Color me shocked.
Newsflash; Just because “no one ever told him it was offensive” doesn’t mean that it’s somehow not offensive to actual Black people.
Regardless to what kind of music he makes or how popular it is, regardless to how many talented Black musicians he’s worked with, regardless to how much “high esteem and regard” he has for them.
I commend Mr Lee for his choice to change his glibly chosen stage name in light of the times.
As long as he doesn’t change it to a name already in use by a black musician and then sue that musician, like the group “Lady Antebellum” did recently after changing their name to “Lady A.”
THIS
Good name or bad it is and was a problematic choice even with the good intentions he had and good for him to own up to it.
Yeah, it definitely wasn’t a good look.
Lady anti-BLM
That’s a good one. I don’t know if I like it, but that’s a good one.
Again?
An American brush for sure. I don’t know about the UK, but over here in Germany & The Netherlands ‘negro’ had no negative connotations for the majority of people in the pre-internet era. It just meant black. At least that was the way it was in the progressive (admittedly rather white) anarchist subculture I grew up in.
There were more blues/soul/rock&roll fans calling themselves names like ‘the rocking negros’ and things like that and really honestly mean it in a positive way (similar to a (german) irish folk band called ‘the whistling paddies’ from the same city, I can’t really remember but it might even have had some of the same people in it.).
Was it a good name considering the connotations of the word negro in the US? Certainly not. But the US what a lot further away back then. ‘Minstrel shows’ was a one paragraph item in the second grade history book for most people.
I remember my history book describing minstrel shows as something along the lines of: ‘white people who liked black music and therefore dressed up, and oh yeah some of them were racist’. (The writer of that paragraph was wholly incompetent or worse).
It’s really only in recent years that the general population is having different feelings with the word Neger. I know when I was a kid in the netherlands for a while, that Zwart (Black) was used in a derogatory way, while ‘Neger’ was just a description meaning ‘dark skinned’.
djbeefburger’s post was a useful addition to the topic, and calling him a coward and generally making him ‘the enemy’ is imho uncalled for.
Well…
That’s definitely where I live, where the racial strife has never ended, and where the terms Negro, Negroid, Colored, Darkie, etc are definitely considered offensive in the 21st Fucking Century.
I grow beyond weary of hearing from some of our cousins across the pond with no actual skin in the game deigning to tell me (or even to imply) how I should not find such things offensive, because the chattel enslavement of Africans wasn’t ever so deeply entrenched in Europe as it was in America.
As if the world has not evolved and grown smaller as it has advanced, as if the ‘lesser degree’ of offense somehow makes it less antisocial and deplorable, and as if we who know history dont remember that it was Europe who originally “colonized” the ‘new world,’ bringing imperialism and oppression of POC for centuries to come.
So, it’s okay to do something hurtful, if your intentions are good…?
In the UK? Fuck, yes it had negative connotations!
That’s interesting. I’m sure there are many descriptions of Jewish people from German history that weren’t considered- strike that. They kinda were.
Someone really ought to screenshot that glib comment and post it in White Culture, as a prime example.
That was some next level gas-lighting, which could have only been born of the obtuse White privilege it takes to really believe that appropriation is somehow a positive thing.
In no way do I deny you the right to be offended by the term. I also agree that calling yourband ‘the rocking negros’ would be very insensitive/tonedeaf to do today, even in Germany.
But I argue that in the late eighties/early nineties it was very well possible to be a well meaning, non-racist lover of ‘black’ music and choose an in restrospect bad name in good faith. The extra info djbeefburger posted imho made it very plausible that that is what happened here and I don’t think it’s productive or fair to attack djbeefburger just for providing some context the the BB article. And yes, that was an attack. Or at least it looked like one.
Presenting Germany as having a history devoid of racism is an interesting strategy.
ok, that somewhat changes it.
To reiterate, since it apparently needs saying in multiple threads:
For anyone bemoaning how they can’t understand from a dictionary definition how a word can be offensive, a thread:
Terms and meanings change. Just because something was used at some time in the past to mean something different, does not mean that the connotations are the same today.
Also, when it comes to communities – terms used by those inside a community or group to refer to themselves are not necessarily acceptable for use to someone outside of that group.
that’s absolutely not what I was saying.
but I know, I know. djbeefburger had the wiser reaction here with his ‘no thanks’. I’ll see myself out and go to bed.
Check your ego, yo.
In no way could you do that, if you actively tried.
I don’t have a problem with Mr. Lee.
I have a major problem with overzealous fanboys, “white knights” and arbitrary apologists who try to act as though his choice to give himself a racially insensitive stage name for shock value was somehow not problematic.
