"Fortnite Dances" is Cultural Erasure. Straight Up.

DigitalOp · Nov 8, 2018

Mod Edit: There is a productive discussion to be had here, but if this thread is to continue, we will need to take it seriously, not antagonize each other, or be dismissive about the topic. Post in good faith and be civil.

"EveryTime Somebody Does My Dance Dey Give Credit to @FortniteGame But Dey Ain't Create Nothing But Da Game So Basically Dey Takin Money And Credit For My Shit Dats Crazy," BlocBoy tweeted out in early September. He followed that by adding, "Dey Love Our Culture But Hate Our Color."

They don't want to pay them.

They don't want to give them proper credit.

So the result is things that are associated with our culture gets loaned out wholesale and entirely re-appropriated to mass audiences with no reverance for the source.

I can't even watch NBA without literally every single kid doing these on camera. These kids go perform for their parents and they laugh and clap while they praise Fortnite for its creativity, totally unaware how this all stems from Black Culture at the source.

Its a continuation of the same cultural erasure that has happened throughout history, esp in regards to Hip-Hop.

Are white kids not allowed to do black dances?.... No, nobody is saying that. We're saying give us our damn credit. Stop whitewashing our creations and show people the source.

Fortnite makes money off of this stuff. JB Blocboy even says he don't even care about the money, he just wants the credit. Its one or the other, but this is just ridiculous.

I should be able to 'shoot' in public without someone saying "HAHA, Its that dance from Fortnite!" Thats really fucking annoying to hear from white people.

And before you say "FoRtNiTe MaDe tHeM PoPuLaR"....... No, these dances made it to Fortnite BECAUSE they were already popular. You got it backwards.

What would make this even worse is Are there even black devs working on Fortnite? I could understand a little if they added some of this stuff in, but if EPIC is primarily a white development company, that makes all this shit even more devious and suspect

Just like the YT comment says : Cause everything we do is Ghetto until they find it profitable, and then it's Creative
-----

And y'all can kiss my ass for this one. Here is a video citing the Top 10 Dances.....

And #1 is the HYPE....

BUT THE GUY DOESNT KNOW WHERE THE SOURCE IS FROM. HE PLAYS A VIDEO OF A WHITE USHER DOING THE MOVE.

And y'all wanna sit here and act like Im fucking crazy? When this shit PROVES my fucking point?

Phantom · Nov 8, 2018

Honestly Fortnite, PUBG, Blackout, all these games and/or modes are just showing how creatively bankrupt this industry is, kinda like Hollywood.

vestan · Nov 8, 2018

You're right OP and a bunch of condescending posters will tell you that it doesn't matter. It's impossible to get Epic sued over this but the artists absolutely fucking deserve some sort of recognition, especially because Epic is making millions of their dances.

Chessguy1 · Nov 8, 2018

https://www.resetera.com/threads/ch...es-money-should-be-shared-with-artists.55531/

LucidMomentum · Nov 8, 2018

It's in Destiny II as well to some extent.

Orange Justice is probably the only Fortnite-inspired Fortnite dance.

Deleted member 1185 · Nov 8, 2018

Forgive my ignorance but I would have never associated any dance with a specific culture.

I'm certainly not arguing with you but I imagine many others are in a similar situation where its just something we never even thought of.

I am curious though how do we define a dance as belonging to a specific culture and what belongs to popular culture?

It seems like it would be tough to know unless you are somewhat familiar with those cultures to begin with

Powerofthecloud · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
They don't want to pay them.

They don't want to give them proper credit.

So the result is things that are associated with our culture gets loaned out wholesale and entirely re-appropriated to mass audiences with no reverance for the source.

I can't even watch NBA without literally every single kid doing these on camera. These kids go perform for their parents and they laugh and clap while they praise Fortnite for its creativity, totally unaware how this all stems from Black Culture at the source.

Its a continuation of the same cultural erasure that has happened throughout history, esp in regards to Hip-Hop.

Are white kids not allowed to do black dances?.... No, nobody is saying that. We're saying give us our damn credit. Stop whitewashing our creations and show people the source.

Fortnite makes money off of this stuff. JB Blocboy even says he don't even care about the money, he just wants the credit. Its one or the other, but this is just ridiculous.

I should be able to 'shoot' in public without someone saying "HAHA, Its that dance from Fortnite!" Thats really fucking annoying to hear from white people.

And before you say "FoRtNiTe MaDe tHeM PoPuLaR"....... No, these dances made it to Fortnite BECAUSE they were already popular. You got it backwards.

What would make this even worse is Are there even black devs working on Fortnite? I could understand a little if they added some of this stuff in, but if EPIC is primarily a white development company, that makes all this shit even more devious and suspect

Just like the YT comment says : Cause everything we do is Ghetto until they find it profitable, and then it's Creative

We have gone through this thread before. Most of the dances are from multiple cultures. You can not copyright a dance moves.

DigitalOp · Nov 8, 2018

Chessguy1 said:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/ch...es-money-should-be-shared-with-artists.55531/

Well aware of that old thread, we talking about this again since Fortnite is bigger than ever and nothing still has changed

stumblebee · Nov 8, 2018

Yeah, this isn't just a fortnite problem. It gets pinned to fortnite because it's the most popular game in the world. Destiny, League of Legends, and dozens of other games feature the same shit.

I don't think you can credit the original artist, because even that gets murky in some circumstances, not to mention that it probably opens them up to a legal can of worms.

Wiped · Nov 8, 2018

That's what culture is

It's borrowed, adopted, loaned, changed. If you copyrighted and charged everything in our history we wouldn't have recipes, phrases, sayings, nursery rhymes, cliches... anything.

Derachi · Nov 8, 2018

Every time I hear the phrase "the Fortnite dance" I die a little more inside. They really gotta do something.

Powerofthecloud · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
Well aware of that old thread, we talking about this again since Fortnite is bigger than ever and nothing still has changed

Why would it.

Surface of Me · Nov 8, 2018

I don't think they should be paid, but the creator of the dance should definitely be named in the dance name in game or it's description.

As to your last point, yes the dances were already popular but I'd say it'd be easy to argue Fortnite propelled their popularity beyond where they were at and reached new demographics. So even if they do get credited, many people will still call them Fortnite dances.

DigitalOp · Nov 8, 2018

Powerofthecloud said:
We have gone through this thread before. Most of the dances are from multiple cultures. You can not copyright a dance moves.

Deleted member 36578 · Nov 8, 2018

Doesn't this bring up the question if dance moves can be trademarked or copy written again? I remember a super huge topic here about it. After watching the video, it seems countless people copied the original dance and never gave the Creator credit for it.

Chessguy1 said:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/ch...es-money-should-be-shared-with-artists.55531/

Yeah this is the one I remember reading through .

SCB360 · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
Well aware of that old thread, we talking about this again since Fortnite is bigger than ever and nothing still has changed

And why should it? Just cause you say so?

Its just a dance, something we as humans have done for our entire existence, its not stealing culture, its embracing it

Deleted member 34873 · Nov 8, 2018

Although I don't necessarily agree with your conclusions, I was with you until the part about a white dev team suggesting that this might be some calculated, intentional effort to disenfranchise black culture.

That's a bit of a leap in logic that doesn't help advance your more well-reasoned contentions.

ImperatorPat · Nov 8, 2018

It would be nice to see credit in game.

As someone who isn't plugged into music culture and plays destiny 2 I've noticed people mentioning "this is an X dance" as bungie rolls out some new dance move microtransaction with a generic name.

Would be cool to see them credit the source in game rather than just using a generic name.

Zukuu · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
Well aware of that old thread, we talking about this again since Fortnite is bigger than ever and nothing still has changed

Rightfully so. It's dance moves. What has the world come to that people even remotely think those things should be copyright material?

Etrian Darkness · Nov 8, 2018

I've only seen people do these dances since Fortnite.

apathetic · Nov 8, 2018

Kinda unrelated to the subject at hand, since it doens't matter how long this has been done, but what was the earliest game that did this sort of thing? First I can think of is WoW but was it really the first? Using recognizable dances as a side thing that is just for cosmetics/not a main part of the game.

DJ_Lae · Nov 8, 2018

Is cultural erasure the new term for cultural appropriation, just with added oomph?

I also don't see how having black staff at Epic makes the insertion of 'black' dances better. Some credit would be nice, but they're under no obligation to do so, and the different dances are pulled from all over, not just a single culture.

Khanimus · Nov 8, 2018

SCB360 said:
And why should it? Just cause you say so?

Its just a dance, something we as humans have done for our entire existence, its not stealing culture, its embracing it

Embracing it would be crediting its source.

Razorskin · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:

Does that mean Bungie is paying him for Destiny 2?

ynthrepic · Nov 8, 2018

Powerofthecloud said:
We have gone through this thread before. Most of the dances are from multiple cultures. You can not copyright a dance moves.

Pretty much, even if its sometimes frowned on in the hip hop community to straight up steal someones style/moves. Micheal Jackson did not invent "the moonwalk" but popularized it to the point where that's just what its known as. Im pretty sure there are hundreds of examples of people doing that move in media.

DJ_Lae · Nov 8, 2018

apathetic said:
Kinda unrelated to the subject at hand, since it doens't matter how long this has been done, but what was the earliest game that did this sort of thing? First I can think of is WoW but was it really the first? Using recognizable dances as a side thing that is just for cosmetics/not a main part of the game.

Everquest, maybe? MMOs have done this thing forever, with different classes and genders having dances from all over.

DonMigs85 · Nov 8, 2018

Deleted member 4037 · Nov 8, 2018

I dont think you should be able to copyright physical movements, most of these are derivatives that dont take away from the source material. They shouldnt have to pay them for dance moves, I dont think fortnite should be credited with making it, but they should be able to use dance moves

psychowave · Nov 8, 2018

bananafactory said:
Forgive my ignorance but I would have never associated any dance with a specific culture.

I'm certainly not arguing with you but I imagine many others are in a similar situation where its just something we never even thought of.

I am curious though how do we define a dance as belonging to a specific culture and what belongs to popular culture?

It seems like it would be tough to know unless you are somewhat familiar with those cultures to begin with

really? you don't associate flamenco with spain, or the tango with argentina, or capoeira dancing with brazil?

Cocolina · Nov 8, 2018

Epic and the dances that it chooses to include in its game exist in the same culture.

Zukuu · Nov 8, 2018

Khanimus said:
Embracing it would be crediting its source.

You can't for the majority of them. Even "obvious" origins have copied it from somewhere else. It's a deep rabbit hole that would lead to major trouble for no benefit.
Wanna credit the Moonwalk to MJ? Well tough shit, some guy did it before.

LinkStrikesBack · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
And before you say "FoRtNiTe MaDe tHeM PoPuLaR"....... No, these dances made it to Fortnite BECAUSE they were already popular. You got it backwards.

They're a hundred times more popular because of Fortnite, unfortunately. This is some Sapkowski level delusion ("my books made the games popular, not the other way around" talking about the Witcher games in the west).

Chindogg · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:

It'd be interesting to know if Blizzard's paying him.

boris_feinbrand · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
Well aware of that old thread, we talking about this again since Fortnite is bigger than ever and nothing still has changed

Why would it? It's dances. It happens all the time to every culture. Fuck the Romans basically stole everything from the Greeks and Etruscans and pretended it was their shit.

I will say however that I would love a note referencing the origin of the dance moves. At least that should be included.

5taquitos · Nov 8, 2018

bananafactory said:
Forgive my ignorance but I would have never associated any dance with a specific culture.

I'm certainly not arguing with you but I imagine many others are in a similar situation where its just something we never even thought of.

I am curious though how do we define a dance as belonging to a specific culture and what belongs to popular culture?

It seems like it would be tough to know unless you are somewhat familiar with those cultures to begin with

You don't associate any dances with specific cultures? Seriously?

Flamenco?
Breakdancing?
Jarabe Tapatio (the Mexican hat dance)?
Pretty much literally every dance ever?

Powerofthecloud · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:

Not the moves themselves outside of a performance

DigitalOp · Nov 8, 2018

You all really don't realize that the big issue is that Fortnite and EPIC is profiting off of this?

Its like you guys go out your way to make this okay.

Manu · Nov 8, 2018

CozMick · Nov 8, 2018

So I can't fling my arms around like a mad man without giving some dude the credit ?

This is up there with King trying to trademark the word Candy.

Ridiculous

BernardoOne · Nov 8, 2018

Most of the people that popularised the moves before Fortnite didn't invent them either and they sure didn't give credit, why should Fortnite? And Fortnite has a ridiculously wide and diverse branch of emotes all coming from all sort of different shit, and doesn't credit a single one of them.

DigitalOp said:

Fornite is not putting Soulja Boy emotes on the game because nobody has given a shit about anything Soulja Boy has put out in a decade.

Deleted member 1185 · Nov 8, 2018

psychowave said:
really? you don't associate flamenco with spain, or the tango with argentina, or capoeira dancing with brazil?

Not particularly but I'm not much of a dancer. Even so I might understand the country of origin (as with foods) but I've never heard of someone mad at an American cooking perogies or a Canadian performing a salsa dance.

So I understand the origin of these but never interpreted them as "belonging" to these countries/cultures

Deleted member 34873 · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
You all really don't realize that the big issue is that Fortnite and EPIC is profiting off of this?

Its like you guys go out your way to make this okay.

Well now you're reverting to the old thread, making this one redundant...

Raonak · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
I should be able to 'shoot' in public without someone saying "HAHA, Its that dance from Fortnite!"
Thats really fucking annoying to hear from white people.

Uh.... What? You sound like a bit of a racist...

Like, how would you feel if I (a minority) said "HAHA, Its that dance from Fortnite!". I'm not white, so is it okay?

Craig · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
You all really don't realize that the big issue is that Fortnite and EPIC is profiting off of this?

Its like you guys go out your way to make this okay.

It is ok

Hamchan · Nov 8, 2018

Copyrighting body movements seems like a nightmare to be honest.

HStallion · Nov 8, 2018

SCB360 said:
And why should it? Just cause you say so?

Its just a dance, something we as humans have done for our entire existence, its not stealing culture, its embracing it

If no one knows where the dance actually came from you're not really embracing anything but the game itself.

Merrill · Nov 8, 2018

People just looking for a pay day from the cash cow in my opinion.

see5harp · Nov 8, 2018

Every time they do the Carlton dance in an NBA stadium why isn't Alfonso getting a check? Cultural theft lollollplllollolooo

CalamityPixel · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
You all really don't realize that the big issue is that Fortnite and EPIC is profiting off of this?

Its like you guys go out your way to make this okay.

You gonna go after Valve cause they included a Hopak dance in TF2?

It's a weird subject proffiting off emotes based on real world performances.

Edit- But now I think about it, it probably wouldn't even cost much for epic to pay the creators anyway.

Cocolina · Nov 8, 2018

DigitalOp said:
You all really don't realize that the big issue is that Fortnite and EPIC is profiting off of this?

Its like you guys go out your way to make this okay.

Are the dance originators profiting off the dance? Is Epic stealing their revenue?

"Fortnite Dances" is Cultural Erasure. Straight Up.

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