Championship of Russia 2010

[ImaginaryPogue]

NO ONE is accusing DomShabs of being racist.

1. Precisely.

2. oxade, do you believe there is nothing wrong with Shabalin darkening his skin to imitate an Australian aborigine?

3. To use another analogy, if an ice dance team from the Central African Republic (go with me on this one) skated to Germanic music from the 1930's with a Swastika armband on his/her arm, would you feel it was appropriate?

 

[oxade21]

1. Precisely.

2. oxade, do you believe there is nothing wrong with Shabalin darkening his skin to imitate an Australian aborigine?
No, just like as Asian I do not have any problem with Caucasian opera singers putting Asian makeup for Md. Butterfly performance. Or Caucasian opera singers putting black makeup for Othello performance. Or Robert Downey Jr. putting black makeup for Tropic Thunder.

3. To use another analogy, if an ice dance team from the Central African Republic (go with me on this one) skated to Germanic music from the 1930's with a Swastika armband on his/her arm, would you feel it was appropriate?

Exactly, just the fact that you are making these comparisons indicate what's wrong with this whole discussion.

Get over it, Canada.

 

[ImaginaryPogue]

Educate me, then. And don't call me Canada - I'm not representing 32 million people, and seriously, that just makes you ignorant. I'll write my point of view

1. A swastika is a symbol. No one would argue that eight lines arranged as they are in fact offensive in any way. However, the cultural weight of the swastika (which makes it unlikely that people would be ignorant of it, which is a weakness in my argument, I admit) means that people associated it with race hatred, anti-semtisim, the Holocaust, Nazism etc. There's no way around it

2. Darkening of the skin isn't offensive. After all, different shades of skin and altering your look to be another one in and of itself is not offensive. But like anything that's offensive, the symbol and context have to be explored here. And here, it invokes race hatred, minstrel shows, lynch mobs, segregation and the general subjugation of an entire race (Here is the wikipedia article on the subject).

So, can you see where I'm coming from, or is it best that we just don't debate each other as our viewpoints are so far apart?

 

[oxade21]

Educate me, then. And don't call me Canada - I'm not representing 32 million people, and seriously, that just makes you ignorant. I'll write my point of view

1. A swastika is a symbol. No one would argue that eight lines arranged as they are in fact offensive in any way. However, the cultural weight of the swastika (which makes it unlikely that people would be ignorant of it, which is a weakness in my argument, I admit) means that people associated it with race hatred, anti-semtisim, the Holocaust, Nazism etc. There's no way around it

2. Darkening of the skin isn't offensive. After all, different shades of skin and altering your look to be another one in and of itself is not offensive. But like anything that's offensive, the symbol and context have to be explored here. And here, it invokes race hatred, minstrel shows, lynch mobs, segregation and the general subjugation of an entire race (Here is the wikipedia article on the subject).

So, can you see where I'm coming from, or is it best that we just don't debate each other as our viewpoints are so far apart?

I do see where you are coming from. I see that you are trying to see things that simply do not exist. There is no correlation between "symbol" (not sure where you saw that in D/S dance) and context. Just the fact that you are making these far reaching conclusions from the fact that the White dancer decides to paint his face to get into character (no matter how flawed that character presentation is) is really what's wrong with the current state of the international FS. None of the arguments made so far indicate to me that that was the intent nor do I see anything wrong with the fact that they even tried to go that route. This debate just illustrates that this sport is so subjective that even makeup and costume would be interpreted in totally twisted way by any side of the argument. So I would suggest you not argue your flawed viewpoint with me.

 

[ImaginaryPogue]

Fair enough. If you can't see the symbolism of a white guy darkening his skin to imitate an aboriginal man, then we're not gonna see eye to eye on anything. But thank you for taking the time to respond.

 

[life684]

I read the other board, and it seems the very idea of DomShab's OD is unfortunate. The dance may be found offensive not only because of the make-up and costumes, but also because of the moves and even the fact that non-Aboriginal persons are performing it.

Looks like the only way they can proceed with it in it's current form, is to get an official approval from Australian Aboriginals.

I think D/S should get approval from aborigines on the coloring of face as well as on the dance. The authenticity may silence some critics. also, i would like D/W to go to Sangeet Natak Akademi (Government of India organisation for performing arts ) for certificate of authenticity of D/W dance.

But then the problem with this discussion is that this is an annual occurrence, isn't?, if they retire some other russian team will get that position.

D/S won the russian nationals, and very few in russian believe they robbed anyone of the there worthy olympic spot. I don't think B/S or R/S (they were battling each other) believe they would have finished ahead of the D/S. If K/N was present and they performed a program vastly improved from GPs probably would have won, but they didn't turn up for the competition. As for europeans, lets discuss the outcome after the europeans rather than now.

No one knows how bad Maxim's knees are, or whether he can actually get to full fitness before the olympics, if they feel they are embarrassing themselves and they have no chance to improve they will definitely not compete (its they who should feel embarrassed not you for them ).

Educate me, then. And don't call me Canada - I'm not representing 32 million people, and seriously, that just makes you ignorant. I'll write my point of view

1. A swastika is a symbol. No one would argue that eight lines arranged as they are in fact offensive in any way. However, the cultural weight of the swastika (which makes it unlikely that people would be ignorant of it, which is a weakness in my argument, I admit) means that people associated it with race hatred, anti-semtisim, the Holocaust, Nazism etc. There's no way around it

By giving this example you may have actually offended or in some people 's disrespected a religious symbol.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika

Swastika symbol example exactly shows the problem, the truth for one person may not be the truth for an another, regional factors comes to play. Please do read the entry because the sysmbol predates hitler, and the symbol is considered auspicious by more than a billion people.

 

[jennylovskt]

Get over it, Canada.

I don't understand what does it have to do with nationalities?!:scratch: What's the difference your Americans make?! You shout this way, so your opinion could get cross over more and better? Such claim could easily offend many Canadians and easily dismiss your might be otherwise valid arguments.

 

[oxade21]

I don't understand what does it have to do with nationalities?!:scratch: What's the difference your Americans make?! You shout this way, so your opinion could get cross over more and better? Such claim could be easily offend many Canadians and easily dismiss your might be otherwise valid arguments.

Who said that I care what Canadians think? It's just becoming the trend that every annual rant and whining comes from the posters from that part of the world.

 

[jennylovskt]

Who said that I care what Canadians think? It's just becoming the trend that every annual rant and whining comes from the posters from that part of the world.

Well, this just showed how isolated and narrow your way of thinking is. And I know you are not alone even on this board.

 

[life684]

Article by Beverley Smith in "the Glode and Mail"

Ok she can criticise the skating , but she is already cooking up conspiracy theory.. .

Just read this section...

None of us knows where this is going to end, but it’s clear that the Russian officials would like to see Olympic medals, no matter what and the marks were their message of intent.

Referee of the dance panel at the Russian championships was Gorshkov, who also doubles as head of the ice dancing technical committee of the International Skating Union, with plenty of weight to throw around at the Olympics.

And the technical controller at the national dance championships was the ponytailed Alla Shekhovtsova, wife of Russian federation president Valentin Piseev. Shekhovtseva, who always has strong opinions about skaters, will probably show up at the Olympics as a judge or some kind of official, although no one knows why the ISU would ever allow a federation president’s wife to judge.

After all, aren’t judges’ marks now rendered anonymous in the new judging system, so their votes can’t be tampered with by federation presidents? So there won’t be any more scenarios like at the Salt Lake City Olympics, when French federation president Didier Gailhaguet was said to pressure French judge Marie Reigne La Gougne into judging for the Russian pair over Canadian pair Jamie Sale and David Pelletier?

Watch and see if Shekhovtseva judges on an Olympic panel.
There will be a Russian judge on the dance panel, but Russia is guaranteed to be only on the first panel, the one for the compulsory dance. After that, they’d have to survive a draw for subsequent portions of the event.

Canada is in the same boat.

 

[chuckm]

There just is no NEED for Shabalin to darken his skin (and it's his entire costume, designed to make his entire body dark) to portray an aboriginal. It's the DANCE he's supposed to portray, not the person(s) who originated it.

Brent Bommentre and Kim Navarro are doing an Afro-Brazilian dance this year, and they did an African dance two years ago. In both cases, they skated in their natural skin color.

IMO, the crazy costumes and dark skin were intended to divert attention away from the fact that Shabalin really can't skate well.

 

[Buttercup]

Brent Bommentre and Kim Navarro are doing an Afro-Brazilian dance this year, and they did an African dance two years ago. In both cases, they skated in their natural skin color.

I'm not going to discuss D/S and their choice of costumes, beyond noting that they are immensely unflattering. The OD is a mess and the FD, too. If Maxim's knee makes it impossible to skate at the level they are capable of when healthy, they should not be competing. Period.

However, since you brought up N/B: I had pretty good seats during the OD at TEB, and I really don't see how what they wore can be interpreted as "their natural skin color", nor do I think it was particularly respectful of the culture the dance was supposed to represent, especially Brent's outfit.

Folk ODs are rarely accurate portrayals of the actual dances, and DomShabs are not the only team with outlandish costumes. As to whether or not they're offensive - you guys can carry on that discussion without the benefit of my amazing insights .

 

[KKonas]

Article by Beverley Smith in "the Glode and Mail"

Ok she can criticise the skating , but she is already cooking up conspiracy theory.. .

Just read this section...

Bev has a point re Alla being allowed to judge since she is related to Russian Fed Pres. Just a quick look at the 2009 season in Ice Dance - Alla judged Worlds, Nebelhorn Trophy (Referee), GPJapan (judge), GP Russia (judge), GPFinal (judge) and Russian Nationals. She has judged the GP Final the last 5 years, 2006 Euros, (and probably every Euros for years) 2006 Olympics (and every Olympics since Piseev has been president of Rus Fed.), plus others that I can't find on the internet. One would think she was the only ice dance judge in Russia. She always gets the "plum" judging assignments and will undoubtedly be on the panel in Vancouver. Of couse it has NOTHING to do with the fact that she is wife to Piseev. She's just wonderfully lucky!!!!

 

[luvsasha]

IMO, the crazy costumes and dark skin were intended to divert attention away from the fact that Shabalin really can't skate well.

for some reason I think that is incredibly funny in an incredibly sad way.

 

[jcoates]

It really is interesting to see how throughout all of Oxade21's rather narrow-minded comments, there has been little to no acknowledgment of the criticism of this dance coming from Australia. That in and of itself should make all the difference in this matter. It's even more distressing considering that she lives in a country still dealing with it's own longstanding history of racial tensions.

If anyone takes the time to examine race relations in Australia between the majority white population, especially those descended from the original British settlers, and the indigenous population, you would find that the issues of how the nation, as it now exists, was established is still a source of painful memories, tension and at times shame. In fact, the current prime minister apologized, after years of refusal by his predecessors, either this year or last for the dreadful program the country ran where indigenous children were forced to attend assimilation schools that stripped them of their cultural heritage. That is one of the reasons now why there are so many efforts today to preserve and appreciate that culture and to acknowledge, even in the face of deniers, that significant wrongs were done. ANY attempt to pass on their culture is now done extremely carefully. That's why it matters that there was no apparent consultation with the people being portrayed by Linichuk. This is also a major issue, because the added time off due to Maxim's injury should have allowed for any choreographic, costuming and sensitivity issues to be ironed out IN ADVANCE despite the expected loss of skating quality. Something like this should not be an issue this close to the Olympics.

Now it does not take a genius to notice the striking similarities between the recent histories of the indigenous people of Australia and the First Nation tribes of Canada and Native Americans in the US. In all cases, these people were nearly wiped out over time in a massive land grab. Hindsight shows that there should be an effort made to preserve as much of those cultures as possible, in part as a means of atonement. Any such action should be done with great sensitivity.

Now the reason why the reactions of African Americans or any other people of color are relevant in this context is because all non-white people in the US and likely in Canada have had a history of second-class status and have been subject to the kind of insensitive treatment that blackface represents. (As an Asian you might want to research that yourself, if you are unaware.) As I and others have said, these sorts of representations are offensive to wide range of people because of these very similar histories around the world.

The fact that such a history exists does not make people who are unaware of it racist, but it does not exclude them from having any responsibility to learn about the culture of the people they plan to represent or those of the venue in which they plan to perform. And by the way, if I were Oxade21, I would really cease telling people to get over their personal issues when it comes to this subject. That is a blindingly harsh, insensitive and shortsighted statement when you consider the millions of people who have lived through some very difficult periods in past decades. Those wounds don't heal easily or disappear quickly.

 

[Anna]

Photos

 

[chuckm]

I also believe Oxade21 would do well to "get over" her sensitivity to any criticism of Russian dance and pair teams.

Criticism of DomShabs' OD and FD is completely justified just on the basis of the performance factor alone. Shabalin is not able to skate at even an acceptable level of performance because of his injury. He is dragging Domnina down with him.

 

[Wicked]

I like Oksana and Maksim, and I believe they deserve better. I want them to get the respect they deserve at the Olympics, and I do not think this programme will accomplish that.

ITA. I'd hate to see them be harshly judged, or worse, booed, for something they never intended and that has nothing to do with their skating. I really don't think they designed this dance to insult. Skaters choose costumes and make-up to enhance the character of the program. It's not in their best interests to present themselves in a way that is off-putting. I think D&S just aren't aware of how a lot of people are going to see this.

Remember Miki and her crazy costume at the beginning of the season with the weird make-up? It didn't go over, she realized it, and it was changed. I hope that's what happens here.

 

[Hsuhs]

Comparing this "Aboriginal Dance" (quoted from D&S ISU Bio for 2009/2010) to the frequent interpretations on ice of Bizet's "Carmen" is not relevant. "Carmen" is not presented as a Folk Dance/Country Dance. It is simply an opera. This is like trying to compare apples and oranges, and simply serves to obscure the points that critics of the new D&S programme are trying to present.

It was me who brought up Carmen. I used it as an example of something very well known, even overused, and still being a product of rather questionable authenticity. The plot can be tracked back as far as the early 19th century Russia, when a member of one minority group wrote a story about members of another minority group, and that the resulting portrayal can be considered biased. The fiction was then further reworked by several other non-Gypsy authors, the main characters received new names and found themselves in Spain.

Carmen's been used in OD a number of times, but, you're right, it's never been danced as a folk or country dance, I stand corrected. Those who used it for their ODs, simply danced to the tunes of the opera. There's no way to prove that the costumes or moves of those ice dancers are inspired by the story or that the female partner is trying to resemble a Gypsy woman.

The authenticity may silence some critics. also, i would like D/W to go to Sangeet Natak Akademi (Government of India organisation for performing arts ) for certificate of authenticity of D/W dance.

You know and I know D/W ain't going to be able to get such a certificate from the said body. Can we please, please lower the standard for D/W and refer them to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of India, where they'll have a better chance?! I just love their OD this season!

But then the problem with this discussion is that this is an annual occurrence, isn't?, if they retire some other russian team will get that position.

You mean Domnina and Shabalin are hated because they are Russian and gold contenders? Oh. I sincerely hope it's not the case here. Because that would be so so wrong.

 

[mishieru07]

I'm an Asian living in Asia and seriously "blackface" isn't taboo in my country (well we have a sizeable population of Indians but no one bothers with make-up if we do Indian dances). The offensiveness of "blackface" is something I learnt from the US and Canadian posters. Clearly, I don't think you can really blame DomShabs for being somewhat ignorant of the history and how offensive it is.

I seriously don't think DomShabs have any intent to offend anyone. (Why would they? Gain brownie points with Speedy? Cause a controversy in Vancouver?). Personally, I would rather they just lose the make-up. D/W have proved that you don't need make-up to do a good folk dance (they sure don't look like Indians to me).

That said,
10 years ago:
Sam Newman of Footy Show fame appeared in 1999 in blackface to mock Aboriginal AFL legend Nicky Winmar. The irony was quite overwhelming considering that his great playing prowess aside, Winmar had shot to national prominence after famously lifting his shirt and pointing to his black skin in response to the racial taunts of Collingwood supporters. Newman’s buffoonery sparked widespread media coverage and howls of outrage, particularly among black Australians.
http://nit.com.au/blog/?p=302

Yeah. If it could potentially be offensive to the Aboriginals, I sure as hell hope they get rid of it. It would be plain rude to offend the very people whose dance they are trying to portray.