Sweden: Store Removes ‘Racist’ Dolls

http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=2253

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Stockholm’s most prestigious department store, Nordiska Kompaniet (NK), has had to remove a set of black ragdolls from its Christmas window display after receiving a number of complaints from concerned customers.

A visit to NK’s Christmas displays has been a part of Stockholmers’ staple holiday traditions ever since 1915. This year’s theme was “A dream Christmas”. Puppies, dragons and polar bears danced side-by-side with sugar plum fairies and… what appeared to be http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=1272.

When the windows were first available for public consumption on Sunday, one featured three of the black dolls emerging from a Christmas package. “The company that does our window displays gets a lot of its stock from Germany,” NK spokeswoman Sofie Stenbeck told The Local.

“They went there to buy the dolls. But they ended up getting a lot of e-mails from customers, who said that the dolls looked like golliwogs,” she added.

A golliwog is a black ragdoll that was originally a literary character created by English author and illustrator Florence Kate Upton in the late 19th century.

http://www.thelocal.se/9252/

2007-11-29