A liberal party candidate has posted a photo of herself with a man in blackface who dressed as a dead Aboriginal singer for a fancy dress party.
Redcliffe candidate Kerri-Anne Dooley posted the photo to her Instagram page at the weekend with the caption: ‘Got to meet the lead singer of Yothu Yindi yesterday’.
Ms Dooley told Daily Mail Australia she was at ‘an Australian-themed house warming party where guests went as icons of prominent Australian identities’ when the photo was taken.
Redcliffe candidate Kerri-Anne Dooley (left) posted the photo to her Instagram profile at the weekend with the caption: ‘Got to meet the lead singer of Yothu Yindi yesterday’
The Redcliffe politician has since deleted the photo and apologised for her mistake.
‘One person was a fan of the band Yothu Yindi and lead singer, the late Mandawuy Yunupingu,’ she told Daily Mail Australia.
‘On reflection it was a mistake to post this photo and unprompted, I deleted it.
‘I apologise for any offence that this may have caused.’
‘On reflection it was a mistake to post this photo and unprompted, I deleted it. I apologise for any offence that this may have caused.’
Redcliffe politician Kerri-Anne Dooley (pictured) has since deleted the photo and apologised for her mistake
Blackface came to prominence in the 19th century when non-black performers painted their faces to represent a black person.
The make-up has been widely condemned since.
Indigenous rapper Adam Briggs slammed blackface last year after a photo of a child in blackface surfaced online.
A mother posted a photo to Facebook of her son dressed as AFL star Nic Naitanui in 2016.
The woman admitted she had reservations about painting her son but went ahead with the costume idea anyway.
‘I was a little worried about painting him. (So many politically correct extremists these days). He is pastey white and if I just sent him in a wig and footy gear, no one would tell who he was,’ she said.
The photo comes after a mother posted a photo to Facebook of her son dressed as AFL star Nic Naitanui in 2016 (pictured)
‘So I grew a set of balls and painted my boy brown and he looked fanf***ingtastic.’
The mother received a huge backlash online, prompting her to delete the photo and apologise for any offence caused.
When the photo surfaced, Indigenous rapper Adam Briggs spoke out against blackface.
‘It’s 2016 and in Australia you still have to explain to people why blackface is racist,’ he told ABC’s Hack.
‘Every now and then, it’s OK for me to make an example out of some of these racists, or people who harbour these racist views.
‘(Blackface) dehumanises, and it creates a mockery of someone’s culture… to them it’s a laugh.’
Mr Briggs again pleaded with people to refrain from dressing in blackface, after a photo surfaced of two Victorian men dressed up as Indigenous Australians.
‘F*** these dumb redneck scumbags. Anyone who wants to stick up for this kind of bulls*** can swiftly go f*** themselves. Anyone who wants to harass the person who originally called them out can direct all their attention to me,’ he told Hack.
Indigenous musician Thelma Plum also condemned the costume make-up.
‘I have put up with casual racism and racist jokes my whole life. I’m tired of it. And I’m sad. I’m so sad. Is there no way at all that you could see this from my point of view,’ she said.