JinJer & Felicity 44: The Glossy Veneer is Slipping

[Rachel333]

47 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

So what is a good reason? A good friend of mine from college brought me a sari when she went to visit her family in India because I love them and it was beautiful. Is that a good reason because someone from the culture gave me permission? It hardly seems so as if I ever wear it people ( in my personal experience only white people) get angry at me for wearing it.

Well, most importantly your Indian friend clearly thought it was fine. If it bothers other people I guess that's up to you how to deal with that.

46 minutes ago, SapphireSlytherin said:

Serious question after this statement:

Does this mean I shouldn't eat Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Mexican, Italian, or Greek food?

Does this mean I shouldn't have a Japanese-style screen, or a Chinese lantern, or a Mexican salsa bowl? (I have none of the above - just using those as examples.)

Where is the line drawn, and who makes that decision?

P.S. I've found that many times, people other than those whose cultures are being (presumably) appropriated are the ones who are outraged/irritated about these things. Outrage on behalf of a group who may not see the outrage? Is there a term for that? Cultural appropriation confliction? 

I don't know where the line is, and I don't think that I'm the one to make that decision anyway. Regarding food, I've never seen anyone get upset about food unless it was people profiting off of recipes they took from marginalized cultures.

In this thread the specific only thing I've actually called cultural appropriation is when non-Native people use warbonnets as fashion accessories, and that was because I have seen it almost universally condemned by actual Native Americans and not because I made that decision myself. I haven't accused anyone in this thread of cultural appropriation and I have repeatedly said that I personally don't think every example of someone using something from another culture is appropriation. (If anything, I think I'm probably too quick to say things definitely aren't cultural appropriation, when that isn't really up to me either.)

All I'm saying is that I disagree with the attitude that someone is entitled to use things from a culture that isn't theirs simply because they like them, as I keep seeing people say without even mentioning how people from the culture in question might feel about it. That kind of blanket attitude is the whole reason that cultural appropriation can be an issue.

Edited October 4, 2018 by Rachel333

[fluffernutter]

52 minutes ago, zee_four said:

Wow... I know this is ccommon  but still sad. You should be proud of your daughter.

A high school in the Denver area, the Arapahoe High School Warriors in Littleton,  kept their mascot but redesigned it after forging a relationship with area Arapahoe tribes and their elders. They kept their school's "tradition" but have become very respectful in doing so. Maybe you could pass that on to your daughter if its something she's still passionate about for ideas?

She presented some ideas for alternative mascots. It fell on deaf ears. Here is hoping, if one kid makes an issue of this every year, they will start to come around.

[MamaJunebug]

3 hours ago, fluffernutter said:

We live in an area that is so conservative and largely oblivious to cultural issues. Our school's mascot is a Native American. It's everywhere- in the football stands, all the fans wear items associated with Native Americans, the kids all wear shirts saying "Indians Bleed Green (school color)" etc. So last year, my daughter wrote about changing the mascot for her argumentative essay. She got insane backlash. She was teased, ridiculed, and told she had no right to be in marching band since she lacked school spirit, etc... . Other kids wrote their essays on how it's respectful of the district to "honor" Native Americans by choosing that mascot. Luckily, her teacher was super supportive and she got a good grade, and had a really positive discussion with the teacher and another administrator. Nothing's come of it yet, but I was proud of her for taking it on.

As a friend and extended family member of Native folks, I thank your daughter AND you and will keep you both in my prayers!  May she continue to be strong!!!

[bethover89]

4 hours ago, fluffernutter said:

We live in an area that is so conservative and largely oblivious to cultural issues. Our school's mascot is a Native American. It's everywhere- in the football stands, all the fans wear items associated with Native Americans, the kids all wear shirts saying "Indians Bleed Green (school color)" etc. So last year, my daughter wrote about changing the mascot for her argumentative essay. She got insane backlash. She was teased, ridiculed, and told she had no right to be in marching band since she lacked school spirit, etc... . Other kids wrote their essays on how it's respectful of the district to "honor" Native Americans by choosing that mascot. Luckily, her teacher was super supportive and she got a good grade, and had a really positive discussion with the teacher and another administrator. Nothing's come of it yet, but I was proud of her for taking it on.

My elementary school was “the Indians” until the mid 90’s when it was thankfully changed to the wolves. (We had an awful school chant and horrible characatures before the change). That’s great of your daughter for standing up to it! 

Edited October 4, 2018 by bethover89

[Shadoewolf]

Totally not relevant to the conversation but but it came across my FB feed. Thought I'd share...

[ItsMeY'all]

My hubby and I must be horrible tribal members because we are both totally fine with mascots and names. Just about everyone I grew up with is also tribal to some degree (we are from Oklahoma...) and I seriously haven't heard complaints from anyone. In fact, it is usually the opposite.  Maybe those that are bothered don't feel as though they can speak up? I know that is just a small sample and clearly there are those that are really upset, but I do think people would be surprised by how many of us don't care. There are just sooooo many other problems within the native communities right now that seem so much more immediate I guess it makes mascots seem kind of unimportant. 

Edited October 4, 2018 by ItsMeY'all

[Rachel333]

49 minutes ago, ItsMeY'all said:

Just about everyone I grew up with is also tribal to some degree (we are from Oklahoma...)

Yeah, I have a lot of family members in Oklahoma and many of them are registered tribe members. None of them are particularly connected to that side of their heritage and they are often are downright racist, including to Native Americans. ? They're all big Trump supporters too...

Edited October 4, 2018 by Rachel333

[SapphireSlytherin]

When it comes to high school mascots, I think this one takes the cake.

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/controversial-mascots/13/ 

 

[Rio]

Sorry the door-to-door missionaries conversation is a few pages back but I have to tell my story:

Years ago I was in the back yard and saw two clean-cut young men in shirt and tie knocking at my neighbor’s door. My small sons were in the house and I realized these guys must have been at my door first. I asked my older son (maybe 7 or so) why he hadn’t opened the door. He stated firmly, “Those are strangers, Mom!” 

[libgirl2]

3 hours ago, SapphireSlytherin said:

When it comes to high school mascots, I think this one takes the cake.

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/controversial-mascots/13/ 

 

Wow that is awful. 

[MayMay1123]

when i was growing up there was a neighborhood steak shop called "chink's", that was the owner's nickname from childhood on, though he was greek. it was called that for 55 years! when he died another guy took over and had protestors because of the name and he changed it to his name (i grew up with the new owner, he's a good guy). now people still call it "chink's", and think the new owner bowed to political correctness carried too far. the controversy made national news. personally, i think the guy should call it whatever he wants to, especially now that it is his name on the front. wdyt?

[HerNameIsBuffy]

14 hours ago, Rachel333 said:

All I'm saying is that I disagree with the attitude that someone is entitled to use things from a culture that isn't theirs simply because they like them, as I keep seeing people say without even mentioning how people from the culture in question might feel about it. 

This issue is very complex and ripe for whataboutism but this sentence reminded me of something that irked me years ago.

Idk when it was but there was a time in the 80s when it was a thing for some people to wear rosaries as jewelry because they looked cool.  Sometimes a bunch of them at a time, people who had no religious or cultural ties to the Catholic church whatsoever.

Thanks, Madonna.

It annoyed me when I'd see it.  Not enough to protest or even confront them because I didn't care that much, but I didn't like it.

Oddly enough it didn't bother me that Madonna did it.  She was anti-RCC but she was raised Catholic so I saw it as something she was entitled to use to rebel since it was part of her cultural heritage.

I didn't get outraged about it because I understood that to those with no Catholic ties they were just objects, costume jewelry and meant nothing...I'd never have worn mine that way because they have significant symbolic value to me.  However, I wouldn't trivialize sacred objects of other cultures because I understand some people care more than I do.

In fact when I was in grade school I really wanted a star of David necklace because all my friends had them (I went to a predominantly Jewish school) and my arguments of it being pretty, that David is in our bible too, etc didn't wash with my mom.  It was disrespectful and wasn't mine to wear.  She didn't use the word appropriation but that was her argument, definitely not an anti-Jewish thing would have been the same for any other culture, and I wasn't allowed even if I bought it with my own money.

I did however wear a pot leaf necklace for a while because it was given to me by a bf, even though weed was never my party supplement of choice.  

 

[DarkAnts]

17 hours ago, zee_four said:

Indigenous here, and I'd say cultural appropriation is a problem when very sacred religious/spiritual items and practices are taken and used in an ignorant and inappropriate fashion.

 

 

Like the warbonnets of Plains tribes are sacred items for Male elders. The hula for my people kanakas (Native Hawai'ians) is a very sacred spiritual practice. Being cheap and sexy replicating these things are  a problem.

 

The sexy "Indian maiden" or slutty "hula" girl are even more problematic because of the horrific problem with sexual assault for indigenous women, most often perpetrated by white men and not prosecuted or investigated or really anything done about it at all.

There's nothing wrong with wearing or owning items from a cultural that aren't super sacred and miscued. Buy Navajo beadwork headbands or Hawai'ian gourd instruments just try to buy from actual NatIves not white owned corporations massproducing Native work. Like how the Polynesian Cultural Center is for profit and owned by the LDS Church you know the original missionaries who took over our island and people for their white business interests and banned all of our culture and language as demonic and barbaric and took our Keiki (kids) so they didn't learn from their ohana and learned to be like white Mormons instead eexcept seen as descendants of sinners from the past for being marked with dark skin.

Other than that eat our food, listen to music, just understand and respect different minority cultures when you do and that's no problem.

 

Hope that makes sense.

I always look for made by/in tag before I purchase something. I was surprised by the number of made in China stickers I saw for supposedly “Native” items at the Seattle Art Museum gift shop.

[Don'tlikekoolaid]

Cathedral of the Ozarks fundy church.  Not Catholic but doesn’t a Cathedral require a Bishop?   So then that would be appropriated from the Catholic Church, right?    

[SapphireSlytherin]

From Wiki:   ...the term "cathedral" is often applied colloquially to any large and impressive church, regardless of whether it functions as a cathedral, such as the Crystal Cathedral in California or the Arctic Cathedral in Tromsø, Norway.

[SilverBeach]

On 10/3/2018 at 9:50 AM, bekkah said:

My brother in law is a first generation immigrant from Africa, he does not consider himself to be African American. The way he speaks, dresses and practices religion is completely different from African Americans. So, it is obvious how we talk about our family is different than a bicultural relationship between white and African Americans. Culture is such a tricky thing to navigate and than throw on top skin color becomes even tricker. 

This is a pet peeve of mind. If anything, people from African nations are African-Amercan (which is a garbage term to me, it's like saying North American-American). The rest of us are just black people. We have some commonalities, and we have some differences, although my experience is that people from an African nation identify with their nation (Ghana, Nigeria, etc.), not the entire continent of Africa. My experience has also been that the people from African nations are mostly Christian and practice like the rest of us . Many Africans in my church. They tend to dress like the rest of us too.

[Iamtheway]

4 hours ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

I didn't get outraged about it because I understood that to those with no Catholic ties they were just objects, costume jewelry and meant nothing...I'd never have worn mine that way because they have significant symbolic value to me.  However, I wouldn't trivialize sacred objects of other cultures because I understand some people care more than I do.

When I was younger I went on a trip to Krakow in Poland. We did a tour of Auschwitz and visited a monastery that people pilgrimage to. In their museum they had rosary beads made from bread by a woman in Auschwitz. Having just been there and seen the horrors that took place there it really affected me that she would use her food like that when she had so little. 

I am not at all catholic (as heathen as they come) but I bought rosary beads at that monastary and had them hanging in my room to remember the experience. I would never have worn them though. That would have felt really weird and wrong. 

[HerNameIsBuffy]

14 minutes ago, Iamtheway said:

I am not at all catholic (as heathen as they come) but I bought rosary beads at that monastary and had them hanging in my room to remember the experience. I would never have worn them though. That would have felt really weird and wrong. 

I think that's a lovely tribute to that woman and all the others who suffered there.

[Daisy0322]

I know I'm a little late but I feel like cultural appropriation is using something from a culture without respect for it.  For exsample wearing a geshia costume on Halloween not cool....but if you love the culture and take interest in it and want to do a photo shoot or dress up for some culture appreciation day that's fine.  Or like My husband isn't Mexican but he grew up in a largely Mexican neighborhood so he really loves the culture.  He speaks Spanish to our son and knows a lot a about the holidays/ traditions and he gets so mad when he sees sugar skulls used inappropriately. 

You can enjoy other cultures without it being appropriation.

[Jinder Roles]

At the risk of beating a dead horse (or parrot), the key elements that make something appropriation are power relations, profit and effect (intent or not).   There’s also a thing called assimilation (which a lot of people confuse for appropriation). And it tends to be situational. It’s a complex issue y’all.

Baby turbans are...weird, but I don’t think it’s appropriation. However, if there are people that face negative effects from a baby turban (feels a little silly typing this) that opinion would be more important than mine.  

@SilverBeach Exactly. I studied in the US for college and people kept on calling me African-American and I was like “nope, I’m black”. Mostly because I’m not American. Though I swear some people thinks saying ‘black’ is an insult or something. No idea why. 

[SilverBeach]

Baby turbans crack me the hell up! My DD had way too much hair to wear one of those when she was a baby.

[BachelorToTheRapture]

5 hours ago, SilverBeach said:

This is a pet peeve of mind. If anything, people from African nations are African-Amercan (which is a garbage term to me, it's like saying North American-American). The rest of us are just black people. We have some commonalities, and we have some differences, although my experience is that people from an African nation identify with their nation (Ghana, Nigeria, etc.), not the entire continent of Africa. My experience has also been that the people from African nations are mostly Christian and practice like the rest of us . Many Africans in my church. They tend to dress like the rest of us too.

In my (fairly limited) experience with Americans born in Africa or who's parents immigrated, they tend to prefer Nigerian American, etc. rather than African, but I've seen the same with any immigrants/2nd generation immigrants from Europe or Asia as well. People don't seem to like all the cultures of their continent being lumped in together, they seem to prefer more specificity (even more with some Italians, my grandma is half SICILIAN, don't tell her otherwise)

[SapphireSlytherin]

My former boss referred to a brown-skinned man from England as "African-American" in general conversation. The English guy was completely confused, and asked me later why...  I explained that many (white) people are almost scared to use the word "Black."

My cousins and friends always call themselves "Black" (yes, capitalized). Not African-American. Further, they always ask if I want to be referred to as "English-American" or "German-American" or whatever (jokingly) because my most-recent immigrant ancestors (my mom's mom's mom's mom & dad) arrived in the USA in 1871. 

[Rachel333]

I saw this tweet today and it made me think of the conversation here. 

 

[closetcagebaby]

I’ve already spent too much time talking about cultural appropriation in another online community today and it’s stressing me out, so I’m just going to leave this link here for anyone who feels moved to read it. 

https://everydayfeminism.com/2016/05/defending-cultural-appropriation/