Would it be racist for a person of one race to cosplay as a character of another race if it involves body paint?

Question

Another thread made me wonder: say you really like a black rapper and you're white, there's a cosplay party and you dress up like that rapper which includes dark paint all over your body. The person shows respect for the rapper and isn't doing it in a mocking way, only in a way that allows them to celebrate the character. In your opinion, is that racist since it could be considered blackface, or is it okay bc the person isn't doing it with intention to mock? Explain further if you'd like to.

Btw I would never do this, just genuinely wondering since I saw it on another thread.

Accepted Answer

Blackface, with or without the intention to mock, is insensitive and wrong. You can dress up as a black person you admire without painting yourself black or brown.

Answer

There's no going around that, that is blackface. It's perfectly fine to dress up as a rapper if it doesn't involve putting paint on your body to make your skin color different.

Answer

I think it's racist. It's easy to dress up as a person w/o using body paint.

Answer

Let me reword my comment. In the cosplaying anime world, cosplaying is an art form and taken super seriously, people spend hundreds of dollars and months working on making their costume perfect and as accurate and real looking as possible for conventions and/or photo shoots . When I was into cosplaying I never looked twice at someone dressed and painted as a black, white, asian, character. However, I think like with Halloween when white girls dress in full Native American garb, that's racist and insensitive, dressing up as a real black rapper is fine but the black face is an issue, or just dressing up as a "black person in general" is racist and insensitive. I feel if you aren't dressing as a character and it isn't like your literal life hobby (which cosplay is for many people) that you spend most of your time on perfecting, it's very insensitive and racist. Also actors doing it is wrong, Hollywood should cast someone of the actual race of the character, to play that character instead of making a white actor super dark with pounds of makeup. Or sometimes they don't even do that they will just take out a black or Asian character and cast a white peeps to play them. All those are really awful and racist.

Answer

If you can't portray a character without blackface for Gods sake you must not be that into them.

Answer

It's racist. You can dress up as your favorite rapper without painting yourself black. I'm 100% sure people will still get the costume.

Answer

Unless it's blue or some crazy coloured shit I think body painting yourself another race is offensive under any circumstances

Answer

Interesting how no one ever complains about actors that use body paint to play a character of a different race. 🤔

Answer

I guess I'm the oddball because I would think if you wanted to dress as someone, you'd go all out. And I'm not meaning to make fun of the person.

Answer

I think it depends on the intent, but in general I just don't think it's necessary to paint your whole body a different skin tone to portray a character of a different ethnicity (have fun getting it off later!). Was it racist for my Native American friend to paint her face white for her old school Harley Quinn costume? I don't think so, but it was also "clown white," consistent with the character's makeup, not "hey let's slather you with NW13 to make you look European."

Would it be racist for a person of one race to cosplay as a character of another race if it involves body paint?

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