To summarize, this scandinavian comedy trio from the 90’s made a parody of Miami Vice. This being 90’s scandinavia, you can probably guess that the actors/comedians didn’t exactly have the melanin-credentials of parodying the black guy from Miami Vice, so one of them instead wore blackface (well, brownface would perhaps be a better description, due to the color tone).

As far as I can recall, the skit didn’t really make race much of a punchline, except from when they’re fixing their hair before the final showdown (which one of course have to do, this being a Miami Vice parody), and the white guy asks the black guy to borrow some hair gel but gets the response: (roughly translated) “I’m black, I don’t use hairgel. I use chocolate pudding.”

So yeah, asking because I’m a middle aged extremely white guy, and I found this skut funny as shit when I was a kid, and I stumbled across it recently, and I got curious.

EDIT: Found it. Turns out it’s from 1989. https://youtu.be/GDpLUXtA-4M
I can’t be arsed translating, because in retrospect it’s not really that good, but you can see the blackface and its origin in the beginning.

38 points

Fuck the blackface, wtf is this??

“I’m black, I don’t use hairgel. I use chocolate pudding.”

Christ almighty, that’s the kind of shit you could only think is NOT racist if you’ve like, never seen any Black people in your life personally (Scandinavia, so…possible).

Even in the 80s in America you’d get punched for something like that. And yes, I was around, I’m not a zoomer who thinks that Lincoln fought a war to free the gays.

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7 points

Is that… Not what Lincoln is known for?

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34 points
*

I know it’s not the popular opinion, but I agree with your position in your first paragraph. I think the context does make a difference.

The chocolate pudding line is definitely weird, but also definitely racist.

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29 points

blackface

Yeah that’s gonna be an immediate no from me.

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3 points
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It should be noted that I’m not 100% sure of the definition of blackface, so I may have used the term incorrectly. In this specific case, it is makeup applied in a manner so the actor appears somewhat realistic as being african american (as opposed to the minstrel-show-makeup). I think theybwere trying to have him look like the actual Miami Vice guy, this being its parody. Please see the first few seconds of the youtube link and help me clarify.

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19 points

That is blackface, yes.

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5 points

Noted, thank you. Editing the original post accordingly.

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20 points

Like the intent (probably) wasn’t racist, but it was still racist.

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13 points

Blackface is just a very big no.

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3 points

Would you say that this was racist, or shouldn’t have been performed?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vkzox_t3Z-Q

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