By Golly, These Dolls Are Racist
Some people still don't want to admit their racism. Exhibit A - Golliwogs
White people often demonstrate an appalling cluelessness.
A cluelessness buttressed by racism.
Take the recent row in the UK over golliwogs.
A golliwog is a doll that used to be extremely popular worldwide, especially in the American South, UK, South Africa, and Australia.
In other words, places where racism made the minstrel-styled dolls acceptable.
By the 1970’s, the golliwog was finally recognized as a symbol of prejudice and intolerance. This recognition was accelerated by the fact that the word “golliwog” had become a racial epithet.
Even so, just as with other racist symbols like Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben, there was an outcry by some who refused to recognize its offensiveness. Many fans of the doll began to call them golly dolls instead of the full name, as if that would make them more palatable.
It wasn’t until 2002 that Robertson’s marmalade, a popular UK brand of jams and jellies, stopped using their “Golly” mascot. Their public reasoning was that the mascot has become unpopular with children (who obviously had better sense than their parents). The company insisted they were not bowing to political pressure:
“We are retiring Golly because we found families with kids no longer necessarily knew about him. We are not bowing to political correctness but like with any great brand we have to move with the times. “
(Sometimes, all White people have to do is just say, “This was racist, and it was time to get rid of it,” but they don’t have the courage and decency to do it).
Over the years, numerous controversies have popped up over the display of these ugly creatures.
The latest attempt at defending the golliwog occurred in Grays, Essex England. The owners of the White Hart Inn (oh, the irony) thought that it was a good idea to place golliwogs over the bar. Some were hung by their necks over the bar.
Hung by a rope.
Over time, police received so many complaints that they seized fifteen of the dolls from the Inn in 2018.
The owners, Chris and Benice Ryley, doubled down and put more dolls on display, hanging a sign that said,
“We have golly dolls displayed inside on our shelves. If you feel offended please do not enter.”
As complaints continued to come in, they remained defiant, saying that the problems stemmed from “political correctness.”
This February, more complaints were made, and police came and removed the dolls.
After the dolls were removed, Chris Ryley posted that the people complaining were “narrow minded,” and
“These people that call us racist have never ever been to our pub or even been in Essex. Keyboard warriors are the worse people you could wish for. Get a proper job and life.”
It was noted at that time that Ryley had also posted racist comments on his Facebook page, including jokes about Mississippi lynchings.
When asked about her husband’s posts, Benice said
“I don’t know anything about that, you’d have to ask my husband, but I can assure you that my husband and I are not racist at all. At all.”
Vandals decided to break pub windows and paint “racist” on the bar walls.
Then, Carlsberg and Heineken breweries decided not to supply the inn with their beer and issued public statements to protest the golliwogs.
After this, the Ryleys decided to close the bar.
Benice said,
“I’ve had enough now. I’m angry, annoyed and upset, if the police had left it alone we wouldn’t have been in this situation, and we would have plodded along. But the police have ruined it.”
Yes, it was the police’s fault that they were racists.
What the Ryleys don’t know but should is that Golliwogs are relics of the past.
They are symbols of previously acceptable racism.
Unfortunately, there are many kinds of currently acceptable racism.