Turkish TV Mocks Obama With Blackface

A television program in Turkey recently featured a commentator dressed in blackface in a side-by-side split with Obama.  Shock and outrage ensues in the US by the insensitivity of it, but I think its okay because I respect other peoples’ culture.  In Turkish culture, it is okay to mock foreign leaders in blackface, so who am I to judge?

Actually, the fact that eastern Europeans and Asians (arabs) don’t know this behavior is insulting and wrong is not their fault.  In fact, I was floored on my recent trip to Jordan when some of the locals I was talking with always used the word “niggers” to refer to anyone from America with black skin.  In fact, they were absolutely convinced that blacks in America are all in violent street gangs and hold their handguns sideways.  After all, that’s what they always see in American movies.  Also, they hear blacks in those same movies refer to each other constantly as “nigger” as well in American popular music.

So it’s no wonder that they act this way.  Blame Hollywood who has been irresponsibily portraying blacks as criminals and violent thugs, not the foreign cultures who simply don’t know any better.

The TV program referenced above ended with a shot of two young black girls, supposedly Malia and Natasha Obama, doing “double dutch” jump rope on what was supposed to be the White House driveway.  Not really.