Stetson University Women Under Fire For Blackface Costumes
Players Painted Bodies Black, Wore Fake Gold Teeth
Members of the Stetson team dressed up as school basketball star Grlenntys Kicking Stallion Sims on Halloween by painting themselves black, wearing cornrows and fake gold teeth. Some players wore the blackface costumes to a contest to a Deland bar, according to the Stetson student newspaper.
The blackface photos some how ended up on a Web site this month and have since outraged civil rights activists at the Southern Poverty Law Center in Alabama, Local 6 reporter Tarik Minor said.
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"I can see why people would consider it offensive," Sims said. "They said they wanted to dress up as us but they didn't say they were going to paint their bodies or anything. We are real close with the softball team and we didn't think anything of it. We gave them our jerseys."
Some people on campus are angry with the photos, saying they remind them of the humiliation and mockery blacks suffered before desegregation, Minor said.
"Not too many people know the history of blackface, student Cameo Humes said. "It was a form of basically mocking African Americans by painting their faces black and giving them exaggerated features, such as big lips." Sociologist Leonard Nance said the students did not realize their costumes would spark controversy.
"It could be offensive to some people and could not be offensive to some people," student Kevin Gallagher said. "The thing is that if they go out in public like that or they go to a bar, they are going to offend somebody." The women who wore the blackface costumes are required to read a book written by Tim Wise called "White Like Me," write a reflection paper and have conversations with the school's diversity council.