Watch the Spice Girls shut down a TV host defending blackface in this brilliant 1997 footage

A 1997 video of the Spice Girls denouncing blackface on a Dutch TV show has resurfaced online, and it's gold.

The "girl power" band was on the Laat de Leeuw show when the host, Paul De Leeuw, introduced a group of people dressed as "Zwarte Piet" aka "black Petes" as part of the Sinterklaas Dag (St. Nicholas's Day) celebration.

For centuries, Dutch adults and children have dressed up as "black Petes," the black helpers of Sinterklaas, as part of a pre-Christmas tradition.

Only recently did the Dutch begin to acknowledge the custom's racist connotation.

But, as usual, the Spice were ahead of their time:

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“I think they shouldn’t paint their faces. You should get proper black people to do it,” Mel B tells Leeuw. “I don’t think that’s very good.” 

The host tries to justify it saying it's a cultural tradition but Mel B is not having it, and tells him to "change it" because "this is the '90s".

Geri Halliwell doubles down: “Update your culture!”

People loved it:

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