It’s that time of year again. Soft cotton covers buildings and and lies densely at their feet, clouding up the street, children count days till gifts, be them Hanukkah, Sinterklaas or Christmas-paper wrapped, and weather reports announce the onset of a short ice age. Everybody seems to be huddling against the outside world.
As was I. With a glass of wine and some butternut squash risotto. Friends and family gathered around our green plastic dining room table while the curtain-less windows looked out on a deep blackness, just beyond the glass, reflecting our own images back at us.
The conversation quickly turned to Zwarte Piet and Sinterklaas. Some people are none too happy about those two moseying in. Two newbies to our circle admitted to having seen their arrival, and having been shocked by it. “The most racists thing, ever”, they gasped.
Some of us who grew up with the Dutch Sinterklaas festivities reacted; “It isn’t racist. It’s a party. For kids! Besides, parents tell their children he comes through the chimney. That’s why he is black. It’s soot. He’s not a slave. Anymore.” The thing is, he never was. Bare with me.
(It’s worth noting most corners were well represented in the conversation; Dutch, Antillean, African, Asian.)
Even though the chimney story doesn’t explain Piet’s kinky hair or big red lips, I could not find fault with it. Much like Santa’s helpers, to me, Zwarte Piet is not human. He’s not real. Sure, he was at some point. But now he can hear you all year, he scales roofs, he jumps down chimney’s and he has an endless supply of candy. How human is that?
It was always implied that ‘the original story’ involved our hideous history of slavery one way or another, but children learn about that later. If the system does not fail them they will already know that not one color is better or different from the next.
When young, those same kids are worried about candy, carrots, hay, putting their shoes out, and singing in tune. One black friend who grew up with Sinterklaas says simply; “It’s just fun. There is no reason to look for underlying motives. It’s a guy who brings by candy and it became a tradition. That’s all.”
I never thought it racists either. I do think that looking for those underlying motives within both the white and black communities can give way to populism and might make room for racism.
“Surely a white man putting on ‘black face’ to play a black man is offensive!” someone shouts. Why though? What is offensive about it? Sinterklaas also puts on white paint to play a white man. In fact, in Curaçao, black men often put on white paint to play Sint.
The reply comes quickly; “Why is Piet black? And if he has to be black, why can’t a black man play the part? Why a white man dressed up? And why so stereotypical with the red lips and curly hair?”
In Curaçao black people do play the part. They also sport the curly wigs and painted on red lips. Who says it is white men dressing up like black men? It’s white men, and black men, and latino men. Maybe we should wonder why there aren’t any woman. Surely Sinterklaas isn’t a misogynist?
But the stereo type! That horrible stereo type; they say. They mention the lips, the black paint, the relationship between Sint and Piet. Yes, it’s a stereo type. But of what exactly?
The black devil that accompanied Saint Nic during his days of duty in Germany and the Czech Republic in the 15th century? (Derived from the Germanic god Wodan, who some say is precursor to Father Winter, and his helper Eckhart who filled the boots of Wodan’s loyal believers with gold)
Or of the legendary Saint Nic who fought the devil and won, making the king of the underworld his servant? The devil, back then, was called the black one – referring to the black peck of hell; not the color of his skin. (Philosophical debates about why black stands for evil and white for good are currently being held at the blog next door)
More often heard is that Saint Nic paid the ransom for slave Petrus of Moorish origin, thereby freeing him. Petrus stuck around to lend old Nic a helping hand. As the tradition rooted itself in Dutch society the story gained ground. According to this tale, Saint Nic came from Spain.
And yes, to the European rich and aristocratic alike, a Moorish slave was ‘normal’, fashionable even. The slaves were dressed in exotic customs so as to seem ‘relaxed’ and horrifically shackled at the ankles to prevent their escape. But Piet or Petrus was not a slave.
The first Dutch images of Zwarte Piet stem from 1850. They were conjured up by Dutch school teacher Jan Schenkman, together with Sinterklaas’ steam boat, his trusty white stallion who nimbly transports him from rooftop to rooftop and the gifts that fell from the chimney on the eve of the holy man’s birthday. In the picture book Piet works for Sint. Schenkman intended the story to be a pedagogy tool.
And we haven’t even discussed Nikolaus yet, the real person who was born in Myra, now part of Turkey, in approximately 260 A.D. and died a lifetime of Holiness later on the 6th of December in 340 A.D. (They think.) The man who is celebrated every year and in several countries. The patron Saint of children, women, sailors, thieves, the weak and the fragile. The man who did not have a slave.
So what stereo type are we rejecting? That of a freed (fictional) slave? That of a symbolic devil? That of a Moorish man? That of a master-slave relationship? That of a black man working for a white man? What if Sint were black? Would he be a bomba then? And why are we rejecting it now?
It seems to me that while the Dutch enjoyed a progressive reputation, that of a liberal country, tolerant and open, there was little complaint about the multiple-passport carrying Saint. But as Holland has become more conservative with its leaders, its people try to identify, divide, expel and dispel.
Turning Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet into a political agenda point feels both misplaced and superfluous. If the Netherlands is aware of its history, if their world-renowned education system and pedagogically infused up-bringing is as strong as they claim, could it not embrace Sinterklaas and his employees? Could their former colonies – the Antilles and Suriname – not do the same?
Tradition is about who you were AND who you are. Improving ideals won’t hurt, nor will understanding the pain of others. But before we change a children’s festival should we not properly identify the problem and should they, the children, not be taught to withstand any injection of hate mongering or racism – year round? And can the past not stay part of our present? If it can’t, have we learned nothing from it?
I propose that we leave Piet and Sint the way they are. One gentle, gray old man, and lots of happy, beautiful faces. Both fictional characters based on historic figures with many different roots and realities. Both meant to teach and entertain, but most of all, both meant to inspire goodness in everyone.
Maybe we could add some white Pieten. Would that solve the problem?
Getting rid of Piet, who to most children is a mischievous elf, is not going to solve the resurfacing problem of nationalism in countries like the Netherlands and its former colonies.
* This is the fifty picture project after all. So my picture this week has little to do with the subject matter in this blog other than I found it a nice example of two beautiful girls happily sharing a moment.
