http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/12/12/santa_claus_white_fox_news_megyn_kelly_thinks_so_but_santa_s_not_real.html
But many responses have (unsurprisingly) been negative. I’ve been labeled a “racist” more times than I can count, and more than one person has wondered whether or not I think snow should no longer be white. Some of it’s pretty amusing, actually.
But the “controversy” reached its apex last night when Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, along with three (white) guests discussed the topic on her show, The Kelly File. Just before diving in, Kelly made sure to emphatically declare, “For all you kids watching at home, Santa just is white.” It doesn’t get much better from there:
Since Fox didn’t bother reaching out to me personally to debate the issue at hand, I’ll offer up my own response here. Kids, look away …
Santa isn’t real.
Sure, as Kelly File guest Monica Crowley notes, Santa is loosely based on Saint Nicholas, a fourth-century Greek bishop known for secret gift-giving. But while the names “St. Nicholas” and “Santa Claus” are often used interchangeably, modern-day Santa hardly resembles his supposed inspiration, who was depicted as tall and thin and, you know, Greek.He did not have a workshop in the North Pole nor eight faithful reindeer. Santa as we know him today is the result of wild imaginations and creative input from many people across centuries, including, as I noted in my piece, Washington Irving and Clement Clark Moore. He’s utterly divorced from his religious and historical roots.
why is it necessary to tell kids young enough to believe that santa is white, will they suffer a disassociation with reality like Black kids have from being deprived of their reality and only being taught and subjected to commercials that portray and are for Whites, sticking a token in only magnifies the discrepancy.
Finally, changing Santa does not mean we’re being “politically correct.” It means we’re expanding our perceptions of the “norm.” The argument that Santa must be white spills over into conversations about other, equally fictional characters.Can James Bondor Spider-Man be played by people of color? Why not? And yet some people will tell you—believe me—that they have to be white. Of course, some people also believe that characters who were written as people of color are not actually people of color.Which goes to show how deeply rooted the idea of “whiteness” as the default really is. And that presumption carries over into our everyday lives as well, sometimes with sad results.
those my age can remember the White indians, and any other darker skin peoples being portrayed by the current White stars in makeup, they then got give a damn about it and scratched the makeup, the reign of White everything is coming to it's end minorities are now majorities and since they discriminated across the board we all are now a super majority and need to make the first shot across their bow Nov. 4th 2014, be there
