Mary poppins

This week the New York Times published an article which was long overdue, illustrating the obvious racism featured in the original Mary Poppins movie. (Something which, incidentally, Titania McGrath had already flagged up in a tweet last September: I remember watching that scene as a child one Christmas, and even at the tender age of four, a woman putting coal on her face instantly reminded me of the black and white minstrel show which I would read about 14 years later when studying for my Bachelor’s Degree in Human Rights and Social Justice (Hons). This, coupled with the cultural appropriation of Dick Van Dyke putting on a West Indian accent throughout the entire film utterly nauseated me.

No idea is too stupid to be entertained on the op-ed page of the New York Times. I was reminded of this truism last night when, changing the paper in the parrot’s cage, I read that the latest enjoyable vehicle for Lin-Manuel Miranda’s talents is not just a good 20 minutes too long, but also perniciously racist, if not sunk to its Victorian corsets in white nationalist propaganda. ‘Mary Poppins and a Nanny’s Shameful Flirting With Blackface’, wrote Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, professor of English and Contemporary Virtue at Linfield College, Oregon.