‘Unacceptable’: Black Lives Matter Malta Calls Out ‘Blackface’ In Educational Campaign On Road Safety
Anti-racism movement Black Lives Matter Malta has called out the possibility of ‘blackface’ in a road safety educational campaign video.
The video was released by Mapfre Foundation, as part of a campaign called ‘Street Smart’, and Black Lives Matter Malta said it has “a problematic association between blackness and bad or reprehensive behaviour”.
“BLM Malta is calling out this campaign and also the wider and pervasive anti-blackness that is found in various levels of Maltese society,” it said in a press release.
“BLM Malta also finds it necessary to stress the importance of recruiting people with diverse origins and backgrounds in positions where decisions are taken so that such unacceptable productions are challenged and prevented from being released,” it continued.
The campaign, which is mainly aimed at families and children, features a family labeled as the Safe Family, as well as a character named Mr Careless.
“While the Safe family respects the rules, Mr Careless constantly makes poor decisions and is reprehended by the Safe family for his behaviour. Mr Careless differs visibly from the Safe family, where he is not only dressed in black but his face is darkened and his hair is textured, and also the only one to have hair.”
In the advert, there is an obvious contrast between the Safe family and their yellow but lighter colour and Mr Careless and his darker colour and textured hair.
BLM Malta also made reference to previous concepts such as “black is bad”, where darker tones are often associated with a negative connotation, or negative personality traits when compared to lighter skin tones.
“We also know that such associations between Black and ‘something undesirable’ are made in Malta, for example through the common use of the phrase ‘mela, jien iswed?!’.”
“And we know that for a section of the Maltese population, blackface and its negative history and connotations is not taken seriously – as seen when government-owned Manoel Theatre’s director justified the use of blackface in one of its productions,” it said making reference to a previous incident.
The organisation also pointed out that the video was released right after the launch of Malta’s anti-racism strategy, as well as being aimed at young children and is therefore passing down the wrong ideas to future generations.
Malta Public Transport denied the possibility of blackface, saying that, “it is clear that the characters in this educational video series are crash test dummies, and the actors’ faces are painted in yellow and grey paint. There are no references to any race in this production, which was created solely for the purpose of promoting road safety.”
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