Post by @flipper@mastodonapp.uk

2026-03-22 18:04 UTC

@aSweetGentleman@mstdn.social @blogdiva@mastodon.social I disagree with updating these books. It wasn't a different time, it is racist now, it was racist then. You were just less likely to get called out on it, is all. They knew what they were doing. Keep the books as they are, so they remain a record of how people have been treated. But don't give them to kids anymore - consign them to history just like those awful blackface dolls that still occasionally surfaced when I was a kid.

Replies (2)

@lienrag@mastodon.tedomum.net 2026-05-17 08:19

@flipper@mastodonapp.uk "they knew what they were doing" Yes and no. Father Wallez, the editorial director of young Hergé, certainly knew what he was doing. Hergé was 22 years old and not very wise nor traveled when he started drawing Tintin, and he obeyed Wallez about the themes he used for Tintin's adventures, getting (IIRC) his documentation from him. It's only from "Le lotus bleu" onward that he started to be his own man (or at least get better influence : Tchang was a Maoist). @aSweetGentleman@mstdn.social @blogdiva@mastodon.social

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@lienrag@mastodon.tedomum.net 2026-05-17 08:21

@flipper@mastodonapp.uk Also, when I was young I remember a young adult friend from Central Africa (don't remember if he was from Congo specifically, I was very young) who *loved* "Tintin au Congo". @aSweetGentleman@mstdn.social @blogdiva@mastodon.social

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