It’s that time of year again, ya’ll: time for the Annual Zwarte Piet Debate! Aren’t you excited? I know I am.

A very brief background...

Sinterklaas is the Dutch version of Santa Claus, although he’s sorely lacking in the bowl-full-of-jelly belly department. His outfit dates back to the time when he served as bishop of Turkey (um, Turkey?), which is why he looks more like the pope than jolly Father Christmas. Sleighs are for losers; Sinterklaas arrives each November in the NL by steamboat and travels around the country on horseback for a month or so, returning only after his big birthday celebration on December 5th to his home in Spain (again: Spain?), where he resides eleven months of the year. He’s also a good deal stingier and stricter than his American colleague. Good children get cheap-ass candy they have to gather off the dirty floor while bad kids get the switch, unless they’ve been really bad, and then they get stuffed into his burlap sack and carted off to his dungeon in Spain.

The Annual Debate part occurs around his “helpers,” all conveniently named Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). Depending on what you care to believe, the Pieten are either Ethiopian orphans who were saved by slavery to Sinterklaas, chimney sweeps who apparently have no time for bathing, or Moorish assistants who are Sint’s “friends and helpers.” As it plays out in real life, though, the Pieten are Dutch (thus, white) natives who paint their faces shiny black, don a curly wig, and carry a switch. My kids were always scared shitless of them.

In the pro-Piet camp are the Dutch, who claim it to be an old, innocent, festive tradition and an essential part of their culture. Piet is a lovable fairytale figure, more clown than curmudgeon, and is Sint’s friend, not his slave. He just happens to be black from sliding down all those chimneys on his way to bring the kids gifts. He acts silly and hands out candy. What’s not to like?

On the other side is pretty much everybody else. Piet is a politically incorrect racist disgrace, and his blackface has no place in any culture, either as historical context or source of comedy or even as a source of outrage. He is an illustration of the subtle paradox that exists in a culture that claims itself to be so modern and progressive, somewhere between blatant racism and a hypocritical tendency to look the other way.

If you’re a faithful reader (and you ARE, aren’t you!?) and remember my posts like this one and this one, you’ll probably have no problem figuring out where I fall. Though I’m Dutch enough to understand the Zwarte Piet tradition in theory, I think there’s something sinister about an entire culture’s stubborn refusal to acknowledge anything the slightest bit racist about a white person in blackface and a nappy wig. Seriously. I mean, take Piet out of context and drop him anywhere else in the world, and then reassess. NOW what rational arguments can be used to defend him?

But all this seriousness makes me want a nap. Which is why I’m ending this post with a clip from the fabulously fabulous Boom Chicago, an American comedy club smack in the middle of Amsterdam.

Smooches!

~K