Ill-Advised or Racist? Bernard’s Blackface Beermat
“The best black is Bernard from Humpolec”
Bernard brewery co-owner Stanislav Bernard’s ad campaigns are usually pretty clever so what on Earth possessed him to don blackface for this “world’s best dark lager” campaign?
PraguePig.com found this beermat in a pub in the Šumava. Has anyone seen it in Prague?
Hmm, I think black people have a sense of humor too.
But then again, maybe not as open as the Czechs.
Cheers,
That’s because all kinds of “dark beer” are universallly called “black beer” in Czech (and as far as I know, it has been called that ever since always). Hence, “Bernard is the best black”. Black as in black beer. Or black as in black man, with all implications thereof. A typical Czech pun, inviting people to perpetuate the joke by saying things like “I sure prefer Bernard to Mugabe.”
Apparently, life in Czechia is rather simple in some aspects, compared to western countries. It must be terrible and tiresome to constantly see racism everywhere, and it must be even worse having to self-censor yourself constantly out of the fear of insulting somebody. Czechs simply don’t worry about this; they’re at home, after all.