiced openly, so if you put two and two together odds are whenever this tradition began
it probably did involve an actual slave or two.

EDIT: Worth noting it does state something about the dark complexion being because these guys are up and down chimneys.
Also a large percentage of social media users had an uproar when a celebrity by the name of Julianne Hough used a sort of 'blackface' costume 
based on a character from Orange is the New Black.. So if there was uproar about that, I am not at all suprised there is some about this.

[Barkles]

Laurenz basically said what I was going to say, but smarterer.....

[MrTreeGames]

Where do I start? I'm a typical dutch dude: white, blond and I grew up with this festival. Sinterklaas is a very old tradition, loved by every Dutch native person. I have to admit that the earrings and the red lipstick are a bit overdone, but I cannot understand how you can find it so racist. We won't go to the USA and say that Thanksgiven is racist for turkeys, do we? Anyway, I agree with the fact that it's time for a change. Remove the red lipstick, earrings and maybe even the black colour from his face and replace it for soot (because of the chimney), but the festival itself has to stay. People who are in favour of Zwarte Piet are trying to find out where it actually comes from. Here some theories:

- It comes from the Germanic myth. A Germanic god, who wanted to check if the people were worshipping him by sending helpers through their chimney.

- Saint Nicolas is ancient Greek for: Saint = Holy , Nike = win , Laos = Population. Something like that. He originally came from the little town Myra (Nowadays Turkey). He was a bisshop and wanted that the poor people should win from the rich people, who ruled the area there.


The discussion became so big that the UN decided to set a committee that would investigate Zwarte Piet. The president of this committee said it was a awful tradition and the festival is racist. People who were in favour sent her threatening e-mails.

I hope you can understand the whole concept now. I find it Zwarte Piet perfectly fine, but I do think it should change a bit, because it is freaking 2014. Racism is wrong, but this tradition is not racist.

Kind Regards
Tree

[Decay]

Laurenz basically said what I was going to say, but smarterer.....

[Adman]

We won't go to the USA and say that Thanksgiven is racist for turkeys, do we?

Despite not actually making any sense, how is that even relevant?