Julianne has gotten quite a bit of flack over her choice of
costume. She was not in “blackface” as
is being reported, she was in “extremely tanned.” She has now been forced to profusely
apologize. She should not have
apologized. She should have stood her
ground and held her silence. This was
not a slip of the tongue that caused mainstream media to toss Martha Stewart
under the proverbial bus. No, this was a
Halloween costume based on a character.
Miss Hough did nothing wrong.
The Martha Plimptons of the world saw a fine chance to get
in the spotlight. Any publicity will
do, even if it shows your ignorance, apparently. And it is quite ignorant to blindly tweet
your narrow-mindedness, as a quick perusal of Plimpton’s Twitter account will
plainly show.
If it’s not okay to dress up as a character
of color, it must not be ok to dress up as a fat woman. What about men dressing
up as women for Halloween? And then
there’s the whole cross dressing thing.
If it’s wrong to dress up as a black character, it must be wrong for a
man to dress as a woman, according to Plimpton logic.
Is there any difference, really, between an actress dressing
up as a character and an artist painting a nameless African American face? I think not.
Julianne Hough was not racist, she was dressing up as a fun
character that she personally liked.
Racism is all in the attitude, not in the shade of someone’s skin or the
makeup they choose to wear. Racism is
not nearly as alive and well as a select few would have you believe. If the Jessie Jacksons, Al Sharptons, and
Martha Plimptons would be worried about such things as the (un)Affordable” Care
Act bankrupting middle class America, we would all be a lot better off. With the many real issues in the world today
that we can be concerned about, why spend your day worried about a Halloween
costume?
Some people dress up and have fun. Others look for ways to be offended.
