Yeah, generally mobs can be bad.
So your definition of “inappropriately” is a legal dispute over who owns Greek antiquities? You can’t come up with a more socially relevant example of inappropriate or harmful cultural appropriation? You opted out of a pretty good discussion upthread, so here’s your chance!
-Tom
Oh, we’re just quoting ourselves? Okay, here you go:
Again, if a legal dispute over antiquities is all you can come up with, you’re not making much of a case for anything other than countries not stealing museum pieces from each other. What’s an example of harmful or inappropriate cultural appropriation? That was the challenge presented upthread.
-Tom
I picked that one because it was obvious and undeniable. Unless it is a unicorn, it follows that there can be more. If you’re going to deny it nonetheless, there isn’t really any point in discussing it with you, is there?
Now the case mentioned earlier, about the restaurant pushing the line that other Asian restaurants are dirty, while saying racist things? That is certainly a case of bad cultural appropriation. It is intentionally attempting to push out actual businesses from that community by pushing racist lines.
@scottagibson the Elgin Marbles are 100% not cultural apporpiation. They are cultural theft for sure. But they aren’t pushing them as their own. They just stole them under a colonialist approach. It is vandalism, it is stealing of historical artifacts, and it is bad, but it is in no way comparable to someone cooking different cuisines, or wearing clothing from other cultures.
Other than calling them the Elgin marbles, you mean? Crediting Lord Elgin with them?
Eh, discussing the theft of actual physical artifacts that have individual value is a couple steps removed from what is commonly discussed as cultural appropriation.
Honestly, i think a lot of people agree with a lot of the core concepts being discussed, but start to bristle when they’re labeled “cultural appropriation”. It’s become like describing something as “racist”, simply a question of avoiding or disavowing the label without engaging with the nuance of the situations actually being discussed. Besides which, most of the time, cultural appropriation isn’t being used to say “you are a bad person, and should have all your money taken away and go to jail”, most of the time it’s being used to say “Hey: you’re being gross / an asshole, in a very particular way. I don’t like it.” And as always everybody gets to decide for themselves whether or not you care about me calling you an asshole.
The cultural appropriation test for me is mostly the same as the test I think people should use for racism: “did you show this to even one black person and ask if it’s yikes or not”. If it’s yikes, maybe think it over again.
There’s always going to be misunderstandings, defensiveness and excuses around this stuff. It’s been discussed for years, like what the problems are, where the feelings come from and how come the various groups don’t even agree with each other. Social Media just gives everyone a way to voice their opinion quickly to a lot of people, but tackling the issue isn’t new. It’s just the discussion takes on a new form as it addresses potential new examples of the latest doing and reacting to it.
I wear my hair naturally. I have lost jobs, been called unprofessional, been made fun of and been dismissed because of it. These hairstyles are not just… like you wake up one day and decide this is what i want. They’re a necessity, and I said screw any employer who demands I burn my scalp to look professional a long time ago. And I don’t have beauty shops around here who can do my hair so… I just let it be. But I’ve seen what our society does with these styles, calls them less than, outright ban them at work, in schools and at businesses and then some white rich girl shows up on TV and suddenly it’s high fashion… but only for them and people like them. It’s just not right. I mean its’ so bad we have laws going up all over the place to allow black hair styles… like actual laws to protect black people in order to have hairstyles appropriate for their hair while white women can wear them just because, and not get… fired or expelled.
I’m not familiar with Amandla Stenberg but that was an interesting/informative video. Thanks for sharing that.
I can see how tricky cultural appropriation is. I think a lot of people have brought up good points/observations in this thread. The only conclusion I’ve been able to come to is that nothing about it is cut and dried, there’s a whole bunch of nuance and there’s not going to be a one size fits all answer or solution to it. So my takeaway is that I need to try to be aware of it and to make sure to listen and understand the perspective of those people who raise the issue.
She’s Rue from Hunger games, would probably be the most mainstream thing she did early on, and also the reason she got slammed at a very young age with a lot of racism.
I just think people get stuck on well who owns this and what is it’s origins and how can anyone want diversity and exchange while at the same time say they are also concerned about cultural appropriation.
Braids in general have a very, very old origin. We’re talking ancient culture type of thing, so when someone says it’s cultural appropriate… are we really talking about stealing from ancient Africa or the Vikings… not really. But why can a young white woman wear them and be fine, a black woman is called ghetto and the military just bans one of the most common African hairstyles you can do without chemicals? It’s an issue but not because anyone is trying to claim ancient ownership to braided hair or claim hairstyles weren’t exchanged at some point long ago.
Yes, I totally agree with this.
It’s not a unicorn but it doesn’t seem like culture appropriation in the same sense as a Westerner wearing a kimono or running a Korean BBQ food truck. The Elgin Marbles were flat out theft or singular objects.
Edit to say that others said that first. I’d delete my post but instead I’ll simply add a different comment.
This bugs me because it implicitly says that the decision should be made by the more extreme person, the most offended person. Yet in other areas such as pornography, drugs, dress codes, and behavior in general it feels that we are moving in the right direction when we ignore the most offended people.
Final edit to say that @Sharpe perhaps made my point better while I was typing it.
I agree with this but sometimes after listening and understanding, it’s still OK to say “Yeah, that’s not really something worth getting worked up about.” just as sometimes the reaction is 'Yeah, that’s a real problem and we need solutions".
In general, I’ve become much more aware of the impact of context, both small and large, in life and in politics in recent years. In my younger years, I would often talk about “in an ideal world” or ideas “fresh from the drawing board”. Now I realize we only have one world to live in and context is all encompassing (pun intended).
No, it really doesn’t. I didn’t say show it to every black person and if any of them object, it’s a problem. I said “even one”, as in, pick somebody at random, as in the archetypical “reasonable man’s standard”. Just make sure the “reasonable man” includes people of color. You’re always going to find somebody who will object to anything, and while you shouldn’t totally ignore them, you shouldn’t let them fully define your agenda either. Again, this isn’t a unilateral veto. You get to decide whose voices you care about listening to. Just know that the people who you aren’t listening to are going to be upset, and act accordingly.
Also, that’s like, the most entry level bar. It’s like the Bechdel test. It isn’t the final standard for whether something is misogynistic or not. It’s a bare minimum rule of thumb that you use as a starting point, or a gut check. “We’re thinking of doing this clothing line inspired by Native American head-dresses. Maybe we should ask some Native peoples if it’s deeply disrespectful or not.”
It’s complicated. Moana is a good example because they tried pretty hard to get Pacific Islander representation. They lucked out that one of the biggest stars in the world at the time was Samoan, but they also did some research about various Pacific Island culture and mythologies, and went out of their way to find an unknown Hawaiian girl to be the star of their film. They were doing the legwork. Then, some people complained that the Rock wasn’t Samoan enough, and that he had to learn the Samoan chants phonetically. Those people are a small minority, and their opinion should be listened to, but should also be weighed against the people who found the representation respectful.
I agree with this, with the caveat that if your standard, either explicitly or implicitly, is “it’s only a problem if (rich) white males are upset about it” or “it’s only a problem if I’m personally upset about it”, you’re definitely doing it wrong.
I find this discussion fascinating because it’s something I want to be more sensitive to, but I honestly don’t understand the objections. Your example isn’t very helpful, and I doubt it even qualifies for how most people discuss the topic. But if you’ve got a better example, I’d love to hear it.
-Tom
Let’s pick a recent-ish high profile example: Lucky Lee’s.
So, here you have a white woman starting a restaurant advertising “clean” Chinese food, ostensibly named after a family member named Lee.
However, it’s abundantly clear that this restaurant used the name “Lee” in an attempt at claiming an imprimatur of authenticity, as it’s a common Chinese name. At the same time, they were explicitly trading on racist stereotypes of Chinese food (and by extension, Chinese people) as low class and unhealthy by making claims of food being too oily, or making you feel bloated, etc. Additionally, quite obviously invoking long debunked claims about the negative health effects of MSG in Chinese food.
Setting aside the question of whether they were depriving a Chinese entrepreneur of the same location, they were quite clearly attempting to capitalize on Chinese food’s cultural cachet to differentiate themselves from the crowded restaurant scene. They were doing so by simultaneously explicitly perpetuating negative stereotypes of Chinese people and food as scary and unhealthy by casting themselves in contrast. They were using Chinese culture to profit by bolstering their own credentials while doing harm to Chinese people in America.
What could they have done differently? Well, the opposite of all the things I mentioned. Choosing a name that doesn’t imply endorsement from the Chinese community. Not invoking long discredited racist stereotypes about Chinese food. If you want to serve macrobiotic gluten free lo mein? Say that. Don’t say “all other Chinese food is bad for you except ours.”
I think that’s a great example of racist stereotyping.
I find this an interesting discussion because some of my favourite Italian food is prepared by a Chinese chef who trained in Italy, but is reverential about it, while I’ve certainly seen “appropriation” by what appeared to be fairly modest Vietnamese in Europe who claimed to cook “Chinese food” but it was clearly nothing like actual Chinese food (probably because Chinese food rings more tills than Vietnamese food, at least 20 years ago).
Maybe it’s easier to define “appropriation” more narrowly when someone tries to use or take another culture, and fails to provide credit for it. Where it is disrespectful or troping (which is when most of us start having issues with it), then we can just call it out as racist.
Sure, if you go out of your way to define things as not cultural appropriation, don’t be surprised if you don’t see a lot of cultural appropriation.
I think the distinctions about deliberately sowing confusion with Chinese culture and profiting from that confusion are clear and that the situation is more complex than just racial stereotyping.