Gems like 'Henry Jones, Your Honeymoon is Over', racist

[Victrolacollector]

I have to agree. History is history, you can bend it twist it but it does not change history. In no other area can some one pretend that something happened the way they want it, than history.

These recordings are a link to our past. The good the bad the pretty the ugly. We as a country have hopefully learned from the past and as a result have became better.

I agree eventually we will see funding cut to those entities which display what is deemed "racist" artifacts. At 41, I am not young and not old, but old enough to contrast a period of time when this country was more united than it is today.

I played a record for a friend Golden and Hughes, and they were doing their skit and he could not believe the content. He said I dont want to hear it its racist....on on and seem to think its a crime that I have such records.

[edisonplayer]

I don't want to get political,I just want to enjoy the music.edisonplayer

[VintageTechnologies]

The past can't be properly viewed or interpreted through Politically Correct glasses. It is what it is. The current attempt to purge Confederate symbols from public view is revisionism straight out of the Third Reich, the Soviet Union or George Orwell's writings.

More in keeping with this thread's topic, most humor is based on absurd situations or "different" people. Racial humor at the expense of all groups was a staple of comedy in earlier times. (Irish, Jewish, Oriental, etc.) I've never heard anything on old records that would be characterized as vicious or hateful - the stuff was meant to be funny. Those records are documents of public tastes at that time - let's preserve that perspective for future generations to study, whether good or bad. Do you want to see something culturally offensive? Watch "The Jeffersons".

[phonogfp]

The past can't be properly viewed or interpreted through Politically Correct glasses. It is what it is. The current attempt to purge Confederate symbols from public view is revisionism straight out of the Third Reich, the Soviet Union or George Orwell's writings.

More in keeping with this thread's topic, most humor is based on absurd situations or "different" people. Racial humor at the expense of all groups was a staple of comedy in earlier times. (Irish, Jewish, Oriental, etc.) I've never heard anything on old records that would be characterized as vicious or hateful - the stuff was meant to be funny. Those records are documents of public tastes at that time - let's preserve that perspective for future generations to study, whether good or bad. Do you want to see something culturally offensive? Watch "The Jeffersons".

Very well put.

This isn't so much a political discussion as a societal one. With mainstream media obsessed with finding opportunities to be "offended" for various groups, it's all too easy for young people to assess history through a 21st-century pop-culture lens. I sincerely hope that eventually they will come to understand that everyone is more or less a product of their times. Al Jolson in blackface is no more racially degrading than some of today's rappers and hip-hop artists. And a more balanced historical perspective may help prevent these same millennials from someday themselves being labeled as purveyors of puritanical moral superiority. Many of them are simply following where they're being led during their times.

Some of the KKK records of the 1920s and much of the wartime propagandist pop tunes (ala Spike Jones) can be vicious. But rather than destroying these records, they should be preserved and shared as examples of how otherwise good people can be misled through fear and demagoguery.

This is pretty heady stuff for what's supposed to be a fun hobby. I agree with Edisonplayer - - let's enjoy the music!

George P.

[Curt A]

"Some of the KKK records of the 1920s and much of the wartime propagandist pop tunes (ala Spike Jones) can be vicious. But rather than destroying these records, they should be preserved and shared as examples of how otherwise good people can be misled through fear and demagoguery."

I agree George, but in regard to the KKK records - the ones I have heard are simply boring - one in particular has a humorous title - "Daddy swiped the last clean sheet and joined the Ku Klux Klan". Obviously, the organization sucked in a number of members through fear mongering... on the other side of the coin, I just read that some African Americans in Chicago have started up their own branch of the KKK to deal with growing crime problems in their community...

One of the most prolific propaganda campaigns in WWII was waged through Charlie and his Orchestra, a German band who put new words to popular American and British swing tunes and broadcast them from Hamburg in an effort to demoralize soldiers and citizens of opposing countries.

Charlie and his Orchestra (also referred to as the "Templin band" and "Bruno and His Swinging Tigers") were a Nazi-sponsored German propaganda swing band. Jazz music styles were seen by Nazi authorities as rebellious but, ironically, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels conceived of using the style in shortwave radio broadcasts aimed at the United States and (particularly) the United Kingdom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsPOKoNKii4

[phonogfp]

I agree George, but in regard to the KKK records - the ones I have heard are simply boring - one in particular has a humorous title - "Daddy swiped the last clean sheet and joined the Ku Klux Klan".

About 12-15 years ago I occasionally wrote book reviews for the ARSC Journal. (Association for Recorded Sound Collections.) One of the oddest, yet most interesting books I reviewed was Ku Klux Klan Sheet Music, An Illustrated Catalogue of Published Music, 1867-2002 by Danny O. Crew. In addition to music written ridiculing the Klan, there are of course dozens and dozens of musical pieces meant to glorify the Klan and its activities. Some of these lyrics are reprehensible (a common theme was the fear struck into the hearts of blacks when the Klan came 'round. This fear was gleefully described much as you would expect from a cowardly bully). But as noted by Curt, most of these KKK songs were pretty boring. The book contains many illustrations of sheet music and includes the lyrics. After reading through it, one can only conclude that the KKK was not generally comprised of America's best and brightest.

George P.

[orpington]

I have to agree. History is history, you can bend it twist it but it does not change history. In no other area can some one pretend that something happened the way they want it, than history.

These recordings are a link to our past. The good the bad the pretty the ugly. We as a country have hopefully learned from the past and as a result have became better.

I agree eventually we will see funding cut to those entities which display what is deemed "racist" artifacts. At 41, I am not young and not old, but old enough to contrast a period of time when this country was more united than it is today.

I played a record for a friend Golden and Hughes, and they were doing their skit and he could not believe the content. He said I dont want to hear it its racist....on on and seem to think its a crime that I have such records.

It is sad that certain groups and organizations use their power to bend or twist history such that it suits them. Or, cut funding to something because it does not necessarily make the world seem as THEY want it to! Your friend is an example of this--and it is too bad that he is so incredibly narrow minded.

Not to get political, but Ebay and Paypal are excellent examples of corporate entities that use their agenda to make things as they want them to be. There are certain items you cannot purchase on Ebay, as listings are removed, not because they are illegal, but because Ebay thinks they are not politically correct. Same goes for Paypal. For example, you cannot buy a Confederate flag on Ebay. Furthermore, Paypal now is supposedly blocking payments to a certain flag distributor that continues to sell Confederate flags. Of course, the two companies are owned by the same entity for now, but this is a good example of those with money and power trying to make things as they want them to be, and not necessarily as they were or are now.

[phonogfp]

I must say that reading this thread has been a welcome breath of fresh air and common sense!

George P.

[orpington]

I must say that reading this thread has been a welcome breath of fresh air and common sense!

George P.

Absolutely! A 'mature' topic and everyone has exhibited extraordinary decorum.

[Rastus10]

One of the DJ's at the local swing dance club plays the Trumbauer version of "Mississippi Mud," in which "darky" is mentioned more than once. Nobody has ever noticed, or at least those present are not amongst the social justice warrior crowd to whine about it.

Arthur Collins' "laugh," which adorns many of the Columbia Male/Peerless Quartette's minstrel recordings is spot-on, even one hundred years later and that can't be denied. Those who probably take most offense to it are those who have had the least amount of contact with blacks (see SJW reference above). Hey, it's alright to mimic white bumpkins, so fair is fair in regard to race, in my view.

Yeah, and rap...what a convenient little cultural inconsistency in respect to this topic.