Victorian football club slammed for posting blackface photos to social media

A Frankston football and netball club have apologised after members of the teams posted blackface photos to social media.

The Frankston Bombers hosted an ‘iPod Shuffle’ themed dress-up party on Saturday and photos from the party posted to Facebook and Instagram showed party-goers with their bodies and faces painted black, dressed as various rappers and singers.

Indigenous rapper Adam Briggs shared one of the photos from the party to Facebook, saying he was sick of sporting teams getting away with racist behaviour.

“Shout out to @FrankstonBomber for their ‘Racist Night’ and door prize for most #Blackface,” he wrote.

Speaking with The Age, Briggs said people need to focus more on educating themselves.

“It's 2016, if people would spend more time educating themselves rather than defending their right to be racist idiots, then we'd have a lot less problems," he said.

Hip hop artist Remi took to Facebook in support of Briggs.

“Every time I see blackface, all I see is images of slavery,” he wrote.

“Images of brutality inflicted for no other reason than being born black. Images of being a second-class citizen," he said.

“This behaviour, maybe unintentionally, reinforces the mindset that we are just some sort of animal to be ridiculed, mistreated and held back in this world.”

After receiving backlash for the photos the club took to Facebook to apologise.

“We are extremely regretful of the situation that has transpired over the last 24 hours and want to assure our supporters, sponsors and the wider community that the Club is in no way racist and unreservedly apologises for any offense that has been caused,” the club wrote.

“We now understand that our actions at last night’s club event have caused offense and division and for this we apologise.”

The club said it is in the process of initiating an educational program “relating to vilification and discrimination” to make sure everyone involved learns from the incident.

The incident is being investigated by AFL South East officials.