Alison Saunders was shocked when she saw a postcard promoting a show she was part of Black History Month Programming in Pointe-Claire.
Saunders said, “If I show it to a four-year-old … it’s scary, full stop.”
Display, Blackbeard’s Incredible Mystery Or Incredible secret of black beardShows a puppet depicting black people in a way she considers racially problematic.
Saunders believes this is not appropriate, especially because the play is designed for children.
“If they’ve never had any positive interactions with a black person or black people and it’s this puppet they see as a scary ‘sauveage’ from the woods…. four to 10-year-olds,” Saunders said. Children who cannot yet form an opinion can form an opinion based on what they see.
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Saunders wrote a letter to the Pointe-Claire City Council, asking the mayor to cancel the play.
Councilwoman Tara Stanforth, who chairs the city’s diversity and social inclusion committee and who spoke with Saunders, says she requested that the image be removed and the play removed from Pointe-Claire’s Black History Month programming. be removed
“There are two reasons, mainly because it’s fiction and we wanted to look further into it, but also because I didn’t think Black Beard’s story was necessarily a story that was part of Black History Month, also through presenter Black and I know he’s pretty well known in Quebec, which is amazing, and we’re happy to have him as part of our roster on a regular basis.
While the play was dropped from the city’s Black History Month programming, it is still scheduled to be shown in the spring.
Mayor Tim Thomas says he’s open to removing it but would like to hear from the artist and the black community first.
“It’s hard for us to say whether we know better or weigh in until we hear from a larger part of the community on this. There’s this thing called artistic freedom, artistic expression that has to be protected,” Thomas said. told Global News.
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Thomas says he will reach out to the West Island Black Community Association (WIBCA).
The artist is Franck Silvestre, a French immigrant of Martinican descent.
He says he is surprised by the reaction and never intended to offend. Silvestre says his puppet is a character he created 25 years ago, an exaggerated caricature based on himself.
“That’s the principle of a children’s show. Things are big, colors strong, things not sophisticated,” Sylvester explained. “Is it because the character has dark skin that we can’t do children’s theater with it? Is this it?”
Silvestre invites those who are upset to watch the hour-long drama and then talks with him.
In the meantime, Saunders wants to have a conversation with the mayor and, moving forward, suggests that the city engage people in the community to choose Black History Month programming.
Stainforth says this is something the city is already working on.
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