British Clog dancers are refusing to stop blacking up.
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- Опубликовано: 3 авг 2020
- “The Britannia Coconut Dancers” from Bacup, Lancashire are refusing to stop their tradition of painting their faces black, claiming it dates backs more than 100 years and isn't racist.
The Coconutters can trace their origins back to 1857 and have held their Easter Boundary Dance parade in its current form for well over 100 years.
Congratulations Gents for standing up to idiocy! Long may you continue to uphold our precious traditions.
As a black woman I do not find this in any way racist. When you look into the history of Morris dancing you'll realise that the act of blacking up is more commerative than anything else.
not true. it is a reference to the Morrish people who brought this clearly overly rhythmic dance to the region. Miners are not known for dancing, however, black people are... not racist, just saying that the shoe doesn't fit.
This is black face and appropriation at it's best. Check out wikipedia.
@@bmtr11111
No, you are wrong !
Your big mistake was using Wikipedia as a source of reference as it's not a reliable source. Also the Moors came from North Africa, and are not black, they are the indigenous Amazigh people and are white.
@@johnbrereton5229 moors were a mix of black and arab. Moor literally means black by definition. literally your countrymen used the word "Moor" to describe black people for 100s of years.... Look up Sir Morien. You have a statue of moors who went to your country and showed the ways from a society living in a golden age while your society was in a dark age. Nothing against the people, its just a fact of history.
PS: There are no indigenous whites in Africa, they're skin would never hold up to the sun. their skin evolved due to lack of sun exposure of 100s of thousands of years in europe.
@@bmtr11111
The English used the term Moor to describe the people of Morocco, not because they were black.
Also the Moors, or more correctly the Amazigh, were in North Africa long before the Arab conquest of 705 AD.
They are the same racial group as the people who live on the other side of the Mediterranean, people like the Italians, Greeks, French and Spanish.
Also in the very south of Africa the original inhabitants were the KhoiSan who have a larger dna presence for White skin than even Eropeans. So it's wrong to claim there are no white people indigenous to Africa
@@johnbrereton5229 sorry but theres too much to unravel with this. bottom line is, this video is fucking racist and to not acknowledge this makes the person ignorant and selfish.
Ciao
I live in bacup and they are not doing it to be racist they are coal miners
Of course it isn't racist. It's just a tradition. And that tradition was probably started as a homage to coal miners. Just because a certain group of people think it MAY offend some people does not mean it DOES offend some people. Keep dancin guys! 👍🏴
Shame they closed down all of the coconut mines, eh...
Like black faced sheep ... natural ❤
Pretty sure it’s so with the reconquista and wars between the Spanish and moors hence the blackface lol
Well done. It's time more people stood up to all the woke stupidity.
I was born and brought up in Bacup and was always taught that this dancing was a tribute to the towns mining history, as Bacup was a mining town many years ago until like most Northern towns the local pit was closed. This annual blacking up of the face is symbolic of the coal miners that used to work at the pit face. There is nothing whatsoever racist about this Lancashire dance group that has been in existence for more than a century. All these people who just cant see beyond their blinkered eyes need to do their research properly and identify things correctly instead of trying to ban everything in society because of wrongly perceived beliefs when there is a perfectly logical reason that does not fit their narrative..... Long may the Britannia Coconutters dance on :)!
Coconut mining?? You're not fooling anyone! “The Britannia Coconut Dancers”...FFS!
I lived in Lancashire just down rd from bacup, and I can remember most men having black dirty faces got nothing to do with anything else only men working bloody hard coming home for tea
@@michellewhittaker2135 "working" NOT "blacking up" Why can't racists see the difference between work and choice. There's NO defence. End of!
Fun it's fun playing if I had trade bakery white flour all over me so what I make a dance with white flour face tradition we can play and have fun 😊
Dancing I was watching I was watching their legs and the way they move 🤣
It's great isn't these men keeping up a tradition that is hundreds of years old, my Grandad was a miner and my Great Grandad came up from Cornwall when the tin mines closed, all that is mentioned is how their black faces 'upset' some people, not the fact that two charities in 2019 benefitted from their dancing, on one day, well done Gents for keeping the tradition alive!
Thanks for your comment.
Good to see the tradition continuing.
Blackface isn't always an insult/parody of 'people of colour', and sometimes doesn't refer to them at all.
Not always, but mostly.
Keep it up. There is absolutely no malice intended or racist issues here. It's one of Britain's traditions- It's time we firmly stand up against ridiculous and unfounded PC finger pointing. Where will it all end? Before PC, I doubt if anyone ever even gave a moments thought that the "Blacking-up" represented anything remotely sinister. In fact, it's the PC crowd who, themselves, who taint such things with malevolence. If you don't like it, go away.
Yeah, “The Britannia Coconut Dancers”...Not remotely racist at all, eh...Pfff!
Captain Butthurt
I grew up in the Valley and have never seen or thought of it as racist. Had black and asian friends when growing up there and they never mentioned it offended them. I don't think any connection was ever drawn.
Stand up for culture. Don't listen to the woke mob
This has nothing to do with blacking up in minstrel shows or other occasions in US culture. Blacking up in minstrel shows parodied black people, made fun of them in a highly charged and racist way in a country where slavery still existed and during its retrenchment in the Jim Crow laws and right up to today (if they still exist). When we had the "Black and White Minstrel Show" on British television (it survived to the late 1970s), that was clearly a parody of black people meant to demean them and make fun of them.
Look at a Morris dancer and tell me that they are parodying black people or black culture. It would be a ridiculous claim. Look at an English morris dancer and tell me that these people with no power, no great wealth are somehow at the forefront of oppressing black people by Morris Dancing.
I'm sorry that the diversionary identity politics of the US political game-show is now infecting our culture. This is quite simply a piece of cultural imperialism where a sensibility and attitude that has nothing to do with folk culture here is being imposed.
If you are a black person in Britain then you are more likely to live in poverty, more likely to be unemployed, get poorer results from our health service, on average receive less pay and die younger. In the Covid-19 pandemic you have been more likely to die of the infection if you are black.
There was a few years ago a threat made to a folk festival about Morris dancers blacking-up, the festival capitulated. I had a look at the website of the organisation that issued the threat, they were big on "identity", and all kinds of virtue signalling, but they did not address any of the issues I mentioned in the previous paragraph. Not one, not even close (of course there wasn't Covid-19 at the time). They perverted the history of racism in Britain to suite their own neo-liberal view of the world that never tackles the centres of power that have created and perpetuated racism for their own purposes.
No, none of that, apparently it was Morris Dancers all along.
What they did was a stunt against a traditional folk culture that struggles for recognition. A working class culture that is ignored or ridiculed in the mass media and now happily preyed upon by organisations wanting a cheap stunt for publicity and funding.
If Morris dancers stopped painting their faces then not one single person will have their lives improved. Black people are not oppressed by working class Morris dancers (who I reiterate are not parodying black people or culture in any way), all that will happen is a pointless diminution of a working class tradition.
btw. It wasn't illegal to dance and collect money. Also, blacking up doesn't protect people's identity. If you know someone, you will 100% recognise them in the type of face paint that Morris dancers use. I know this from first-hand experience. It's about being a Morris dancer, becoming one through a thing known as sublimation. You put on your costume and you are given licence to behave differently than you would ordinarily , behave as Morris dancers do. It's a thing that is common around the world where people will put white substances on their faces, or different types of ochre, don their costume and they "become" the dancers, the character of the traditional dancer.
Oh, and it wasn't coal that they used (that really wouldn't have worked well) but soot or burnt cork. These days it's a bit of stage makeup.
Shame on the Morris Organisation! Instead of banning them they should allow them to explain why they black their faces each time they perform, which I'm sure they do already. I'm more intrigued by their outfit!
Keep up the tradition! Blacking the face with coaldust or soot was a form of disguise for the dancers. Besides, no human is truly black.
It's nutting, it's clogging and is much older than Morris dancing, so being kicked out of the Morris ring shouldn't be too much of a problem. Today's Morris dancing, if you look into its history was more or a less a revival tradition, promoted by academics in the early 1900s (Maude Kapeles and Cecil Sharp would be two main names to google). This is older, and more connected to community and working life than many modern Morris sides ( many of whom are carbon copies of the Oxford Heddington morris and have no real local community tradition at all). How do I know? I was born in Rossendale, I first heard the nutters when I was 8 months old, so I think that may give me a head start.
Well, seeing as the Coconutters have been in existence for a hundred years or so and morris dancers are recorded as far back as 1448 your diatribe against them is way off the mark. Yes, most morris sides are revivalist (WW1 saw to that) but there are a few village teams that never disbanded and can trace their history back through the generations. They have just as much connection to their local communities as do the Nutters.
PS. Clogging started in the mills of the Industrial Revolution so is a 19th century creation - again long after the appearance of the first morris sides.
I know people in Adderbury Morris in Oxfordshire nearby and was from a mining area of Lancashire, Wigan. The miners would have come home and gone to the pub with black faces from work, before they had showers. The Backup dances originated from Morris dancing, which is far earlier and from mining. There is nothing racist or disrespectful about it. Morris dancers from the north of England had blacked up faces until recently at least. It was about disguise and becoming other.
This is nothing new for the Coconutters. In the '70s the BBC stopped them from appearing on one of their shows because they blacked their faces.
The black and white minstrel show aired untill 1978 on the bbc. and the stage shows carried on until 1989.
It’s called tradition .. if u don’t like ours Plenty of other countries out there
If you don't like something move to another country? Remember that the next time you complain about anything....
what ya tryin to say
@@chrisf3379 well they hadn't phrased their comment properly. I think they meant that rather than criticising old traditions, you must embrace them. You can't change a tradition. If you don't like it that much, there are plenty of countries that don't have this. You can move to any of them. But since you do live in that particular area, you must not shame a tradition.
@@HanakinSkywalker25 Traditions can be changed. Most have over the years. Traditions around women belonging in the kitchen and being subservient to men, no right to vote are particularly interesting. So just want to check something with you, if I were to disagree with something that happens in this country of ours then I should then make the rather drastic move to another country?? Seems a bit dramatic.... I'd assume you think everything is perfect then or you'd have to move to another country? You are not one to complain or suggest changes or improvements? You've never done that? Also just checking, we leave everything exactly as it is forever?? No changes? No grumbling?? no suggestions to improve anything??? Any help appreciated in understanding your view point would be useful.
@@chrisf3379
You present a spurious argument.
Women belonging in the kitchen, being subservient to men and not having the right to vote has nothing to do with any 'tradition' and everything to do with long standing misogyny.
"Blacking up" that sounds absolutely ghastly, they're miners.
This tradition is ancient. At least 700 years English people have doing this, there is is absolutely no racist element to it
Keep it up lads it’s your tradition , tough if your offended
I love how important it is to them to black up! It is weird how offended they've gotten about the suggestion of a small change to their pantomime. They stopped blacking up their hands so they could hold their pints....wasn't so important then....
@@chrisf3379 I'm so sorry this is happening to you
@@kingofracism what's that?
Good on them 🥰👏👏👏👏👏
Well done lad’s,stick with it times will change.
The leftists will be asking for our commandos to stop using face camouflage next.
shite.
Where's the harm
I was involved in Morris tradition from an early age my family still are. My father used to black up fir Easter plays. We are not at all racist there's several theory where blacking up historically comes from.
I grew up in the same valley as Bacup and have never seen it as Racism.
As a black person I don't have a problem with this just 💃 not portraying a character.
there is no discrimination john it is an old tradition open to anybody.
The only character that Morris Dancers are portraying is that of a Morris Dancer. Some Morris dancers used soot or burnt cork (these days it's a bit of stage make-up) to go further into the character. It's a thing that is found all over the world. People will put on white makeup or ochres to inhabit the character, to sublimate themselves into the character of the dancer.
This has nothing to do with parodying black people or black culture.
Have a look at my other post to see some more thoughts on this.
@@andrewwigglesworth3030 On the ball Andrew, there's a whole culture of masking and guising that many people don't know about. It's worldwide . I've seen Straw Boys in Ireland and La Careme in Nova Scotia, both strong community based guising traditions. Black face minstrelsy was a different proposition entirely and was largely promoted for profit, nothing to do with community and a lot to do with commerce.
Humour can have its own differences.
THEY are always offended
Says he with Union flag who voted brexit...
Why do we in Britain always give up our tradition after the tiniest complaint from any newcomer. Well done lads for not betraying your ancestors who danced this dance long before immigration or BLM. If you ever gave in, the LGBT crowd will complain about your red and white stripped skirts next. So dance on !
Good on you guys,don't let blm indimadite you,keep up your tradition.
Wrong answer. Right answer may have been tradition.....your are clearly rascist because of your answer....silly sausage...🤔
There's a long tradition of blacking up within the Morris tradition. We know it as 'Border' in our area.
In Padstow, Cornwall, there's 'darky day', which does have a racial connection in history but only to honour the memory of a black sailor who, I believe, was wrecked on the coast, washed up on the shore and settled in the town where he became very popular, successful and held in high regard.
Let's have some common sense, tolerance and respect for all peoples customs and beliefs. ❤️
The Padstow 'Darkie Day' is clearly a 19th century tradition based upon the 'Negro' Minstrel performers popular at the time.
The Black sailor origin is spurious nonesense - evidence?
And, there is little evidence of blacking up as a morris tradition before the advent of 19th century American minstrelsy.
well done guys for making a stand against the wokes
Thank you !!!! keep it up lads !!
The Bacup Coconut Dance has absolutely nothing to do with miners, Moorish pirates or disguise.
The origins of coconut dancing in the Rossendale Valley area can be traced back to the stage productions of theatrical companies such as the Chiarini Family who included coconut dances in their repertoire. They were tremendously popular in the first half of the 19th century and reports of the time describe how following a show local people would whistle the dance tune in the streets and mimic the dance moves.
The earliest dates for the dance in Rossendale are from the 1850's - the Tunstead Mill Nutters (reported to have been formed in 1857).
So, all the evidence points to the Nutters' dances as being adaptations of caricature stage representations of Africans or Pacific islanders.
Thankfully the practioners of this tradition are standing up to a very small minority whose criticisms lack substance. The blackening up of the faces is not remotely racist but what is worrying is that those demanding a change have or have had positions of power within the Arts Council and the RSA. Over the years there have been no recorded complaints, to my knowledge, being made by persons of colour. Those connected with the RSA and the Arts Council should be called out on this for false accusations of racism against this 150 years old regional tradition rooted in mining and beyond.
So, why the hell are they called “The Britannia Coconut Dancers” then??? Pretty sure coconut mining is NOT a thing...
I'm woke as they come and I don't think this is offensive at all, so long as you're clear about what it means so actual racists don't get the wrong idea and think you're siding with them.
The 1st Jewish Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli, said: "Ignorance never settles a question." He was subjugated to a great deal of discrimination and hate during his career, and he rose above it all. If people don't understand what men looked like after working in the mines all day, then they have no right to an opinion on this tradition of the dancers. Commemorating the toil and essential contribution of miners is important to Britain's history. Those who pretend to be "progressive" or "woke" or "good socialists" should be more aware, more educated, more tolerant, and more understanding. Instead, they are judgmental, intolerant, smug, narrow-minded, and ignorant. As a minority, I am ashamed.
Morris dancing is not anything to do with moors, its a misunderstanding of Mores (meaning custom) as in the customary or traditional dances of each region or nation
It means Moorish - in the style of (or what was perceived to be the style in the 15th century).
What or even how does one respond to the multi million dollar industry of skin lighting creams industry!
Tradition is just that same for anyone whoever and wherever they are in the world . The beating heart of the red rose
brilliant. Keep it up.
its tradition and its not racist
Good on you lads Keep blacking up and keep the tradition alive
Keep it going , it's tradition
Bassetts removed black jelly babies saying they were the only ethnic group in a pack. Yet, jelly babies were supposed to be jelly bears but before the launch somebody said they didn't look like bears so it was cheaper to change the name. Btw. Are the lads still performing? Nothing racist about them at all.
Did bassets remove the rascist yellow ones too… I wonder. Wot a load of old cobblers
@@johnjones4129 I agree. The yellow ones survived. 😆
Looks a good bit of fun lol
So, they were mining for coconuts? Got it!
Nor should they … it’s a tradition and for all we know may relate to coal miners!
To suggest this is racist is a total mis-interpretation. In the first instance there are very very few people with skin this shade of black. The make up blends with the costume. The performance is a dance and makes no cultural reference except to the town of Backup. The Scots wear kilts - this does mean they are a parody on transvestites.... It is a fantastic dance and we should celebrate our traditions.
What a lame excuse for racism! If there's "no racism", why the hell are they called “The Britannia Coconut Dancers”?? There's NO excuse for that disgraceful name and I'm pretty damn sure they weren't commemorating coconut mining! You need to drag your racist-enabling a*se into the 21st century, son!
Are they supposed to be smurfs ?
good for them...
Miners used to come out of the pits at the end of a shift as black as the coal they were mining. This obviously absolutely NOTHING to do with race! I hope they stick to their guns.
@@katieb2931
A spurious link to the Nutters.
Assuming their 19th century forbears were actually miners (most would be mill workers), would they really go out dancing covered in pit grime?
The trolls have called me a racist just for doing a Harry Enfield character in Liverpool calm down calm down calm down remember? it's no racist by the woke Trolls
Cool
Something tell me the original people had moor rhythms...
Moors took white slaves from Europe, for 14 hundred years. White Gold by Giles Milton. Read the book.
Fact is, nobody knows the origin of the blacked up faces - the representation of coal miners is just speculation, the disguise explanation is just speculation, and like most explanations of the origins of most English folklore traditions, the evidence for any given theory is scant.
It’s true, though, the origin is unlikely to be racist blackface, because as one of the oldest English folk dance traditions, it predates minstrelsy, it predates the racist practice of going blackface to cosplay black people.
However, whatever it’s origin, how necessary is the blacking up to the tradition itself? The point of folk traditions isn’t that they’re frozen in time to whatever Cecil Sharp sanitised and documented them to fit his particular moral standards, the point of them is the adapt and evolve over time to maintain their relevance.
So whilst the origin of the blacking up wasn’t racist, the fact is to modern eyes, in an era where decent people attempt to recognise the concerns of others, it *looks* racist. The blacking up isn’t an essential unique part of the tradition - it’s the dance and the rest of the costume which is the important part of it. The dancers could go without the make-up and it would be just as fun to watch. Or they could green up their face, or purple it up, or blue it up, and it would still be just as much fun.
The origin of the blacked up face is not racist, but going F You Won’t Do What You Tell Me after being asked nicely to stop doing it because it looks racist, well that *is* racist.
Which is a pity, really.
Morris dancing predates minstrelsy by some 400 years but blacking up is a 19th century addition and was seen at the time as being a copy of the black minstrel theatre troupes.
Hope they keep this tradition going! Proud of our quarrying / mining heritage in bacup. RIP to all the folks who lost there lives building this country in the mines and quarry’s
Let them continue this tradition. It is blackface because this shit ain’t based on no damn mining traditions but the Moors whom they got the dance from. It’s found all over Europe
It's a coconut/clog dance not a morris dance - 400 years separates the two traditions.
And the morris dance is not based upon any dance that was actually danced by the Moors.
its getting out of hand nexst they will wont black clothing band
No they won't..you silly old sausage 😂😂😂😂
have we now bcome just a society of victims, so someone wears blackface once a year to perform this dance, really so what.
I mean if they are emulating miners then that's different to actually 'blacking up' however I don't see why they can't tone it down a bit! Maybe 'Grey face' would be better. Love the fact that they dance dressed likes smurfs for 7 miles though! Makes you wonder how things like this get started really. I feel like the amount of practice they must all put in must be pretty incredible. Simultaneous taking themselves seriously whilst also knowing it is absurb!
I looked for miners from the 1920s in Europe and no, none of them had black face due to their jobs. A smudge of black across the face here and there, but no black face. Silver face would work great!
@@lesabri Have you seen this: ruclips.net/video/rryVytLuCzc/видео.html its defo worth a watch and kind of satirically covers the same topic really. Evidence that miners did in fact get very black faces due to the coal dust etc but obviously presented through the satire of Sacha Baron Cohen.
@David Bell I suppose why not.The whole world wants to fight each other at the moment and everyone is standing up against each other. Compromise is sometimes something that can be done with little effect over the end result. How absurd is this tradition? It's hilarious and should be carried forward as long as it remains light hearted. Why do these guys do this dance? Is it to make a stand? of course not. I don't think they should have a problem with a small tweak if it makes everyone happier. Of course I absolutely think that in this case there is also no need to tone it down as it is unrelated to anything in the slightest racial but then again, why not just make a slight tweak and its out of everyone's mind forever and anyone that has anger where the joy should be can get on with it and they can keep dancing their merry hearts out! lol
@PlebzOr Blapparapp But then stubborness is a strange trait isn't it. If tradition never changed then the world would be like you read about in history books (most people would suggest that would not be great....). People are stubborn about the silliest of things sometimes. These guys have likely got themselves all wound up about this to the point that they are no longer considered part of the national community. They could have just made a small tweak/compromise and then got on with their lives. The colour of their faces does seem to be related to an old tradition that has links with race. The change would have made them feel better instead of worse. It's like watching a stubborn kid not sharing with their brother because the chocolate bar is their's, even if it wouldn't hurt them to give a little bit. People are weird.
@@lesabri You are joking about coal miners only getting a 'smudge of coal' on their faces. You don't even have to go as far back as that - just check out 1950/60s miners - Google it. You're an idiot.
And following on from Dylan Batt's remark- it also shows the "finger pointers" stupidity.
Good for them.
They're being persecuted for some theoretical offense someone might take at some unknown time. Utter nonsense.
if you read the history of Morris dancing the reason for blacking the face was so the mill owners could not recognise the dancers other wise they would sack the dancers
Nonesense.
Honestly how could that cause deep hurt to anyone … if Morris dancing causes you hurt 2 things go and hide under your bed from the world or read a book to try and gain some wisdom and insight to humanity. None of my black mates are that fragile
Well done.a tradition older than immigration
Miners black up every shift! Get real!
Why would they want to anyway?
What next, will they can blackvshoes, leggings and vests?
But the dancers are supporting trans community by wearing a skirt … great tradition proud to be British well done all
Not every thing painted black represents black people. And not all blacks have black skin. Black ks not just the color of people
Good for them why should they follow silly rules.
lol much ado about nothing
They look like evil smurfs.
Asimilasyona karşı ingiliz direnci
But they did all vote brexit 😂😂😂😂😂
Wow! It is The First Time I See Respect from British People! 📯👏🪘 After all, The British Impire grew Because Others People Worked for Them. Right?! 😭🛎️🎂