[user104658]

Originally Posted by jet

I would agree with all that, TS, apart from the last paragraph. I think it would be a stretch for black people to think anyone was making fun of them by dressing in Zulu costume for a festival. It's a hell of a long time since the majority of black people were primitive or tribal....and white people were once primitive and tribal too...so no dressing as a caveman....

Maybe so but it's not that long since the majority of western people incorrectly THOUGHT that they were, a couple of centuries at most, and of course there are still a few pockets of people who think that way. So my point I guess is that while the people actually dressing up might have no ill intent at all, there's always the risk of a misunderstanding of those motives. I mean, you can say "Well if they misunderstand and get angry that's their problem", which I guess it is, but it's also not an attitude that's actually going to improve the situation as a whole... Where constructive dialogue about the reasons for doing it might.

Basically instead of a town saying "It's tradition so we're doing it and if you don't like it, tough!"... They could give out information about the history of the event to give it proper context and say "It's a longstanding tradition that we feel is positive, here are the reasons we have for continuing it, we hope people aren't offended by it."

There's a world of difference there without anything else actually having to change much.