Cruise passengers horrified as workers parade around while dressed as ‘KKK members’ — and their explanation is mystifying
Now they’re up sheet creek.
An Australian cruise company sent a parade of workers marching through the ship dressed in pointy white hoods reminiscent of Ku Klux Klan garb — gobsmacking passengers, who called it wildly offensive.
Footage of the bizarre stunt shows eight P&O Cruises cleaners tromping by a pool on the ship’s deck while dressed in the face-covering hoods along with all-white outfits in December, according to news.com.au.
“Is this appropriate for 2024?” an outraged passenger captioned the video after uploading it to Facebook.
Hoods worn by the workers feature eye holes cut in a manner similar to those used by the notorious white supremists group.
In the footage, a woman in the foreground of the video can be seen eying the Klan-like spectacle with an exasperated facial expression.
“We were like, ‘are we seeing this correctly?’, it was so bizarre,” passenger, Terri, from Melbourne told news.com.au.
Anyone who saw the parade thought, “what the hell?” Terri said — adding she asked the firm for an explanation.
The cruise company said the workers were dressed as upside down “snow cones” during a Christmas-themed event on the Pacific Explorer voyage from Melbourne to Hobart in December.
“We regret if a recent incident on a Pacific Explorer cruise offended any guests,” a P&O Cruises Australia rep told the outlet.The cleaning crew had “never heard of the [the KKK] organization” before the incident, said P&O Cruises Australia spokeswoman Lynne Scrivens.
“No one can seriously think that was their intention,” she said.
It wasn’t clear why the workers were dressed as “snow cones” for a Christmas event but Scrivens said costumes and other resources are “limited” on cruise ships.
The KKK was founded in Tennessee in 1865, and isn’t as widely known in Australia.
