Race relations in the Netherlands: Is Zwarte Piet racism?
▻http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21588960-debate-holiday-tradition-exposes-racial-attitudes-zwarte-piet-ra
One group in the country’s north who had planned to paint themselves as multicoloured “rainbow-Piets” had to give up after receiving death threats. Anouk, the Dutch representative at this year’s Eurovision contest, was attacked with racial epithets for her opposition to the custom. When a Jamaican researcher for a UN cultural panel said she thought Zwarte Piet was racist, she was overwhelmed with racially offensive e-mails. Geert Wilders, the anti-immigrant populist whose Party for Freedom is currently on top of the Dutch polls, tweeted that he would rather eliminate the UN than Zwarte Piet.
