User blog comment:Raidra/Creepy Craft for Children/@comment-4849011-20141213012652/@comment-4849011-20150107000955

Incidentally, that ad for protective masks for children’s playtime wasn’t the only unsettling mask ad featured in Hey Skinny!. Another ad had a variety of party masks. I think they were for both children and adults, but since the ad touted that you could smoke easily while wearing them, let’s hope they were geared more for adults. For instance, you could get a mask of an ape, a devil, or even Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck. The thing that’s unsettling, however, is that one of the masks offered was “Minstrel”. The dictionary I keep next to the computer defines a minstrel show as “a comic variety show presented by a company of performers in blackface, who sing songs, tell jokes, etc.” To put it less tactfully, a minstrel show was a performance in which performers (usually white, though there were black minstrel show performers too. Times were hard) blacked their faces (usually with burnt cork) and gave performances which depicted African-Americans in stereotypical and offensive ways (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minstrel_show). Yeah. This was not only acceptable, but popular at one point in time. Here’s a link to an ad similar to the one discussed here. (http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2011/01/28/i-saw-it-advertised-one-day-32/) Yeesh! Let's move on, shall we...