I'm glad this thread is being revived just in time for Thanksgiving! It seems very fitting that we get all huff and puff about other cultures putting on black-face right around the time of year we throw feathers on our kids' heads, slap on the war paint and sit down to stuff our faces and be thankful we were on the "winning" side of that genocide. There's a really tasteless joke about a pot and a kettle in here somewhere... I'm not even gonna touch that.
While it may be fun to point fingers at cultural differences and get infuriated at the "intolerance" and "racism" in other cultures, it is just as "intolerant" and "racist" to not respect our differences and diversities. It is belittling to Dutch culture to mock their traditions simply because they don't mesh up with the contemporary, bleached American consumerist-based amalgam of myths that we choose to celebrate.
Anything is offensive if you look at it hard enough. Why is Santa white? Why has he enslaved "little people" (Are they elves? Are they not real people? Are they children?) to do all his work for him? What does his wife's role play in all this? Why must she just wait on him hand and foot? That's pretty sexist... HOW DO THE REINDEER FUCKING FLY?!
Every culture has it's dark past; a foundation of blood, violence and oppression. Dutch are not immune to that, Americans are not immune to that, that is just the cold reality of human history. What the focus *should* be on is the present, the core of the myth, the morals being taught through tradition, the values that these stories teach which are the sole reason why these traditions persist.
We must not forget the atrocities of the past, but rather learn from them and progress into the future. Forcing a culture to adapt their traditions to a "superior" ideology is simply oppressive and intolerant. No one is hurt by these stories and they persist for a reason. They are not being told as a way of indoctrinating a new generation of slave owners any more than the Americanized Christmas story would be inciting a wave of mass enslavement of children or dwarves.
Just live and let live. Our cultural differences are what make this planet beautiful, let's try to focus on and respect that.
With that said, the choice is really in the hands of the individual. The core morals and values of pretty much every holiday around this time of year are doing the right thing, being kind to each other, coming together, etc. If you guys want scramble for more reasons to get upset at each other that's definitely an option, just not really one I personally would prefer to take. There's enough negativity in the world to go around, we really don't need to create more.
Happy holidays, everyone! :romance-heart: