The Golliwog saga

[MKG]

Normal warnings against rises in blood pressure apply ...

The woman initially charged with race-related offences for having a golliwog in her window now has no charges to answer as no evidence was offered in court - for what I consider to be the wrong reasons, but hey ...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-15429369

I hate racism and racists, but I've had about enough of this kind of rubbish. As far as can be ascertained, the term "Golliwogg" was coined by Bertha and Kate Upson in an illustrated story of 1895. There are other attempts at defining the origin of the term, but they're all anecdotal. Here's the story, if anyone's interested ...

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16770/16 ... 6770-h.htm

The Golliwogg is described as a gnome, plain and simple. There is another character in the story, referred to as a "jovial African", and yet another - a black minstrel called Sambo - lending weight to the idea that the Golliwog most certainly should not be associated with any ethnic group (unless gnomes have ethnic groups).

Why on earth should the entire country be held to ransom by those who can't be bothered to do basic research? The golliwog name, together with terms such as "black hole", do not belong to nor are defined by people who are ignorant of the reasons those terms came into being. Golliwogs, and the people who treat them as the toys they are, should not be accused of any form of prejudice because some rabid agenda-follower willingly (and, I suspect, knowingly) misinterprets facts.

I had a golliwog when i was very young (my Mum, bless her cotton socks, still has it). Never once (and it's my mind so I should know) did I attribute any racial interpretation to it - it was just a golliwog.

So there

Mike

P.S. I might have a go at alien abductions next. Or not.

[wabbit955]

i still have my golliwog he is now 44 years old and has jimmywog embridred across his cheast
and he never upset any one :O)

[Thomzo]

I must admit to being confused as to why the term was considered insulting. I, too, collected the toys off the jam jars and thought they were great. Given that most people thought of the toys with fondness and affection, I don't know why the name was deemed a racist insult. Hopefully, someone will enlighten me.

Zoe

[Ellendra]

Maybe it was deemed offensive to gnomes?

[JuzaMum]

Golliwogs have been banned from our local vintage market . Too much PCness about

JuzaMum

[Green Aura]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2 ... ures11.g21

Whatever the derivation of the word/item its use over the last 100+ years is racist. The sentence about Salman Rushdie near the end of the article sums it up.

While I'm sure that a white child owning such an item doesn't make them racist, it might bear thinking how it looks from a black child's perspective.

[contadina]

My two best friends at infant and middle school were black and they had the entire collection (jealous...moi?) and most black friends today have a soft spot for the gollywogs of their childhood.

Sadly, the gollywog cause has been taken up by a lot of racists (I know of a couple of tat-shop owners, who are openly racist, and make big gollywog displays along with their St George paraphernalia. I suspect that banning gollywogs gave idiots like this yet another way to show their stupidity.

[gregorach]

From the article:

Jena Mason, 65, of College Lane, Worlingham, was arrested after a neighbour complained to police.

My emphasis.

If you want to cause somebody some trouble, make a complaint about them to the police. The police are legally obliged to follow up all complaints, no matter how spurious. It's not actually their job to decide who is or isn't guilty of an offence, that's the job of the courts. Yes, this means that spurious complaints can cause people a lot of trouble. However, the alternatives (allow the police to ignore complaints, or give the police the power to decide who is or isn't guilty) also have their own problems.

The unfortunate fact is that if someone decides to cause you trouble in this way, there's very little you can do about it. Basically, all of the stories of this form result from not actually understanding how the legal system works. Or fails to work, as the case may be. The law is indeed an ass, but nobody seems to like the alternative.