White Teens in Alleged Blackface Captured at Six Flags: 'Disgusting'
By: Shira Li Bartov (Newsweek)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
NewsBlackfaceTeenagersHigh SchoolRacism
Two white teenagers have been accused of wearing blackface and harassing Black visitors at a Six Flags in Illinois.
Footage from October 9 showed the teens lining up for a ride, their faces smeared all over with black paint. One of them asked a Black rider, "You like it?"
Visitor Asiah, who posted the video seen over 1 million times on TikTok, said Black customers were also Airdropped a racist meme. The screenshot image showed a Black child holding a toy, along with the message, "Buy me one." A response read, "No. Black people can't be sold anymore."
@asiahsavon
Blackface at sixflags….
♬ original sound - Asiah
Asiah said on TikTok, "We got stuff AirDropped with the name 'jigaboo jones' when there [were] no other Black [people] around."
The posts sparked swift outrage on social media, with viewers quickly identifying the white teens as students at Grant Community High School in Fox Lake, Illinois.
"Hi @GrantBulldogs! One of your students, Isaac Handley, decided it would be funny to go to @SixFlags in blackface and ask some black children if they liked his and his friend's painted faces," said a Twitter user. "This is disgusting behavior!"
In a statement to Newsweek, Grant Community High School said it "condemns racism in all its forms in the strongest terms possible," calling the actions of its students "racially insensitive" and "extremely disappointing."
"When this video came to our attention, we took immediate action to share our concerns directly with the students, their guardians and appropriate officials," said school officials.
Here, visitors line up for a roller coaster ride at Six Flags Over Georgia. Two white teenagers have been accused of wearing blackface and harassing Black visitors at a Six Flags in Illinois. Rick Diamond / Staff/WireImage
Newsweek reached out to Asiah for comment.
A culture war over children's education about race—often grouped under "critical race theory"—has stormed across U.S. schools, sparking book bans and arrests at chaotic school board meetings. Meanwhile, blackface scandals continue to plague school communities.
In January, parents in Iowa sued their Black child's school district after a TikTok video showed a student wearing blackface while another pretended to beat him, finally mimicking an execution-style shooting and holding two thumbs up. Last year, an elementary school staffer in Oregon wore blackface during a protest against COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
Rhae Lynn Barnes, Assistant Professor of History at Princeton University and an expert on the history of blackface, told Newsweek that blackface was actually part of U.S. school curriculums for over a century. Since the Civil Rights Movement, the caricatured makeup has continued to circulate among young people.
"Part of what is happening with young people, specifically young white men, is bonding through shock value," said Barnes. "Teenagers push boundaries and test limits. Few things are more shocking than blackface, and it has always, sadly, served as a form of class or cohort cohesion building through this grotesque form of othering."
Once a feature of stage performances, blackface has grown more accessible to young people through social media, said Barnes.
"Blackface is a cultural and visual language that lends itself well to online jokes and impersonations," she said. "There is also the element of anonymity—instead of hiding behind a blackface mask on stage you are behind the glow of your cell phone or laptop screen, where you are shielded from the immediate repercussions of your actions."
Tags
Who is online
90 visitors
"Part of what is happening with young people, specifically young white men, is bonding through shock value," said Barnes. "Teenagers push boundaries and test limits. Few things are more shocking than blackface, and it has always, sadly, served as a form of class or cohort cohesion building through this grotesque form of othering."
Always? Is that what Al Jolson tried to do? Time and mores change. I don't think people considered it racist back then.
I'm not sure when blackface became offensive , but when Jolson was doing it blacks didnt have any place to complain to even if they wanted to, which many of them probably did.
It is no great mystery why it is offensive, it harkens to the days of minstrel shows, which are now considered to have been entirely racist in nature.
How about when Trudeau did it? Was it racist then?
Maybe one of them will be a democrat governor some day?
Uh, yeah.
It is part of their DNA.
That was in Canada more than 20 years ago, and I don't remember there being any such sensitivity about it in Canada back then as there obviously is now in America. I also doubt you would have been aware of what the situation was in Canada back then.
Buzz, if you think blackface is not considered racist you are crazy.
What do you mean "sensitivity"?
Buzz may just not fully understand the history behind it.
Yes, I consider it racist now, but it was not the first thing on my mind decades ago. It has been made into a big issue, and I don't recall its being such a big issue back then. By sensitivity I meant "awareness" which is the word I guess I should have used. And I don't like the insinuation by ANYONE that I'm a racist. I'm white, married very happily to a Chinese woman.
when the topic arises in the news, it is a big issue.
I dont think you are racist, I think you dont understand this issue.
I understand the issue quite well, but I guess I'm not as familiar with it as a person who lives there.
They are going to get caught doing that crap by the wrong people one day and they will end up crying like babies.
Perhaps, and then that will be a life lesson, something that alot of younger people have been shielded from.
Jesus, why? Why would you even want to do this?
Pure teenage dumbasserry.
I don't know. I was pretty dumb as a young person, but I wasn't racist and dumb.
Of course no one complained when two black men put on white face and maid a movie in drag.
Do you ever read the articles or just make off the wall comments...