Obama Costumes: The Blackface Question

I wasn't surprised at all to see tons of photos of people dressed as Sarah Palin for Halloween, and I wasn't surprised to see relatively few people dressed as Obama. I think several reasons factored in:

a) it reflects the disproportional interest in Sarah Palin in this election
b) more women than men dress up for Halloween because women are creative and interesting and men are boring and lazy
c) the sticky situation for white people of how to dress up as a black person without crossing the offensive line into blackface

Sure, there's a big difference between using makeup to achieve a verisimilitude to famous and respected African-American person and the incredible racist connotations of classic minstrel blackface. But yet... it does still feel weird, right? I assume that along the road of having our first black president, there will be many moments where issues of race will have to be faced and resolved. One of these first ones is going to be "is it ok to wear black makeup to imitate our president?" Imitating our president is an inalienable American right and revered tradition, and a cornerstone of our national comedy. In order to move on as a country, the black makeup issue has to be resolved once and for all.

Here's a few brave souls who were willing to test the waters in this new frontier. Trailblazers holding an olive branch, or provocateurs who deserve a punch in the face?




This one is clever, but skirts the issue:


F.Y.I. this last photo is titled "Negro Muggers for Obama" and has "scary negro" as one of the tags. I guess we still have a long way to go. Sigh...

If you sinking into a deep depression over that last photo, please just stare at this insane cuteness below, and you'll instantly feel better. Obama and a Unicorn:

UPDATE: It has been brought to my attention that the "scary negro mugger" is actually in reference to the story of the crazed McCain supporter who claimed to have been attacked by Obama supporters, but really did it to herself. It's actually a pretty clever costume to dress up as the fictitious mugger dreamed up by the crazy girl.