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Non-blacks shouldn’t air the Oprah Winfrey memes from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s interview – because it supports the “digital blackface”, advises a nonprofit.
The Slow Factory Foundation, which is dedicated to social and environmental justice, posted a warning on its Instagram page on Tuesday, claiming that “digital blackface” is an “online phenomenon” where white and non-black people share images of black people to express their emotions.
The variety of Winfrey’s facial reactions during the interview resulted in a slew of viral memes.
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“While seemingly harmless, the problem with digital blackface is that it often reinforces negative stereotypes about black people as being aggressive, loud, sassy, and just there for your consumption and entertainment,” reads the article.
The organization added: “Doing black, whether in IRL or online, is not an acceptable form of expression of reaction or dissatisfaction, especially not in exchange for likes and retweets.”
“Since the #MeghanandHarry interview on Oprah, we’ve seen a lot of digital blackface violations with some Oprah reaction images and GIFs going viral, but that doesn’t mean you should be using them,” Slow Factory added.
A popular Oprah meme shows the media mogul with a shocked expression on his face after Markle reveals to him that someone in the Royal Family raised concerns about baby Archie’s skin color once he is born.
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Some people on social media have praised the organization for raising awareness of the “digital black face”.
“Thank you for explaining this so clearly. Very helpful,” wrote one Instagram user.
“Thank you very much for that – this is something I didn’t realize and I will definitely be a lot more careful about which gifs I choose and why,” another user wrote.
Others felt that Slow Factory’s message went too far.
“Blackface is a violent and harmful portrayal of black people rooted in violence. Using an Oprah gif is NOT blackface,” one person wrote.
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“Reaction images / gifs and memes are universal and certainly not part of the ‘digital black face’,” another person said. “I feel like it’s extremely controversial. People use reaction images of people of another race all the time and I don’t see how dangerous that is.”
The term “digital blackface” has been around for years, but writer Lauren Michele Jackson popularized it in a 2017 essay for Teen Vogue.
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