spontaneous poster advertising for #ausnahmslos in Erfurt, via twitter
After the racist media reports in the aftermath of New Year’s Eve in Cologne, a group of feminist bloggers and authors have launched the call #ausnahmslos. Together with hundreds of signatories, they are calling for “Against sexualized violence and racism. Always. Everywhere.” and formulate demands to politicians and the media.
The appeal can be co-signed here.
While campaigns such as the Golden and Rusty Radiator Awards raise awareness of Western development organizations’ unjust views of the global South, they do not go far enough. Critiques of cliche media representation must be coupled with critiques of fundamentally unbalanced power structures. For an analysis of the mentioned awards as well as video clips such as “Who wants to be a volunteer”, see our essay on pambazuka.
On July 10, 2014, ZDFneo showed the documentary “Der Rassist in uns”. Volunteers take part in the so-called “Blue-Eyed Training”, which is designed to let participants experience first-hand what discrimination means. Does the experiment really make clear how racism works? Does it help fight and push back against racism? “Miteinander – Netzwerk für Demokratie und Weltoffenheit in Sachsen-Anhalt e.V.” finds no and argues in the article “The authoritarian character. The ZDF Project ‘The Racist in Us'”that the experiment contradicts an “emancipatory educational work”. In our opinion, the approach of Blue-Eyed trainings, which aim to evoke empathy and understanding in White people (“in four hours you can empathize with what racism feels like”), rather trivializes racism experiences of Black people and People of Color. Racism is reduced to an interpersonal level instead of addressing the complex interaction with societal and institutional levels. From our perspective, the experiment neglects not only perspectives of resistance, but also the historically grown, structural character of racism, which Ahmer Rahman’s clip on Reverse Racism sums up well.
The Berlin band Knorkator advertises their latest record with racist motifs and the slogan “We want Mohr”. We heard it on radioeins, saw it in Berlin’s streets and couldn’t believe our ears and eyes, but did nothing. Fortunately, not everyone has remained inactive: for example, the Initiative Black People in Germany has written a statement and the blogger Atif Hussein has exchanged letters with radioeins – rbb.
On August 30, 2013, Deutschlandfunk broadcast the feature “Musikalische Missionierung. Baroque music from the jungle”. Lena Böllinger has written a letter in response to this, which we would like to make public herewith. Several organizations have signed it, including glocal.
Addendum: Judith Grümmer wrote a response for Deutschlandfunk, which you can find here.
Dear Sir or Madam,
I heard your August 30, 2013 feature “Musical Missionization. Baroque Music from the Jungle” on Deutschlandfunk. I am deeply appalled and outraged by the way colonialism and the related missionary activities of the Jesuits have been addressed. At no point in your feature is there a critical reflection on the connection between missionization, colonial history of violence, and racism. Instead, the feature attempts to whitewash and legitimize missionization as “soft colonization.” In doing so, it updates and reproduces colonial-racist stereotypes and white[1] superiority fantasies. Continue reading
In recent days, both a colonial racist broadcast series and a racist commercial have been shut down. While it’s not entirely clear what prompted Pro7 to discontinue the Reality Queens of Safari broadcast series, extensive criticism from NGOs and many others certainly contributed, in addition to low ratings. The campaign against the show even managed to be mentioned on Spiegel Online. In the case of the Ferrero commercial, the matter is clearer. Media such as Neues Deutschland, taz and Stern reported on it, but above all there were many letters from readers and a storm of criticism in “social networks”. Even if insight could look different than explaining to us conceptually dumb people that “[b]y the current advertising […] it is a question of the representation of a product variation of Ferrero Küsschen with white chocolate” and that “[a]lle statements […] thus refer solely to the white chocolate [beziehen] – of course without xenophobic ulterior motives”, Ferrero has decided to revise the advertisement due to the “critical voices […]”. The video clip was withdrawn and the slogan “Germany votes white” is no longer on any advertising posters.
In Berlin-Hellersdorf, the citizens’ initiative Marzahn-Hellersdorf defends itself with T-shirt imprints such as “No to the home” and the dates of the pogrom in Rostock-Lichtenhagen against a planned home for asylum seekers in their district. In Berlin-Reinickendorf, tenants have hired a lawyer to enforce that children from the neighboring home are no longer allowed to play on the playground in front of their house. In Aarau, Switzerland, the city council prohibits asylum seekers from visiting the local swimming pool, sports facilities, library and churches.
At the same time as these racist actions, ZDF is launching the show “Auf der Flucht – Das Experiment” (On the Run – The Experiment), in which German celebrities are to set off “to the countries of origin of asylum seekers in Germany” and thus “experience first-hand [erfahren] what it means to be on the run”. Instead of letting refugees themselves have their say, German state television prefers to produce a program full of racist assessments and descriptions. Nadia Shehadeh has written an open letter to the ZDF television council. It can also be signed here .
Incidentally, RTL and Pro7 are currently broadcasting similarly problematic series: Wild Girls – Mit Highheels durch Afrika and Reality Queens of Safari. The latter has now been discontinued due to low ratings and extensive criticism from NGOs and many others. Not unreasonably, a commenter on africaisacountry wonders “What’s wrong with the Germans?”
Emer O’Toole, writing in The Guardian, sheds light on the neocolonial way in which the gang rape of a female student in New Delhi is being reported in the British and U.S. media. This comment is again criticized by Sunny Hundal: According to him, India does not need a well-meaning defense by whites who are afraid of being labeled as racists. Rather, Indian women should finally be listened to.
