A GLASGOW tanning salon has come under fire after sharing images of a “racist”doll in several pictures in order to promote its business.

Anti-racist charities and local councillors have expressed fury after Shine Tanning Salons on Castlemilk Road repeatedly posted images with a doll, which caricatures black people in an offensive manner.

Golliwogs, or golly dolls, stemmed from a character created by children’s author Florence Kate Upton in the 19th century.

However the black-skinned dolls, featuring exaggerated lips, frizzy hair and paws instead of hands, has become the subject of controversy over the years.

Images of the dolls first appeared on the salon’s Facebook accounts on Saturday.

One picture showed the doll in a coffee shop with an empty cup alongside the caption “wee black double espresso” with two monkey emojis.

A third image had the doll, which the owner has called “sooty” laid back on a tanning bed with the caption “#black2white” in reference to the white2black tanning lotion beside the figure.

Glasgow Times:

READ MORE: Cancer Research UK shop in Govanhill displays Golliwog doll

Charity Show Racism The Red Card Scotland have since hit out at the “horrid” items.

Campaign manager Jordan Allison said: “We stand with the rest of society who fully condemn these horrid items that serve only as offensive reminders of anti-Black racism.

“Education remains key in ensuring these are consigned to history.

“As anti-racist campaigners, we regularly work alongside Glasgow City Council and Police Scotland who are both very proactive in dealing with issues like these appropriately.”

Local councillor Archie Graham added: “I am shocked and dismayed to see these images.

“This is a timely reminder that we need to be vigilant and expose such disgusting behaviour whenever and wherever it occurs."

This is not the first time the dolls have caused controversy in the city.

Last year, Cancer Research UK’s Victoria Road branch came under fire for having one of the figures on sale.

Glasgow Times:

A spokesperson for Shine Tanning Salons said: “First of all, Shine Tanning Salon would like to apologise to anyone who was offended by our recent social media posts.

“Causing offence was never our intention. We make no attempt to condone the posts, which we accept were ill-thought.

“Shine Tanning Salon is a multi-culture salon, owned by a family with Kenyan and Indian heritage, so is very aware of the affects of racism, and casual racism, in society. Again, we can only reiterate that this was never our intention; it was a lazy attempt at humour, which we accept has caused people offence.

“Shine Tanning Salon is very active in the local community, helping local residents back to work, and donating to charity; having donated 3 figure sums to SAMH and Breast Cancer Now this year already.

“We hope that the Glasgow public, and wider audience who were offended by our posts will accept our apology; again, we make no excuses. We will not try to pass blame to an unpaid intern or claim to be hacked. It was an error of judgement by a staff member. We made an error, and we can only try to make up for it.

“We will be reaching out to relevant charities and organisations to seek literature to hand out to staff in relation to the effects racism can have, and we will also be reviewing our social media policies.

“Shine Tanning Salon will also be donating 20% of profits from the remainder of October to a relevant charity. Whilst this by no means makes up for our actions, we hope that it goes a small way towards everyone affected accepting our apology.”