The lengthy history of white politicians wearing blackface — and getting a pass
But for almost as long, there has been opposition to blackface, especially by people who thought that efforts to portray black people as lazy, stupid or hypersexual dovetailed with efforts to strip them of social and political power, said Jody Armour, a law professor at the University of Southern California and the author of “Negrophobia and Reasonable Racism: The Hidden Costs of Being Black in America.”