So as I suspect the Indie/ Giorgio wanted - it's all caused a bit of a fuss, blacking up Kate Moss for their Africa edition.
I've always liked Hannah Pool's writing in the Guardian. Right now I think she's better than ever. "Blacking up has become acceptable in the same way that pole dancing is now sold to women as an empowering thing to do. Both assume that the thing they are poking fun at no longer exists - ie discrimination, racism and sexism. But of course they are wrong. If blacking up existed in a society where racism was not an issue, then it would not be such a problem. But then it would also lose its power to shock. After all, what is so shocking about a white person being made to look black if black and white are equal?"
And the BBC Magazine's Paper Monitor gave it a bit of a roasting too...
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The Grauniad article was excellent and thought-provoking, and exposed these "live as a black person for a day" programmes as the crap they truly are.
But how on earth can she equate the shocking likes of Al Jolson and The B&W Minstrels with Desiree DeVere and Avid Merrion's Michael Jackson? I thought that was bizarre.
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