All this means is that the Thomas franchise has existed long enough to be publishing books since when that word was still in common parlance. I’m sure if you looked at anything from that era, it wouldn’t take long to find something that appears problematic through a modern lens.
Believe it or not, it was not “normal” to use slurs in children’s books in 1952.
There are Marvel comics from the 1940’s with characters straight out of ministrel shows and they still don’t use the word. Would you like to guess why?
Edit: not that it stopped Dr Seuss a couple times in the 30’s, mind you, but he reserved it for comics and not his children’s books, those only got racist caricatures.
The word carried somewhat less of a charge in the UK at the time, where black people were relatively uncommon until waves of labour migration from the Caribbean in the 1950s, than in the US, where it was freighted with the weight of slavery, the KKK, Jim Crow laws and such. Agatha Christie could call a book “10 Little N_s”, alluding to a children’s rhyme. This was an age in which the children who casually sang that rhyme probably had golliwog dolls.
Sure, absolutely no history of slavery and colonialism in the UK. There definitely aren’t a dozen Kipling stories where he calls anyone not a WASP by the term.
While Britain participated in the slave trade, they went out of their way to not do so in Britain; the slaveholders kept their slaves abroad and out of sight, in places where the laws of civilisation which rule such institutions to be obscene are waived. (Sugarcane plantations in the Caribbean were one such place.) And it was impolite to inquire too hard about the sources of fortunes that built stately homes.
The difference being that when the N-word was uttered in Britain, it was belittling and condescending in an exoticising way, like a colonial-era picture book of funny foreigners in their traditional costumes. In America, however, it had a more immediate edge of aggression and violence, implying an other that’s here rather than far away, and firmly below the speaker in the established racial hierarchy, and who must be kept there using tools including designating them as a (N-word).
You’re bringing up fucking Kipling of all people, the one poet everyone knows for being mega into colonialism. That’s like me pointing at the Grateful Dead while saying Americans need to lay off the acid.
It’s a cherry-picked example if I ever saw one, I could just as well go and point at Wilberforce to underline early 19th century attitudes to slavery and I’d be making the same error as this.
Setting aside the incorrect notion that there weren’t black people in England until the 50s, the story in question was published in 1951 and remained in print into the 1970s.
All this means is that the Thomas franchise has existed long enough to be publishing books since when that word was still in common parlance. I’m sure if you looked at anything from that era, it wouldn’t take long to find something that appears problematic through a modern lens.
Believe it or not, it was not “normal” to use slurs in children’s books in 1952.
There are Marvel comics from the 1940’s with characters straight out of ministrel shows and they still don’t use the word. Would you like to guess why?
Edit: not that it stopped Dr Seuss a couple times in the 30’s, mind you, but he reserved it for comics and not his children’s books, those only got racist caricatures.
The word carried somewhat less of a charge in the UK at the time, where black people were relatively uncommon until waves of labour migration from the Caribbean in the 1950s, than in the US, where it was freighted with the weight of slavery, the KKK, Jim Crow laws and such. Agatha Christie could call a book “10 Little N_s”, alluding to a children’s rhyme. This was an age in which the children who casually sang that rhyme probably had golliwog dolls.
Sure, absolutely no history of slavery and colonialism in the UK. There definitely aren’t a dozen Kipling stories where he calls anyone not a WASP by the term.
While Britain participated in the slave trade, they went out of their way to not do so in Britain; the slaveholders kept their slaves abroad and out of sight, in places where the laws of civilisation which rule such institutions to be obscene are waived. (Sugarcane plantations in the Caribbean were one such place.) And it was impolite to inquire too hard about the sources of fortunes that built stately homes.
The difference being that when the N-word was uttered in Britain, it was belittling and condescending in an exoticising way, like a colonial-era picture book of funny foreigners in their traditional costumes. In America, however, it had a more immediate edge of aggression and violence, implying an other that’s here rather than far away, and firmly below the speaker in the established racial hierarchy, and who must be kept there using tools including designating them as a (N-word).
The garbage eurotrash will spread to pretend they aren’t and haven’t been virulent racists is pretty amazing.
IT’s eXotiCisiNg NoT a ToOl oF oUr RacIaL ImpEriAl HeiRARchY
Meanwhile, at the absolute kindest Br*tish imperial racists are being:
https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_burden.htm
You’re bringing up fucking Kipling of all people, the one poet everyone knows for being mega into colonialism. That’s like me pointing at the Grateful Dead while saying Americans need to lay off the acid.
One of England’s favorite poets until public displays of explicit racism were no longer de rigueur.
He’s a perfectly valid example of the feelings of the nation at that time.
One of the favourite English poets amongst a certain grouping of people
It’s a cherry-picked example if I ever saw one, I could just as well go and point at Wilberforce to underline early 19th century attitudes to slavery and I’d be making the same error as this.
Are you fucking stupid?
Are you physically incapable of taking your Amerigoggles off for a millisecond?
They really are delusional.
The denial and defense of their racist antics is amazing to see in real time.
deleted by creator
Those were exceedingly good stories though!
Setting aside the incorrect notion that there weren’t black people in England until the 50s, the story in question was published in 1951 and remained in print into the 1970s.
“relatevily uncommon” != “there weren’t”
Yes, and Black soldiers took part in D-Day seven years prior.
I just checked my copy of the book. Even though it was first published in 1939, my copy was still published under the original titlein 1963.
It was altered in the 70s, around the same time the Thomas book was altered.
Well, now I am going to have to go home and check my copy of Thomas. Because I totally remember that line.
It heavily depends which books you look in.
pretty sure that racism in the days of yore was still racist (please remember who decided what was appropriate in common parlance back then)
the hays code didn’t apply to colloquial speech, it applied to movies.
The Hayes Code didn’t apply to books at all, it was movie specific. I assumed they were talking about the dominant culture at the time.
it just cracks me up because if you look for Hays violating shit, it’s everywhere back then. If they wanted to sing about sex, they sang about food.
deleted by creator
See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_Then_There_Were_None (Agatha Christie, 1939)