Topic: [Netherlands christmas, sinter klaas helper] Zwarte Piet visits london - page 2. (Read 3097 times)

it's interesting how the story transforms from a demon into a black slave over time.... no connotation there at all.... perfectly normal none racist childrens story.

Zwarte piet is something that evolved over time.

Started out with being demons and slowly transformed into black slaves over the years.

It would take me too much effort to make a complete list, but sinterklaas and Christmas are both based on old pagan and shamanistic rituals, mostly fertility rites.

in fact, pretty much every 'modern' holiday is based on ancient rituals and pagan traditions, most people are worshiping old gods without even knowing it.

okay i will dress up as Hitler, parade around the streets of Amsterdam giving sweets to children and that will make my dress sense okay?
I personally think zwarte piet resembles racist stereo types of the past and given the time in history when the character came about and the pictures of him acting as sinter klass's servant, maybe just maybe the anti zwarte piet movement have a point...... but then again the kids get their sweets....

Children can't nor have to understand our current society with their culture standards.
When you say to your kid that he has to behave the kid will see it as a parental requirement.

If you say to the kid he has to behave else he won't get anything from Santa Claus or Sinterklaas the kid sees it as something magical.
People have always known this, why else would there be fairy tales (and there morals).

You would suggest that children may not believe in these stories anymore...
I believe those children would grow up very depressed and with a great dislike of society.

You can only know this if you've ever see the sparkle into a kids eye when he opens up his presents given by some magic and compare it with the times you give him a present yourself...

Trust me, it's worth it

And for why people would dress up, well I think it's to enforce the story (children believe what they see). Off course it is also part of the tradition and as I've said: How is it racists when a "so called slave" is singing laughing and giving candy to happy children??? I think if you live in the past anything can be called racists at some point. The word has been misused a little to much.

Also, I hope everyone realizes that I (and I think a lot of other people) didn't even knew what a moor was until the entire zwarte piet discussion started :p

http://www.hetoudekinderboek.nl/archief/BomNikolaas/BomNikolaas.htm

I don't think children would notice or care if piet was no longer zwarte piet, i don't think they would care if it was a chicken head on a kangaroo body, they just like candy.

traditions change, traditions are not always right for the current times. traditions are born at different times when different things are accepted, but this is up to those living in the Netherlands to decide upon.

Fox hunting was a tradition (rich people) in the UK  but was outlawed 10 years ago...... times change, sometimes for the better.

Yes, because that is our tradition and that is how we celebrate Sinterklaas. Children would be disappointed if "Zwarte Piet" wouldn't be there.

don't get me started on santa claus........ people just need to stop telling fairy tales to their kids about strange old men with beards coming from foreign lands to gift them for being good throughout the year, consumerist bullcrap holiday. We can compare zwarte piet to wahtever you want, but two wrongs don't really make a right do they?

It's cool children enjoy sinterklaas and piet but do adults really need to black themselves up with big red lips and gold earrings for their kids to enjoy sinter klaas?

Point taken, and maybe I'm just defending a tradition we do for generations.

You should see it as if we would change Santa Clause to a skinny sporting purple person because it's an offense to picture an obese white person be pulled by reindeer's. Also the red costume is hidden commerce from Coca Cola and I find it offensive because Cola isn't good for our children...

You see what I did there. I started bitching over a tradition which most of the American people do their entire live.
One culture bitching over another culture would just create a lot of hate between those parties.

The worse part of all this is that 99% of both black and white belgian/dutch people doesn't see this as racism but as the child feast for which it stands. When I go to a Sinterklaasfeast Zwarte Piet is always singing, laughing and giving candy to children. How can that be an insult.

It's that 1 percent that creates these hate movies and put it all into a bad daylight...

If the costume is an insult this could also be said about Santa Claus (Cola, bad for children), Jesus (Why is Catholics most holey man white?), Eastern Bunny (There are no talking bunnies, nor are they laying eggs)...

it depends what you wear, if you wear an American Indian war bonnet and you have not earned the right to wear one then to an American Indian this would most likely be disrespectful.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_bonnet
http://www.mtv.com/news/1837578/why-you-should-not-wear-headdresses/

I couldn't resist:

Everyone does realise that while you call him Saint Nicholas we call him Sinterklaas en you again call him Santa Claes
Histories seem to change but how we dutch/belgian people learn it, goes something like this:

Nikolaos of Myra was a greek saint who helped freeing turkish slaves. (Greeks and Turks have never been close friends).
As a reward for their freedom the slaves stayed with Nikolaes to help him out.
One evening a butcher lured three little children into his house and killed them.
He put them into a sack and wanted to sell them off as Ham.
When Nikolaos of Myra and his followers went visiting the butcher he imidiatly saw trough these lies.
The miracle he performend was opening the sack where the children jumped out, a live and well.

To recall his memory every evening on the 6 of december (The day Nikolaes died), people would honor him by
presenting gifts to their children in the name of Nikolaes of Myra.
To scare the children people say that when their being noughty they would be put into a sack.
The free slaves (who where of turkish origin, some of them where black but not all of them) would in the legend
be given the honor of bringing the toys to the children through the chimney.
That's why they are all black, it's because of the soot of the chimney.

This has always been a feast for children. It's really a shame that the world puts this in such a bad daylight.
The propaganda movies you see are just of some idiots who doesn't know anything about history.

If americans honor native indians, is it also an asult to dress like them???

Zwarte Piet was only introduced at the time, because it was a common thing to gaze upon other people in that day, it was something exotic, they had african people on display in zoos in that time, so it was a fun and hip thing to add to the sinterklaas story. Before that Sinterklaas did not have helpers, or in other countries(france and germany) they had a devil, or other (white)servant. That said, it could be easily adjusted to something hip and fun for this century. I think the dumbing down of the scaryness, the taking of children and punishing is what really should be restored.

The most scary part of the current discussion is the hatred and underlying racism that is coming out of the woodwork, it is  a good thing to get it in the open, racism is still alive. But that is a thing that was made clear with our other white haired friend Wilders.

Children don't care about how Piet looks like, as long as they can submerge in a nationwide fairytale and get tummyaches from all the candy they eat.  

Well, it's a Dutch holiday, so the Dutch Wikipedia is the most accurate. Makes sense right?

Obviously it is a story, a work of fiction and stories can be told differently, but there is history around the story and how the story has changed throughout time. At one point he was "Pieter me knecht" if i have read correctly and now he is just zwarte piet for one example. I am just curious and i guess i like history and find it interesting. again i don't want to offend anyone, sorry if i have.

edit: I'll have a read of the dutch wiki later, i didn't think it would be any different..... I always thought a nl.wiki was just a translation, learn something new everyday!

Well, there is no "real" history, that's the point I tried to make. There are a lot of different stories, some are more racist than others. I honestly don't care about the history and I dislike everyone that has something against "Zwarte Piet". They are just looking for a reason to complain, because they have nothing else to do. It hurts nobody, children don't think of "black" people as "Zwarte Piet" and it's a loving and caring holiday.

I even talked to a few of my "black" friends and they don't give a shit.

It's quite a long drawn out debate to my understanding, i have older dutch friends 60+ years and they don't care, they talk about the soot on his face and how he gives candy and the kids love him. My more younger circle of dutch friends 20-40 years don't like the big red lips, the gold earrings and the full blackface. I don't really know what to think as i have no interaction with dutch children( hate kids). I just looking for some different perspectives. I don't like the history or how i perceive what i have read as history.

Oh I see, well I was never thought the "real" story, because their are a lot of them, according to the Dutch wikipedia page (which is the only correct one, if you ask me).

Children nowadays don't learn that "Zwarte Piet" was a slave, black because of going down the chimney or something else. We never told them anything. They just thought of their own stories and saw them as the helpers of "Sinterklaas".
Currently there is a huge discussion about it being racist or not. 90% doesn't give a shit. However, this does teach children about racism way ahead of their time. They didn't know about racism, they didn't care and they have ever thought about that, till now.

A teacher once did an experiment with a few children. She said that "Sinterklaas" would be coming to their classroom and started to change her outfit into "Sinterklaas" during that story. Once she was done she said that she was "Sinterklaas" and the children asked her where their teacher went. Children just don't see the similarities between "black" people and "Zwarte piet", only we adults do.

I am not talking about the current situation when i say that, sorry for the confusion. I am talking about the history and how the character came about. I should  have said "conditioned" not conditions, emphasis on the past tense... sorry.

eidt: yes children don't care now as the zwarte piet character gives them candy and there is not so much emphasis on the bogeyman aspect of sinterklaas no adays, again i was talking about the origin. I don't think the current situation conditions children to think badly, i was talking about the origin of the story and character.

"Zwarte Piet" in The Netherlands is something children love. Maybe even more than "Sinterklaas" itself (because the Zwarte Piet gives them candy and "Pepernoten"). We don't gave a shit about the history and what the story says, in our country it's just a huge party.

This is 100% bullshit.

To best understand something it is sometimes easiest to look back at it origin....... something you don't seem to know anything about.