Zwarte Piet / Black Pete

Each year on Dec. 5th, the morning before the feast of St. Nicholas, children all over the Netherlands and parts of Belgium wake up excited for gifts and candy while thousands of adults go to their mirrors to apply brown paint and red lips. In their Zwarte Piet costumes, they fill central Amsterdam and small village streets, ushering in the arrival of Sinterklaas who, in the Dutch tradition, rides a flying white horse.

Zwarte Piet was introduced in 1845 in the story "Saint Nicholas and his Servant," written by an Amsterdam schoolteacher named Jan Schenkman. In the story, Sinterklaas comes from Spain by steamship bringing with him a black helper of African origin. The book was wildly popular and with it began the inclusion of Santa's helper in Dutch Christmas festivities.

Despite a rising tide of concerns and complaints about Zwarte Piet being a racist caricature, most Dutch folks are fiercely devoted to the holiday tradition and insist "Black Pete" is a harmless fictional figure who doesn't represent any race. Zwarte Piet is frequently defended as part of Dutch cultural heritage, and those who don't like it are often bluntly invited to leave the country. Many Dutch say Pete is black from the soot he picked up climbing down chimneys to deliver presents -- but that doesn't explain the frizzy hair and big red lips.

Why do so many Europeans, and the Dutch in particular, still rationalize the use of this racial caricature? They know it's hurtful to blacks and other minorities, but they also resent and fear the presence of blacks and other "outsiders." Just like in America, Dutch whites fear multiculturalism for what it represents to them -- the loss of political control by the white majority and their culture along with it.

Those who defend Zwarte Piet are fighting harder now to protect him because they see that public opinion is turning against them. It's important to remind everyone that this is not about American blacks or the history of blackface in America. It's about the history of racism in Europe.