Who are the Black Pete supporters?

Saying the words ‘Black Pete’ is a bit debatable in the Netherlands the last few years. A media storm has hit the Low Countries since the protest group Kick Out Zwarte Piet (KOZP) started to protest during the entry of Sinterklaas (Saint Nicholas). But a counter movement started rising as an answer to the KOZP. This group, which I will call the Black Pete Supporters (BPS) is becoming more and more active in the on- and offline world. I’m going to take a look at how and why they started to campaign for keeping Black Pete black.

What is the tradition?

Sinterklaas is a national celebration in the Netherlands with a long history. It goes back to the celebration of the old Germanic god Wodan (Odin) who flies in the sky on his eight-legged horse. He has two black ravens who tell him what’s happening down on earth. But during the Christianization in the early Middle Ages in Europe, monks replaced Wodan by Saint Nicholas, who was born in Smyrna (Turkey) and died (probably) in 343.

During the centuries, new traditions were formed around the celebration. For instance: Saint Nicholas would throw money around for the people when entering a house - a tradition in which money is now replaced by candy. Similarly, the omniscient ravens of Wodan, who knew exactly what happened on earth, were replaced by Saint Nicholas' ‘big ‘book’ which records whether a child has behaved badly during the past year. However after the Netherlands became mainly protestant during the Reformation in the 16th century, the celebration of Saint Nicholas became less important. Around the 19th century the festivities around him returned, with people dressing up as the saint himself. The first official entr of Saint Nicholas was only in 1934 in Amsterdam.

Wodan

But one tradition is catching a lot of attention the last years: that of the servant Black Pete who helps Saint Nicholas distributing presents for children across the Netherlands. This Black Pete has had, since the beginning of the 20th century, a black face, red lips, golden earrings and afro haircut. Where do these features come from? It’s hard to trace this because there are many options, but an important one is a book about the saint, published in the Netherlands around 1850 called: St. Nikolaas en zijn knecht (Saint Nicholas and his servant) by Jan Schenkman. Schenkman added some new elements to the legend; the horse of the saint, the steamship on which Saint Nicholas arrives, and the saint's black servant. It is not sure whether Schenkman made up these new ‘traditions’ himself or whether he drew on already existing ones. Fact is, that after the publication of this book - and after this one many more - the new traditions became widely popular in The Netherlands.

In the 1950’s the entry of the saint was for the first time live on national television and the festivities around the saint became larger and larger. Today it is a big commercial festival as well. Supermarkets in The Netherlands make a lot of money the week running up to Saint Nicholas on December 6.

But KOZP started to question these traditions by protesting at entries of the saint in different cities. The all-time low was reached in 2017 when Frisians blocked a highway in the north of The Netherlands in an effort to stop anti-Black Pete protesters from entering the city. This resulted in a big traffic jam and in unsafe traffic conditions. The police, however, did not break up the blockade, although the protesters were allowed to protest by the local mayor. What are the demands of  KOZP? They want everything except a black Pete. Pete can have chimney wipes or have colors - for them it doesn’t matter - but he should not be black. Their opponents, in contrast, want to have Black Pete as black as possible. So who are the people who support Black Pete?

Who are the Black Pete Supporters?

There are many Facebook groups and Instagram accounts of Black Pete supporters. There is not exactly one big organization, there are a lot of different groups and subgroups. But in this article, I use Black Pete Supporters (BPS) as an overall concept for all the different pro Black Pete groups. Their main focus is to keep the so-called tradition of Black Pete alive. They do that by sharing images, texts, news links and memes with their followers. Individuals come together in their self-made online world of BPS. They have formed an imagined community, where they ‘meet’ each other online, but probably never see each other in the offline world. It is imagined because the members will never know most of their fellow members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion. (Anderson, 2006)

Those traditions are important for them because they symbolize the nation; the Black Pete supporters are, in that sense, nationalists.

So how to recognize Black Pete supporters? Simple, they share a lot about Black Pete. If they find an article that demonizes the KOZP supporters, there is a big chance they will post it. Another indexical, an attribute that is needed to recognize a particular social group, is the language Black Pete supporters use commenting on Facebook posts. An it’s not only their language, but also their opinions they share with each other, some examples:

The screenshot is translated as: Black Pete is not racist. The comments as (first one): "I reguraly buy old Saint Nicholas books with Black Pete in it and Black Pete dolls. I don't have much to spend, but it gives me the feeling that not everything is lost and forgotten." The second: "Why do we all accept this? Soon or later our tradition is lost for ever." On the left side we see BPS calling KOZP a terrorist group. They also blame the mayor of Eindhoven. 

What the most comments have in common and wat is basically the overall argument is that people don’t want to lose another ‘tradition’. Black Pete is, so is the main argument of BPS, a tradition which has to be maintained. It is also political, take a look at the screenshot below, where you can see they don't want anyone to take away their culture. They use the colors of the Dutch flag as a symbol of the nation-state. 

RSWebsols

What is tradition?

According to the Oxford Dictionary a tradition is a belief, custom or way of doing something that has existed for a long time among a particular group of people. This is not really a clear definition, because the explanation exists of three key elements: it’s a belief, a custom existing for a long time, among a group of people. When we look at Saint Nicholas in general, we can say it is a tradition with a long history among the Dutch population. Can we say the same of Black Pete? He was added to the existing tradition just around 100 years ago, and we can argue that Schenkman created a new tradition in addition to Sinterklaas. What originally was a cultural tradition, is now transformed by Black Pete supporters into a 'invented tradition', a constructed and formally instituted tradition (Saint Nicholas) and a less easily traceable tradition within a brief and dateable period (Hobsbawm & Ranger, 1983). They made the black servant more than just a servant, they made him a symbol for the Dutch culture and nation. 

So, it looks like Black Pete is a relatively new tradition. Yet some people believe Black Pete did not appear out of nowhere. Take a look at this video:

Historian Han van der Horst believes Black Pete is in fact an adapted tradition, because he represents the devil. Take a look at the north of Italy, where people also celebrate Saint Nicholas, but where he is accompanied by a devil-looking figure called Knecht Ruprecht. It is a figure much like Black Pete: he punishes naughty kids with a rod.

Knecht Ruprecht Creative Commons / By: Franz Edelmann

Why cis it a tradition according to some?

Black Pete supporters often see the KOZP supporters as a danger to the nation as seen in the screenshots. Traditions are, according to them, important to keep the Netherlands ‘Dutch’. Take a look at these screenshots:

The first comment is translated as: "I only know four people who have spoken or are speaking the truth: Nostradamus, Pim Fortuyn, Theo van Gogh and Geert Wilders. The second: "Everyone place Black Pete's in your garden, balcony, window or car. That human (probably Silvana Simons red.) is a treath for our society. She has to be forced to go to a mental hospital and then trow away her key. Why is such trashy figure in our council and where are our traditions and culture going?"

It looks like they are politically oriented towards the right-wing and anti-mainstream-media. We also can see that it’s likely the pro Black Pete people are also proponents of keeping firework a tradition during New Year’s Eve and maintaining the bonfires in The Hague. Those traditions are important for them because they symbolize the nation. The Black Pete supporters are in that sense nationalists; “Having a national identity also involves being situated physically, legally, socially, as well as emotionally: typically, it means being situated within a homeland, which itself is situated within the world of nations” (Billig, 1995). They are not only physically but most of all emotionally connected with the Netherlands.

BBC

Translation: "Everyday the same topics of the Dutch Sovjet-Union Broadcoaster, including some divide and conquer-topics." Some standard opinions of the NOS: #Trump is stupid, #Russia is dangerous, # Brexit is scary, #Migrants and refugees are pathetic and #We don't do enough to change the climate.

As I stated earlier, I noticed a lot of Black Pete supporters are politically aligned with the right. They mention names as: Pim Fortuyn (former Dutch politician), Geert Wilders (Party of Freedom) and Thierry Baudet (FvD), politicians who all made Black Pete political by claiming it as a Dutch cultural 'tradition'. But it doesn’t exactly mean that all supporters are right-wing; some also can simply appear to ‘protect’ their nation. In Banal Nationalism, Michael Billig (1995) mentioned the Falklands and the Gulf wars. According to him the protagonists during those wars were not fighting for a god or a political ideology, but claimed to fight for their nation.

Most of the Black Pete supporters also just want to keep The Netherlands as they know it. But the hardcore supporters are not only unhappy with Black Pete becoming less black; for them there are more problems, they are hot nationalists. As Billig also states: “the aura of nationhood always operates within contexts of power”: the power of other countries around the Netherlands, but also power within the Netherlands, it looks as if those hardcore Black Pete supporters are unsatisfied with the current state of affairs in Dutch politics, the people who are in power. Also, the people in power ‘control’ the mainstream media, it is argued. As you can see in the screenshots Black Pete supporters are having a hard time believing current mainstream media such as the Dutch national broadcasting network NOS. They see themselves probably as outsiders, people who do not live conform the rules and norms of the mainstream (Becker, 1963). But, on the other hand, they see people who are against Black Pete as outsiders as well.

A video of Geert Wilders Party of Freedom where they promote Black Pete as a tradition.

Why is nationalism important for Black Pete supporters?

For Black Pete supporters, the nation - including its  traditions - is part of their identity. Their identity discourse (a set of rules, norms and specific traits that make up an identity, according to Becker), is the answer to the question 'what does it mean to be Dutch'? For them traditions as Black Pete are part of being Dutch. We have to imagine that Black Pete has been in peoples lives for many years; in commercials, in shops and supermarkets, as well as in the minds of their children, Black Pete was present everywhere. Even if you’re not a nationalist at all, you would see Black Pete as a ‘traditional’ Dutch phenomenon intergrated in the customs of Dutch society. That's different than hot nationalism, it is more banal nationalism, which means:  not a flag which is being consciously waved with fervent passion; it is the flag hanging unnoticed on the public building. (Billig, 1995).  

Nowadays you can see Black Pete as a form of hot nationalism, instead of banal nationalism. By weaponizing the tradition, Black Pete became more than just a symbol of the Dutch culture, it became a symbol for a nation, at least for the hot nationalists. They politicized Black Pete in the service of 'defending' their Dutch nation.

This is proof that KOZP wants to destroy Dutch culture.

The social group of hot nationalistic Black Pete supporters, is not exactly a new phenomenon, but the way the group formed itself is a new appearance. Because of the intensity of mediated communication among members of this group, these members imagine themselves as being part of a national community (Maly, 2019). This also means that the differences between KOZP and Black Pete supporters will grow even more into an 'us' vs. 'them' template. Social media have an important role in forming those communities. Nations even thrive because of internet becoming a key technology (Eriksen, 2007). 

Today a lot of media banned Black Pete from their medium. RTL, for instance, decided not to show Black Pete in any TV show anymore, NTR is still changing its Pete's from black to chimney wipe, and even shops as De Bijenkorf and HEMA decided not to use the Black Pete in their commercials or product designs anymore. This, of course, can be seen as a victory for the KOZP supporters, but the latter are not stopping untill the 'black stereotypical racist figure is gone'. According to Black Pete supporters, in return, this is proof that KOZP wants to destroy Dutch culture. This is why the discussion is still going on today, with Black Pete supporters feeling as if they are being betrayed by media, by shops and even by some politicians who publicly condemn Black Pete. Therefore, it is not strange to see Black Pete supporters turning to online fora to meet likeminded people and to share posts from Thierry Baudet and Geert Wilders - politicians who bank on the feeling that the Black Pete supporters have: that they are becoming strangers in their own country.

References

Anderson, B. (2006). Imagined Communities. In Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (pp. 1-7). London: Verso.

Bahara, H., & Esseroili, N. (2019, November 15). Zo werd het pro-Zwarte Piet-protest steeds gewelddadiger. Retrieved December 2019, from Volkskrant.nl.

Becker, H. S. (1966). Outsiders, Studies in the Sociology of Deviance. New York: The Free Press.

Billig, M. (1995). Banal Nationalism, (pp. 1-12). London: Sage Publications Ltd.

Blommaert, J. (2014). Ethnography, superdiversity and linguistic landscapes. Chronicles of Complexity. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

Blommaert, J., & Dong, J. (2009). Ethnographic fieldwork. A beginners guide. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

Eliot, T. S. (1982). Traditions and the Individual Talent. In Traditions and the Individual Talent (Vol. 19, pp. 36-42). The MIT Press on behalf of Perspecta.

Eriksen, T. H. (2007). Nationalism and the Internet. In Nations and Nationalism (Vol. 1, pp. 1-17). London: ASEN/Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Glassie, H. (1995). Tradition. The Journal of American Folklore, 108(430), 395-412.

Hobsbawm, E., & Ranger, T. (1983). The Invention of Tradition. In The Invention of Tradtion (pp. 1-15). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Koninklijke Bibliotheek. (sd). Sinterklaas. Retrieved December 2019, from KB.nl.

Maly, I. (2019). SGDW - class 4 - the construction of the mainstream 2019-2020.pptx. PowerPoint. Google Drive.

Müller, L. (2012, October 22). 'Piet was waarschijnlijk een gelijkwaardige partner van Sinterklaas'. Retrieved December 2019, from Volkskrant.nl.

Varis, P. (2014). Digital Ethnography. Tilburg.