Cultural Appropriation

[Frew]

@C.Harris

I feel compelled to throw my own two cents in here. I think your topic, cultural appropriation, touches on a bigger issue that really needs addressing. This is the current trend of allegedly “progressive” individuals/groups to use blanket/subjective terms like “offence”, “sensitivity”, “privilege”, etc to divide communities and restrict freedoms. An immediate to-hand example is in this very thread - those of a specific race and gender should be limited in their ability to decide on the topic (my phone won’t let me quote). But the topic is an objective one. The individual’s opinion and their race, gender or minority-group membership are (or bloody well should be) orthogonal.

It’s not my intention to hijack this the thread, but I do feel we need a broader discussion about the topic.

It is a good point, I touch on general issues with identity politics in the Analysis of the Political Situation thread. It could be useful to discuss separately, but it is relevant to this debate too. If we get sidetracked, we can always split it into a new topic.

@C.Harris

The last remaining bit of the “cultural appropriation fallacy” is the matter of offence (I’m mystified that offensensitivity is MIA). Several people have already expressed that when people engage in cultural matters, it seems to be respectful/inoffensive. That’s a restrictive concept in its own right. First - something being offensive does not automatically make it bad. Shickelgruber and pals would have found the suggestion that Jews have human rights very offensive. I’m sure in it’s time a lot of people thought the idea that you could not own another person was offensive, I’m also fairly sure a lot of people were offended when someone put forward the idea that woman should vote. Today, many people find the idea that everyone should be entitled to a basic income regardless of employment to be a very offensive idea, for that matter, I believe some people will find what I have written here to be offensive. But just because these ideas are offensive dose not make them bad, if a person is offended, then before they raise issue, they should first question if the issue is what they believe. But they should never seek to restrict the freedoms of someone else just because they are offended.

@JRQ

Sacredness is very relative and it seems ridiculous to expect everyone to share the same cultural context of sacredness you do.

I think you are both getting at the same point so I want to clarify. Firstly, I’m not proposing any law or legal protection from offence. I am only talking about my own subjective values being applied in specific circumstances and my own personal value judgements about others’ cultural choices. People can do what they like. I will judge them by my own personal interpretation of the ‘don’t be a dick’ rule. Everyone makes snap judgements about people they haven’t met before based on subjective cues, I am just stating my own prejudice here.

I think both indigenous Americans and Australians have been fucked over by colonialism. Indigenous Australians have had their culture suppressed, the stolen generations was a direct assault on aboriginal culture where children were taken from their families and their culture and indoctrinated into Christianity. On most measures, they are the most marginalised group in the country. The power relationship between the Australian ‘Western’ culture and their own cultures are massively tilted in favour of westerners.

Aboriginal art is valuable as a cultural practice to aborigines. Economically it brings in millions of dollars to otherwise impoverished remote communities. If it were socially acceptable for new Australians (as in Westerners) to make aboriginal art, the money for those remote communities would dry up. Making and selling aboriginal art as a Westerner is IMO a dick move.

When it comes to the sacred artefacts of people who haven’t been systematically marginalised, do whatever you like, I probably won’t care. I actually discussed this in relation to sexy nuns outfits with someone on Facebook, who wondered why I wouldn’t find it offensive. It is because of the power relationship. The Catholic Church is one of the most powerful organisations on the planet. Artists from Wiradjuri country are marginalised. Out of respect for the plight of marginalised cultures I treat them with more respect than others.