Comments on: olive, the other reindeer http://www.localoaf.org/2006/12/22/olive-the-other-reindeer/ Information: It's the Magic Fri, 10 Sep 2010 16:37:26 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: Jon http://www.localoaf.org/2006/12/22/olive-the-other-reindeer/comment-page-1/#comment-187 Jon Sat, 23 Dec 2006 08:33:30 +0000 http://localoaf.org/2006/12/22/olive-the-other-reindeer/#comment-187 This post reminded me, as I see it reminded Ken-ichi, of racism in Santa stories. David Sadaris wrote an essay about the Dutch Santa, Sinterklaas, called "Six-to-Eight Black Men". An excerpt: <blockquote>The words silly and unrealistic were redefined when I learned that Saint Nicholas travels with what was consistently described as “six to eight black men.” I asked several Dutch people to narrow it down, but none of them could give me an exact number. It was always “six to eight,” which seems strange, seeing as they’ve had hundreds of years to get an accurate head count. The six to eight black men were characterized as personal slaves until the mid-1950s, when the political climate changed and it was decided that instead of being slaves they were just good friends.</blockquote> The full text is <a href="http://people.cornell.edu/pages/bs16/Christmas/6_to_8_black_men.txt" rel="nofollow">here</a> or <a href="http://filebox.vt.edu/j/juvandyk/pics/6to8blackmen.htm" rel="nofollow">here</a>. If you enjoy David Sedaris, you can hear him reading the essay <a href="http://accordionguy.blogware.com/_attachments/2549525/David Sedaris - 6 to 8 Black Men.mp3" rel="nofollow">here</a>. This post reminded me, as I see it reminded Ken-ichi, of racism in Santa stories. David Sadaris wrote an essay about the Dutch Santa, Sinterklaas, called “Six-to-Eight Black Men”. An excerpt:

The words silly and unrealistic were redefined when I learned that Saint Nicholas travels with what was consistently described as “six to eight black men.” I asked several Dutch people to narrow it down, but none of them could give me an exact number. It was always “six to eight,” which seems strange, seeing as they’ve had hundreds of years to get an accurate head count.

The six to eight black men were characterized as personal slaves until the mid-1950s, when the political climate changed and it was decided that instead of being slaves they were just good friends.

The full text is here or here. If you enjoy David Sedaris, you can hear him reading the essay here.

]]> By: Ken-ichi http://www.localoaf.org/2006/12/22/olive-the-other-reindeer/comment-page-1/#comment-186 Ken-ichi Sat, 23 Dec 2006 04:32:32 +0000 http://localoaf.org/2006/12/22/olive-the-other-reindeer/#comment-186 Not sure why we don't try to terrify our kids any more (see? things aren't getting better). As far as Santa's companions go, I don't know why they may not have crossed the Atlantic, but I'm sure they don't survive today because many of them are somewhat to overtly racist, like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwarte_Piet" rel="nofollow">Zwarte Piet</a>, Santa's black servant who kidnaps bad children and brings them to Moorish Spain. Not sure why we don’t try to terrify our kids any more (see? things aren’t getting better). As far as Santa’s companions go, I don’t know why they may not have crossed the Atlantic, but I’m sure they don’t survive today because many of them are somewhat to overtly racist, like Zwarte Piet, Santa’s black servant who kidnaps bad children and brings them to Moorish Spain.

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