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Obdicut posted:So anyway, why is 'racism' a useful term but 'cultural appropriation' uselessly vague?
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Mar 30, 2015 22:51
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Obdicut posted:Kudos for having the balls to say it. Now explain why it's terrible that it means different things to different people. I think its terrible because it is obfuscates meaning and starts shitfights between people arguing about different things. Zeitgueist posted:Not really, it means something fairly specific. The problem is that people keep want to explain how racist things aren't racism. I disagree. You can start with the difference between academic and dictionary definitions of racism. e: has anyone made an effort post here detailing both what they believe cultural appropriation is, and the negatives effects that it causes? Miltank fucked around with this message at 23:15 on Mar 30, 2015 |
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Mar 30, 2015 23:12
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Obdicut posted:What should we use instead when we want to talk about racism? Good question. What do you mean by racism?
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Mar 30, 2015 23:16
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Obdicut posted:Depends on the context I'm using it in. See, one cool thing is I'm not actually limited in the number of words that I can use, and the general understanding of racism--that people are put at a disadvantage by being treated differently by perceived differences in 'race', which is an artificial social construct that purports to be based on biological differences--is a pretty good starting point. Using that common knowledge as the springboard, if I'm talking about it I can use other words to clarify my meaning--like has been done with cultural appropriation in this thread, by me and various others. It's nifty! That is the academic definition and it is a useful concept, but I doubt it is the 'general understanding of racism.' Many, if not most people will tell you that racism is something like the average dictionary definition quote:a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race That racism is understood as referring to a thing, and the cause of the thing, and the consequence of the thing, makes it a problematic word in my opinion.
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Mar 31, 2015 00:08
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blackguy32 posted:I think it is foolish for people to want the word to be so precise when it came to a system that was and is horribly imprecise. But like all things complex, we can explain it and what racism means in different contexts. I agree with you.
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Mar 31, 2015 00:53
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It's the commodification of culture that makes it wrong right? This is why I'm not sure that cultural appropriation is a useful concept. It just isn't relevant outside of some sort of economic exploitation, so why not just go straight to talking about that?
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Mar 31, 2015 01:38
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Oh man I wish you hadn't edited that post. E: This whole thread is what happens when you get liberalism all mixed up with leftism. We are supposed to give a poo poo about people's feelings getting hurt? If economic exploitation isn't at the root of the issue then who cares? And if economic exploitation IS at the root of the issue, then address that without the pointless cultural appropriation rhetoric. Miltank fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Mar 31, 2015 |
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Mar 31, 2015 03:16
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blackguy32 posted:Maybe I am not understanding you properly, but what I am getting from what you are saying is that if people aren't being economically exploited then it doesn't matter? If the people aren't suffering then it doesn't matter. If they are suffering, then its probably because of exploitation rather than cultural appropriation.
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Mar 31, 2015 04:24
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How do negative stereotypes go along with cultural appropriation? Miltank fucked around with this message at 04:48 on Mar 31, 2015 |
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Mar 31, 2015 04:38
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blackguy32 posted:Blackface is a perfect example. Blackface is white people appropriating what they perceived to be how black people acted and then presented to people in the form of minstrel shows. Some of those stereotypes still exist today. Isn't blackface about making fun of black people?
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Mar 31, 2015 04:48
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blackguy32 posted:Blackface is at its basic form the packaging of what was perceived to be African American culture and broadcasted to others. So yes, it is still appropriation. One of the most easily visible forms in fact. The reason it is wrong and the reason why it has so much cultural inertia, was because black people were and are being exploited economically. Appropriation is a very weird word to be using in relation to minstrel shows imo. It's a completely different use of the word then in the way it's used to refer to wearing traditional native clothes.
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Mar 31, 2015 05:20
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Black people make music like this: *enjoys a rich tapestry of art from all cultures taking inspiration from a diverse selection of influences. He has created a poignant work of art.* White people make music like this: *cynically markets race music to suburban youth. Despite his commercial success, he doesn't understand or enjoy the source material.
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Mar 31, 2015 17:46
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I'm glad that we finally have a faux-left megathread.
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Apr 1, 2015 16:33
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All will be explained in detail if you just read my 30 page essay on why JK Rowling's so-called 'dark' arts are an erasure of traditional native magics and spiritual techniques.
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Apr 1, 2015 16:44
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GBS!!!! (!)
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Apr 1, 2015 17:21
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I don't have to be able to isolate some distilled essence of leftism to recognize that cultural appropriation is a windmill for liberals to tilt at. E:v lol
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Apr 1, 2015 17:38
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Obdicut posted:As has been said from the beginning, all the trivial poo poo is, indeed, trivial. The more important issues are the continued exploitation and destruction of Native American culture, for example. What confuses me is the relevance of Native American cultural 'exploitation and destruction' at the hands of frat boys wearing war bonnets compared to the exploitation and destruction that native populations face every single day on the reservations. Miltank fucked around with this message at 20:18 on Apr 1, 2015 |
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Apr 1, 2015 20:12
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I don't see it.
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Apr 1, 2015 20:31
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Sedan Chair confirmed as a /pol 5th columnist.
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Apr 4, 2015 04:04
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Effectronica posted:You called everyone in here a racist if they didn't agree with you, implicitly, in this post.  Is it wrong because he didn't do it explicitly like you do?
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Apr 5, 2015 14:10
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It exists, it just doesn't matter.
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Apr 7, 2015 04:51
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Maybe if native Americans weren't living in hopeless ghettos their culture wouldn't be threatened by hipsters?
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Apr 7, 2015 04:54
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Zeitgueist posted:People are talking about appropriation in the context of other oppression, not as if it's separate or worse. The language of cultural appropriation functions to obscure the forms of oppression which perpetuate it.
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Apr 7, 2015 05:07
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ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:Seriously. Tell someone they shouldn't wear a knockoff Lakota ceremonial headdress to a Halloween drink-and-gently caress party because it's extremely disrespectful and also pretty racist and they'll probably understand. Say you shouldn't wear the headdress because of "cultural appropriation" will just make them tilt their head at you and look confused. Yeah. It's disrespectful because the Lakota are currently ghettoed in loving Pine Ridge- not because of liberal wank about wearing a hat that 'doesn't belong to your culture.'
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Apr 7, 2015 05:28
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Zeitgueist posted:Yeah, but I missed the part where the folks who are talking about cultural appropriation didn't know or care about oppression of the groups that they're concerned about the oppression of. We can discuss gender wage discrepancy alongside FGM because they are both forms of exploitation- unlike cultural appropriation. E:^ the western obsession with authenticity is a reaction to consumer capitalism.
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Apr 7, 2015 16:11
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Popular Thug Drink posted:yeah oh deary me we shouldn't talk about academic language in a thread asking for an explanation of academic language I am for talking about academic language. In this case, the academic language is worthless outside of the anthropological study of consumerism. That is what I am saying about it.
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Apr 7, 2015 19:42
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Zeitgueist posted:
You said it was probably appropriation. Could you give an example of how it would and wouldn't be appropriation? e: assume that the headdress is made and sold by natives, and that natives will receive 100% of the profits.
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Apr 7, 2015 19:51
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Effectronica posted:People are using appropriation to refer to (a class of) destructive cultural interactions, because those are the only ones they consider to be bad. Nobody thinks that Americans eating schnitzel is bad, because it doesn't impinge on the cultures that originally produced schnitzel at all. People think that white Americans wearing kimono as a fashion statement is bad because they believe it impinges on Japanese-American (and the broader Asian-American) cultures and damages them. People that are informed generally agree that "spirit animals" is a bad thing because it damages Native religions and cultures. How does the Disneyland spirit animal attraction damage native culture and religion? What is the harm? I honestly don't understand. The American pop left is garbage. The economic reason for why buckskin were being worn was a marketing campaign, and the reason why it was opposed was because the Navajo claimed the exclusive right to sell them. It all really does come down to economics I'm sorry to say. Miltank fucked around with this message at 18:43 on Apr 9, 2015 |
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Apr 9, 2015 18:36
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Effectronica posted:I don't know what the hell you're talking about, but it suggests you're fairly uninformed about these issues. Your second paragraph confirms it, because the reason buckskin fringe became popular was because counterculture people wore it as a sign of solidarity with the AIM and other Native movements, and the reason it was abandoned by those people was because Native activists, most of whom had been the target of cultural extermination in their childhoods, wanted to reserve traditional clothing for their own use to maintain and revive Native cultures. Your story is utterly inane because the Navajo do not and never had a monopoly on the use of deer hide for clothing. Sorry, I thought you were talking about the modern revival. The Navajo do have a legal monopoly on making Navajo clothes. In the 70s, the economic factors were an attempted rejection of cultural consumerism. I didn't say that economics are the only thing that were important to me, but they are what shapes society and everything it produces.
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Apr 9, 2015 18:52
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Effectronica posted:The Navajo are not the only culture that used deerhide for clothes. Furthermore, your entire thought-process, by your standards, is about how everything comes back to this singular phenomenon, which means that you are, by definition, incapable of even approaching objectivity. The 'phenomenon' of who has access to what resources? Yes. E: it is extremely important. Miltank fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Apr 9, 2015 |
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Apr 9, 2015 19:02
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You are an retard.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:05
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Effectronica posted:So then we have two paragraphs wherein you gabble about things that are irrelevant to my position, followed by a final relevant paragraph where you argue that rock-n-roll was exchanged. Exchanged for what, you couldn't tell, but whatever, I'm not going to turn everything into a demand that you use terms more appropriately. Instead I'm going to point out that the reasons black artists were unable to make and sell rock-n-roll records had very little to do with economic inequality, except in third-order effects. It had a lot more to do with racism from record companies and white parents that refused to record black artists and who would only accept rock-n-roll when it was safely white, respectively. Rock and Roll was part of an ongoing cultural exchange between blacks and whites and I have no idea how you could think otherwise.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:19
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You think cultural exchange is like a technology trade on Civ I'm assuming? E: like you think that people are actually obligated to give something back in exchange for adopting aspects of a culture exchange which they are already a part of? E2: the racism is what is hosed up about what happened with rock- not cultural exchange. Miltank fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Apr 9, 2015 |
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Apr 9, 2015 19:25
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Effectronica posted:Look, I give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you're not a precocious teenager with a lot of angst, buddy, but the process of exchange ended with rock-n-roll and doesn't really resume until rap and hip-hop take off. In between, you have brief borrowings with blue-eyed soul and white soul bands, but there's very little interaction between musical cultures. Yes. That is because of the development of market sectionalism and consumer culture with a heaping helping of racism scooped on top. It is a bad thing. Tell me what it has to do with cultural appropriation.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:32
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Effectronica posted:Are you familiar with the term "race music"? If you Google it, I will know. Throw some knowledge down on me mama.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:44
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Effectronica posted:Who's saying anything about conserving cultures?You're acting like cultures inevitably collapse into a monoculture without strict boundaries despite the weight of history against you. Aren't you? Effectronica posted:Most Native American cultures in the USA are in pretty precarious positions and mass media depictions do have a lot of influence on them. Clearly, these labor aristocrats should have their cultures annihilated rather than white people not talk about spirit animals or wear buckskin or go "how". Effectronica posted:People are using appropriation to refer to (a class of) destructive cultural interactions, because those are the only ones they consider to be bad. Nobody thinks that Americans eating schnitzel is bad, because it doesn't impinge on the cultures that originally produced schnitzel at all. People think that white Americans wearing kimono as a fashion statement is bad because they believe it impinges on Japanese-American (and the broader Asian-American) cultures and damages them. People that are informed generally agree that "spirit animals" is a bad thing because it damages Native religions and cultures. Effectronica posted:A lot of people are taking the position that any and all interaction with a culture not your own is appropriation. This would say a lot about their mindset, but I'm guessing most of 'em don't even try to parse what "cultural appropriation" would mean. Cultural appropriation is an interaction that damages the culture's ability to define itself by ripping parts of it out. Effectronica posted:Well, yes, you're really stupid. But let me try this again- cultural appropriation is when you take something from another culture and damage or destroy their ability to use it for themselves. This differs from other forms of cultural change because it is done to a culture rather than by it, and because the cultural component is then used by the culture that stole it. Effectronica posted:People are using appropriation to refer to (a class of) destructive cultural interactions, because those are the only ones they consider to be bad. Nobody thinks that Americans eating schnitzel is bad, because it doesn't impinge on the cultures that originally produced schnitzel at all. People think that white Americans wearing kimono as a fashion statement is bad because they believe it impinges on Japanese-American (and the broader Asian-American) cultures and damages them. People that are informed generally agree that "spirit animals" is a bad thing because it damages Native religions and cultures. If conserving cultures from the monoculture isn't what you are talking about then I have no idea what it is. e: why is it so central that cultures be able to control how others define them within the monoculture?
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Apr 9, 2015 19:57
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Effectronica posted:You're really bad at using basic forums features, Christ. But all this relies on the assumption that allowing people to define their own cultures is "conserving cultures", which is a good example of a disingenuous definition. Why is it so central that cultures be able to control how others define them within the monoculture?
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Apr 9, 2015 20:05
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Effectronica posted:If you're going to put it to a choice between "zero control over yourself" and "total control over others", I'd have to choose punching you in the face. I have no idea what you mean by this. You think that cultural groups should have the power to control the way that the monoculture defines them right? Why would an actual, healthy culture give a poo poo about what American consumers think of them??
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Apr 9, 2015 20:12
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Effectronica posted:No, I think that they should have the power to define themselves, rather than the primary culture (not monoculture) defining it. You're saying that Jewishness should only be defined by non-Jews. Ok yeah, but if they themselves don't already define their own culture for themselves then the battle is already lost right? How could a culture not define itself? I am not saying that Jewishness should only be defined by non-Jews at all. I am saying that Jews have an internal definition for what it means to be a Jew which is separate from what the primary culture defines them as. Miltank fucked around with this message at 20:20 on Apr 9, 2015 |
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Apr 9, 2015 20:17
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I am not saying that Jewishness should only be defined by non-Jews at all. I am saying that Jews have an internal definition for what it means to be a Jew which is separate from what the primary culture defines them as. How does the primary culture impose definitions on the minority culture?
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Apr 9, 2015 20:20
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