Change History??

I was watching a Tom and Jerry video with my kiddos and right before it started, Whoopi Goldberg came on explaining that some of the cartoons featured the black Mammy character, the only human ever featured in the Tom and Jerry cartoons, and that there had been requests to delete scenes involving her or stop showing those cartoons because the depiction is racist. So wait--our apology to those who were treated poorly in the past is going to include pretending they didn't exist? Am I seeing this wrong or is that a bizarre solution?

Especially when it comes to the southern black housekeeper on Tom and Jerry. Whether we like it now or not, there were black women like this--strong, hardworking women who were raising other people's kids and caring for their homes who happened to speak with a southern dialect due to their geographical location. Do we really think they would rather we just pretend they never existed since they weren't treated well or paid fair wages?

And let's face it, Tom and Jerry smoke, drink, play with fire, shoot guns, flirt with skanky female cats and mice, destroy things and seem to exist only to emotionally and physically torture each other...and people have a problem with the black housekeeper who occasionally shoos them out of the house or feeds the cat?? Wow.They didn't delete those scenes since the cartoons wouldn't work without them and since the housekeeper was an important character, but the fact that they even needed to try to explain to kids that her inclusion could be considered racist (when there is PLENTY of real valid racism even these days, unfortunately), seemed unnecessary and absurd.