14 DAY TRIAL // Nick Cannon came out with a new music album on April 1, “White People Party Music,” his first in over a decade but, as you must have heard, it wasn’t like any other album release. For the new material, Cannon crafted a new persona, Connor Smallnut, who is actually Nick in the reverse blackface, the so-called whiteface.
Before the album came out, Cannon shared a photo of himself in whiteface, as said Connor Smallnut, on his social media accounts and, you guessed it, the uproar was instant.
Had a white artist done blackface to plug a new album, they would have been accused of racism and forced to apologize, many wrote to tell Cannon. He should be no different, they argued, accusing him of hypocrisy and disrespect.
Nick refused to apologize, saying there was a big difference between humor and hatred and, since he’d done whiteface with the former in mind, he had no reason to say he was sorry.
On the Rachael Ray Show the other night, he reiterated that and even went as far as to point the fingers at those who took offense in his gesture. Video is available online here.
There is context to the person of Connor Smallnut. “I've been planning this for over a year. The funny thing is, if you listen to the album, that character is an ultra-sensitive character, who hates Nick Cannon and is offended by the album title White People Party Music,” the star explains.
So, he argues, people who criticized him for doing whiteface and accused him of racism didn’t even bother to get the full picture, the context of his “makeover”: they just rushed to judge and spread the hate.
Well, sucks to be them because Connor Smallnut was never meant for them, Nick says. He knows who his fans are and he knows they do appreciate his humor, so he’s not letting the haters bother him too much.
“Some people can't take a joke, but I wasn't trying to reach those people anyway. I'm reaching people who have senses of humor,” he laughs.
So far, white celebrities who have done whiteface for whatever reason (a Halloween party, a comedy show, a TV appearance, and so on and so forth) have always apologized afterwards because of public pressure to do so. Cannon seems determined not to give in, and stands by his initial statement that his gesture wasn’t racist because it was for laughs.