We all love amusement parks! The thrilling rides, the adventures and just all-around fun when you go. It’s supposed to be amazing family fun, but what if I told you that an amusement park took it to far? In Dolancourt, France one attraction has caught people’s attention for being racist. It’s the most popular theme park in the country called Nigloland, with its famous attraction ‘Africa Cruise.’
In the ‘Africa Cruise’, people sit on a boat to experience a safari-style ride. In a display along the river, you can witness two characters in a tree trying to escape a rhino. The white man on the tree is wearing a pith helmet, and the black man is wearing a fez and carrying bananas in his hand. The characters also come with audio effects to make them talk. The white man is saying, “Stop talking Bounama, and help me climb onto this branch before my trousers start looking like a sieve!” While the black man takes in an African accent which is highly exaggerated calling the white character “Boss.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uQANxhkVqU
A visitor at the park posted a video of the attraction on twitter saying, “J’suis allè a Nigoland et j’ai vu ca. J’voulais savoir si vous truviez ca normal??” Which translates to “I went to Nigoland and saw that, I wanted to know if you found it normal??” This started a spark on twitter and people were upset on why this attraction is still at the park. One response was, “It’s shocking it look like the racist jokes of the colonial era.”
Nigloland saw this and made a public apology on twitter saying, “Nous prèsentons nos excuses aux personnes que npuse avons pu heurter avec I’une des scènes de l’Africa Cruise. Nous sommes à l’ecoute de notre clientele et sensibles à la qualiè de notre parc, nous modifions la scène en question dès ce week-end. Merci de votre comprèhension. Which translates to,” We apologize to the people we may have hit with one of the scenes from the Africa Cruise. We listened to our customers and are sensitive to the quality of our park, we modify the scene in question this weekend. Thank you for understanding.”
French24 an international news website contacted the management team and was told,
“Since 2013, 4.6 million visitors have gone on this ride. Its’s in top four rides. There have been no complaints before.
The park’s management team decided to change the display in question as soon as possible. The bananas have been taken out, and the dialogue between the two characters over the speaker has been cut too. As well as this, when the park closes for the winter, we are planning a total re-do of this display.
We understand that it could be offensive, but Nigloland has nothing to gain from showing racist or homophobic scenes or expressing political opinions. The park is open to everyone.”
The theme park is working quickly to remove this scene from the park.
