by Danika Lyle
A notification appeared on El Gato’s Facebook on Sunday, stating that we had been tagged in a post that reads as follows: “The fact that somebody from Los Gatos High School thought it was OK to ask somebody to prom wearing blackface does not surprise me. However, the fact that social media and local news sources have not had the courage to speak out and condemn this inappropriate behavior is truly despicable. Before we continue to normalize racism, perhaps it’s important to think about who and what we are protecting with our silence.” The post was created by Miles Patrick Lucey, an alum of LGHS.
On Friday, May 12, an LGHS senior asked a girl to Prom in blackface makeup. The ask was a recreation of a Bitmoji-Snapchat message he had sent to the girl earlier. The Bitmoji is an African American avatar with blue hair, glasses, a tank top, a bow, and a bright Prom poster. He asked the girl at her house without a bow, tank top, or blue hair dye, but did choose to blacken his face. The student posted pictures of his ask on Instagram, and as I write this article, the post remains.
I shouldn’t have to write an article about the offensiveness of blackface. But here we are, so let’s get into it. Blackface got its start in America in the 1800s as a means to mock, dehumanize, and exploit slaves and exaggerate stereotypes. The continual use of blackface perpetuates the idea that the color of someone’s skin is an acceptable subject of ridicule. It does not matter what the original intent was. It does not matter that the blackface was meant to replicate a fictional avatar. You cannot separate blackface from its racist, colonial origins. The negative effects of blackface still impact and shape people’s lives today.
Thinking that blackface is acceptable in any capacity normalizes the act of taking someone’s ethnicity, using it for your own entertainment, and dropping it when you’ve had enough. That is white privilege: appropriating the color of someone’s skin for your personal jokes and being able to wash it off the next day when so many cannot.
As Lucey pointed out in his Facebook post, one of the most unnerving things about this prom ask is the lack of protest. It had received fifty seven likes. Fifty seven people viewed the post and overlooked its racism. Moreover, 11 people were brave enough to leave comments like “this is iconic,” “GOAT,” and “U the MVP.” Praising someone for blackface does not leave you innocent. By applauding the Instagram post, you are supporting the perpetuation of a racist practice. Even the remaining 46, those who saw the post and liked it, are not innocent. Like Lucey said, it is disgusting to watch students overlook racism in school in favor of saving face.
So who and what are we protecting by keeping our silence on these issues? We are protecting the idea that you can get away with racism if you’re trying to be “funny.” We are protecting the idea that it is more important to maintain relationships and save someone’s feelings than call them out for racism. We are protecting a group of people who are sometimes well-meaning, sometimes just ignorant, but always in need of an education on the impact of their actions. We are protecting the stunted progress of our struggle to heal the racial divide.
The El Gato staff will not protect this act with our silence.
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