If you have to ask whether it's blackface, it's probably blackface

Well, this is problematic.

Is it me or does it seem that every other week some artist paints his or her face black, or dons a war bonnet in name of being controversial and provocative? While I understand that being controversial and provocative is Die Antwoord's raison d'etre, it achieves nothing but relies on petulant adolescent shock value.

And while I also understand that it's easy for a US blogger to paint with big ol' American brushstrokes when it comes to race, Die Antwoord is from South Africa, a country with an equally complicated history of race and inequality. Salon's Aisha Harris says:

"The culture of blackface and minstrelsy in South Africa dates to the 1860s, when English settlers arrived. Since that time, a minstrel festival, first known as the Coon Carnival, has been held in Cape Town every year. The Kaapse Klopse, as it is now known, primarily features the working class coloured population of South Africa these days, participating in a subversive act meant to reject white superiority and the images it has thrust upon them."

In other "What were they thinking?" news, my hometown zoo's Halloween decorations look like lynchings . With ghosts in blackface, no less. They were eventually taken down but how could you look at this picture and not think this was a bad idea? From theGrio:

“It was like a complete outrage to me, it was very hurtful,” said Chris Burchett, a zoo patron, after seeing the photos on the zoo’s Facebook page. “The picture appeared to be African-American people hanging from a rope.” Zoo officials contracted an outside vendor to make and install the display. The ghosts were meant to look faceless, with a light in their heads, so they would light up at night. But during the day, only the black faces were visible, which officials say gave the wrong impression.

The media here has been largely silent about this, which disappoints but does not surprise me.