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Spainkiller

Banned
Jun 6, 2018
3
Judging by the avatar, you're Danish, yes?

Gotta love when the descendants of the cultures that raped the continent of Africa say dumb shit like this.

Stop being a (superficial bigot at best, and at worst a) racist. Judge your fellow men on their character, not their skin colour, country of origin, or the assumed sins of their fathers.
 
Oct 27, 2017
4,018
Florida
Ok. You honestly agree with everything in that post? Even the part where they apparently don't care that someone would wear a turban or a hijab for Halloween? That part is so freaking weird, in that what would a person who decides to wear a hijab for Halloween be going out as? A Muslim Woman?

We can both discuss elements of our cultures being taken for entertainment and fashion purposes, and our home countries being bombed to shit (or having pro US dictators being propped up). The two aren't mutually exclusive. But I love how you find the post that you favour because it aligns with how you feel, and then proceed to ignore the numerous other posts by other none white posters that are on the other side of this topic.

"Funny, a person of colour finally speaks up about this bullshit..."

Finally the right poster with the right viewpoint for you to use as a leaping board eh?

It's not as clear as you make it.

Is that any different than people dressing up as nuns? Is it different than someone dressing up as Alladin? Or someone dressing up as a geisha. Wearing a sombrero? I dont see anything necessarily bad about these Halloween outfits.
 

D i Z

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,085
Where X marks the spot.
Yup.



Very true! That wasn't my point, though. The point was that the person in question is, inherently, a much bigger authority on issues of cultural appropriation than the plethora of pasty neckbeards here — especially if you subscribe to the ridiculous notions of identity politics that most of you do, ironically — and yet no one felt the inclination to address his post whatsoever. I found that telling.



Well, duh. Muslim men don't wear hijabs.


You're gonna have to explain the bolded there, champ.
 
Oct 28, 2017
1,228
It's not about sharing culture, that's harmless and happens all of the time. The problem is when one culture is heavily advantaged at the expense of the other culture. So for your ghost in the shell example, Asian Americans have been traditionally typecasted into certain roles and the thought was that they couldn't carry a movie. So you have 21, which was based on a true story about Asian Americans, get replaced by white people. Or Mickey Rooney playing a stereotypical Chinese person in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Or a film based on Asian culture have white people as the stars like in Avatar. In all of these, Asian Americans were denied the opportunity to have adequate representation especially in properties that pertain to the various Asian cultures and remain marginalized. It's why Crazy Rich Asians was such a success here.
I showed in the video that the majority of the asked people did not mind, so why is it always about Americans and why do you always want to project your culture into everyone?
 

LosDaddie

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
3,622
Longwood, FL
Cultural Appropriation is real issue. Part of the problem, however, is that many of the examples thrown out aren't actually cultural appropriation.

Music / Food / Hair Styles / Language / Clothing doesn't belong to one culture. Never has either. Living in a society means that those things tend to get adopted by those around you, even moreso in the global society we now live in. This is normal.

As far as "Showing Respect" / "Paying Tribute" goes, the most anyone should do is acknowledge where their influences come from for their art/craft. Most artists are actually happy to do so.
 
Sep 28, 2018
1,073
Glad you're getting laid. Has nothing to do with this conversation, and if you continue to be this fucking stupid you won't be getting laid much longer.

Calm down, sweetheart...

It has everything to do with this conversation, you just don't have the brains to put two and two together. Let me spell it out: As a white person of European decent with a long term partner who is a Pakistani born Muslim everyday we are pretty much 'appropriating' each others cultures (by some peoples definition) I wear Pakistani clothes, I celebrate Pakistani holidays and a lot of little things in between, and vice versa... And when we have our marriage ceremony it will almost certainly be very Pakistani in style.

My point was nothing to do with sex, it was that the extremists on one end of the spectrum call us 'race traitors' and on the other end harp on about 'cultural appropriation' and we both think the whole thing is fucking stupid.
 

Deleted member 22490

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 28, 2017
9,237
I showed in the video that the majority of the asked people did not mind, so why is it always about Americans and why do you always want to project your culture into everyone?
I explained it. The very limited sample size of Japanese people living in Japan in that video don't mind it, but issues of Asian American representation in American made films is an issue.
 

Heshinsi

Member
Oct 25, 2017
16,093
It's not as clear as you make it.

Is that any different than people dressing up as nuns? Is it different than someone dressing up as Alladin? Or someone dressing up as a geisha. Wearing a sombrero? I dont see anything necessarily bad about these Halloween outfits.
A hijab isn't at all equivalent to those examples though. What you posted is either a fictional character or an actual role. A hijab is a religious garment worn by muslim women. So if a person decides to wear a hijab (a religious garment that Muslims women to this day face persecution and abuse over) as a Halloween piece, when asked who they are for halloween, what's their answer?

I've seen muslim women/girls trick or treating with their kids and siblings, so the Halloween dress up would be indistinguishable from someone that's a muslim taking part in the festive that night. So you think it's ok for someone to cosplay as a muslim women for a night, in the same countries where they're yanking the hijabs off of actual Muslim girls and women and targeting them for hate crimes by virtue of their head piece?
 
Last edited:
Oct 31, 2017
6,747
I'm white, of Celtic/Anglo-Saxon decent, my girl is a Pakistani born Pashto... We swap and blend culture and sexual juices in equal measure. A little something for the ultra-racists to get upset about, a little something for the ultra-leftists to get upset about.

You're just purposefully misunderstanding the critique of cultural appropriation with some bragging about having sex with an "exotic" woman.

No one really cares that you wear Pakistani clothes and that's way outside of most the criticism of cultural appropriation, seriously.
 

RedMercury

Blue Venus
Member
Dec 24, 2017
17,655
Calm down, sweetheart...
you just don't have the brains to put two and two together.
That's some real valuable conversation right there
As a white person of European decent with a long term partner who is a Pakistani born Muslim everyday we are pretty much 'appropriating' each others cultures
Maybe not the best idea to use your partner or your relationship as a shield, dunno what you think that proves in the broader scope of things.
 

D i Z

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,085
Where X marks the spot.
Calm down, sweetheart...

It has everything to do with this conversation, you just don't have the brains to put two and two together. Let me spell it out: As a white person of European decent with a long term partner who is a Pakistani born Muslim everyday we are pretty much 'appropriating' each others cultures (by some peoples definition) I wear Pakistani clothes, I celebrate Pakistani holidays and a lot of little things in between, and vice versa... And when we have our marriage ceremony it will almost certainly be very Pakistani in style.

My point was nothing to do with sex, it was that the extremists on one end of the spectrum call us 'race traitors' and on the other end harp on about 'cultural appropriation' and we both think the whole thing is fucking stupid.

You still don't understand what appropriation means, do you?
 

Amibguous Cad

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,033
Except braids aren't a common part of white culture the way they are African American culture similar to dread locks.

Also when white people wear braids or dreads it's usually because it's "trendy" and white people are exempt from the negative stigmas that come with braids and dreads. Both styles are often used by police to further profile black people and often used or gatekeep from employment. These style and even some that black women use like box braids etc are often seen as "ghetto" and "unprofessional" in our Eurocentric society. So yeah, when white people opt to use these styles it's not only insensitive and cringy but cultural appropriation.

MMA fighters wearing them is a bit different but google a picture of any prominent white MMA fighter and you won't find many of them using that style out of the ring.

Also consider how Kim Kardashian made "boxer braids" a big style not too long ago and was credited by many publications for popularizing them when that's been a common style with black women for years.

A white person will get dragged on social media for wearing these styles at worse. A black person could lose their life for them.

So I guess I should say that I'm not trying to get into an argument here; this is important to a lot of people that I know, and I'm trying to understand where they're coming from.

The status quo is bullshit, and I can only imagine how enraging it must be to see people who have a million different unearned advantages being able to do things that get you punished with impunity. If a white person talks back to a police officer, the officer might get pissed but he's probably not at risk of violence. If a person of color does it, the officer could do any number of terrible things and get away with it.

But the solution to police brutality isn't to expose white people to the level of brutality that black people are exposed to, right? We can either solve the double standard by making things as crappy for white people as they are for black people, or we can do the opposite.

So... yeah, it seems shitty to me that PoC can't wear hair styles their types of hair are well-suited for without being seen as ghetto or unprofessional or what have you. And it seems extra shitty that the hair styles that are most natural for you get picked up by privileged people who want their hair to be transgressive or exotic or whatever without having experienced a day of the oppression that makes it transgressive in the first place.

But isn't the best way to fix this double standard to make it so that PoC can wear those hairstyles without it being a big deal, rather than creating a strong norm against white people wearing those hairstyles?
 
Sep 28, 2018
1,073
You're just purposefully misunderstanding the critique of cultural appropriation with some bragging about having sex with an "exotic" woman.

No one really cares that you wear Pakistani clothes and that's way outside of most the criticism of cultural appropriation, seriously.

lol 'exotic'... Is everyone in this thread a teenager? I wasn't bragging about having sex with my girlfriend of many years... It's pretty normal.

And, no, it isn't... All the complaints I see about 'cultural appropriation' IS white people wearing clothes of American Indians or having Dread Locks or whatever... It's all totally superficial stuff.
 
Sep 28, 2018
1,073
That's some real valuable conversation right there
I was replying to someone who said "and if you continue to be this fucking stupid " because I made a joke about having sex... I'm just answering like with like...

Maybe not the best idea to use your partner or your relationship as a shield, dunno what you think that proves in the broader scope of things.
A shield against what? I'm speaking about our experiences as a mixed race couple... For example, people saying to her 'Why are you celebrating Christmas?' as if to say 'that isn't for people like you.' I was simply saying that you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.
 

AuthenticM

Son Altesse Sérénissime
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
30,075
Ponder this:

Fortnite dances have cultural roots and they've basically had those roots eroded in the scope of the wider societal lens. The BlocBoy JB Shoot dance is't his dance anymore. It's "The Hype". The connection to its culture and its creators is lost.

It's also about not making a mockery or trivializing things that are revered or sacred. When white women wear bindis to music fests they aren't respecting the culture, they're insulting it. They're turning something that has meaning to a group of people into a fashion statement, an accessory.
This.

The element that people often miss regarding cultural appropriation (which, to me, seems to be the main cause for people not understanding the concept), is the deformation or the warping of the cultural item being appropriated. Take for example a white guy dressing as a "native american" for Halloween:

1. his costume surely isn't a 1:1 recreating of actual native american clothing, but rather what white people perceive it to be (in large part because of Hollywood);
2. that guy is taking clothing from a culture, aka "normal" clothing that has deep ties to the cultural identity of a people, and is wearing it as a Halloween costume. That is not only incredibly insulting to the native americans, but in doing so, this white guy is further twisting the perception of native american clothing and culture in the mind of white people or non-native-american people.

This is in contrast to, say, a white guy making and eating sushi. That is not cultural appropriation.
 

bluie_

Member
Oct 28, 2017
54
This.

The element that people often miss regarding cultural appropriation (which, to me, seems to be the main cause for people not understanding the concept), is the deformation or the warping of the cultural item being appropriated. Take for example a white guy dressing as a "native american" for Halloween:

1. his costume surely isn't a 1:1 recreating of actual native american clothing, but rather what white people perceive it to be (in large part because of Hollywood);
2. that guy is taking clothing from a culture, aka "normal" clothing that has deep ties to the cultural identity of a people, and is wearing it as a Halloween costume. That is not only incredibly insulting to the native americans, but in doing so, this white guy is further twisting the perception of native american clothing and culture in the mind of white people or non-native-american people.

This is in contrast to, say, a white guy making and eating sushi. That is not cultural appropriation.

So an example of cultural appropriation would be to take a norse god, make him a blonde hippie with wings on his helmet and apply him for membership in an american crime fighting group?
 

Haze

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,784
Detroit, MI
Did someone claim Kardashian made braids popular in recent times?

I don't know about that in America, but nobody knows who the Kardashians are in Italy other than those who give a shit about American gossip. Yet when I was a kid, braids like those I can see in Wikipedia - not dreads - were common for girls. Let me introduce you to Pippi Longstocking, a hugely popular and influential book and TV show (mostly known as a show in the 80s and 90s here).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pippi_Longstocking

Which is what you would be nicknamed if you were redhead and with braids in Italy.

But anyway, I understand what you mean about that, just that it isn't as much as an European or European centric thing but an American and American centric thing. Not many Italians in Italy would open a foreign style restaurant, you'd be laughed at if you're not doing actual fusion or well thought styles that don't pretend to be foreign - fusion is considered stupid anyway. We have a strong food culture just like Frenchmen and Germans. While I see that Americans pretend to be "Europeans", they follow just about nothing about our traditions and culinary styles, they changed and adapted to the bland American normality. At best some people in New Jersey and New York seem to still be doing stuff the old way and some people know famous saints. At best. When I hear italoamericans have a fetish for Columbus I cringe super hard, since there are many actual italian heroes like Garibaldi and the people who died defending our country from fascists and nazis.

Kim Kardashian was credited with a specific type of braid erroneously called "boxer braids" which has long been a protective style for black women.
 

Haze

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,784
Detroit, MI
ut the solution to police brutality isn't to expose white people to the level of brutality that black people are exposed to, right? We can either solve the double standard by making things as crappy for white people as they are for black people, or we can do the opposite.

So... yeah, it seems shitty to me that PoC can't wear hair styles their types of hair are well-suited for without being seen as ghetto or unprofessional or what have you. And it seems extra shitty that the hair styles that are most natural for you get picked up by privileged people who want their hair to be transgressive or exotic or whatever without having experienced a day of the oppression that makes it transgressive in the first place.

But isn't the best way to fix this double standard to make it so that PoC can wear those hairstyles without it being a big deal, rather than creating a strong norm against white people wearing those hairstyles

No one is suggesting the first, at all.

To the last paragraph, ideally, maybe. But that isn't the current reality and because of that reality when white people engage in these styles that recently and currently black people are dehumanized for, it's disrespectful.
 

Deleted member 50374

alt account
Banned
Dec 4, 2018
2,482
Kim Kardashian was credited with a specific type of braid erroneously called "boxer braids" which has long been a protective style for black women.
I have literally no idea of what you're talking about (about "boxer braids"), so I just googled it and it came out on a bunch of fashion websites as something that is barely attributed to Kim Kardashian.

Yeah, you're right this is pretentious white people picking up stuff without regards. Apologies for mixing it up with common braids.

Just an example:

https://magazine.lorealprofessionne...ficio-boxer-braids-vs-coda-di-cavallo_a2232/1

Lo stile: Le boxer braids sono da sempre un'acconciatura classica per la scuola... ma la buona notizia è che non sono mai state più trendy! Per un risultato chic, fate in modo che le ciocche siano ben tirate in modo che rimangano ben attaccate alla nuca e si appoggino sulle spalle.

Boxer braids were always been a classical hair style for school... but good news, never been so trendy!

Fuck off L'Oreal, western braids are clearly a different style that starts lower on the hair, around the neck, also way less intricate.
 
Last edited:

OniBarubary

Member
Nov 30, 2017
124
I'm gonna try to help out with this since a lot of people are either focusing on the wrong things or mistakenly believing in some shizz.

Cultural appropriation has nothing to do with skin color or a specific culture. A white culture can appropriate from another white culture (Brits from Scots for instance). The key point and defining characteristic that everyone continually misrepresents and keeps missing because they're either not paying attention or willfully ignorant, is when a DOMINANT culture who is in control of the country/city/whatever's society and culture takes something from a MINORITY culture. And if the word MINORITY is what's getting you hung up, it's because they're using the straight up definition of it as in "the one that isn't made up of the most people in a society" which in the US is black people, latinx, Asian, etc.

So in America because WHITES are the dominant culture, they're the ones who perpetrate it on MINORITIES in America. IN AMERICA. They are the ones who have the ability to take from those cultures, use it on their own and not suffer the problems or cultural removal that the minority has to suffer. So a white dude with dreads not suffering from the same stigma as a black person with dreads as well as the lens that the dominant culture separately views them through is what makes it appropriation. Taking the cuisine of Latin immigrants to this country who don't speak perfect English, who can't open spotless and beautiful restaurants, who can't open them in the "good" parts of the city, who can't afford the advertising to promote them and then using the money your dad left you to open a Latin food restaurant right in the middle of the financial district with beautiful chandeliers and a live band and hiring white chefs to cook food that you were inspired to open because you really like burritos and then slapping "Authentic Latin cuisine!" on the front of your store is appropriation.

The reason American cultural appropriation shows up so often is because the lines are the clearest and easiest to see; we do it based on skin color for the most part. It's the biggest visual key for how we appropriate things.

So to take an example, why didn't Japanese people in Japan care what was going on with Ghost in the Shell? They weren't the ones affected by it! They weren't losing parts to white people, they weren't passed over in casting because they looked "too exotic", they weren't called unrelatable by focus groups, they weren't struggling to make it in an industry IN AMERICA where they have to put up with stereotypes and white-washing and all the garbage that Asian-americans have to deal with. Japanese people aren't a minority in America if they're in Japan so Japan doesn't give a fuck what we do; they are here though so the people who are being taken advantage of are the minorities HERE.

What's this whole diatribe about? To show you that it's not inherent racial attributes that matters, it's the power dynamic and who is in the minority.

Forgive my examples if they are not specifically accurate when it comes to certain things because I am not from these cultures. But even with the particulars perhaps being incorrect the genera l thrust of my point should come across from it.

So let's take the example I said above of English people taking something from Scots. Say that Scottish people are a minority in England and England frowned on kilts. And then suddenly some English so and so in high society wears one and they are SO BRAVE and trend-setting. And kilts are now in fashion! Kilts are worn by Brits everywhere, they don't prevent people from getting jobs, they don't get people beat up in the streets or called names, they don't "out" you as a Scottish person because it's okay for YOU to wear them now! But go back in time a bit and before all this if you, as a Scottish person, wanted to wear your kilt in London or at job interviews or while walking by some pubs would you receive the same treatment? Would it be okay for you to wear your culture's garments there during a time when it wasn't the fashion trend of the English themselves? Both of them are white. Both speak the same language. But one of them is still able to direct the flows of culture in their society.

Maybe an easier example. Let's take Poland. 96.9% Polish. But maybe there are bands of Roma travelling through their cities and you can pretty much just look at this website to see how hated Roma are. They're constantly driven out of places, yelled at, beaten up, generally looked down upon. Maybe they are derided for the music they play, maybe it's too folksy or uses an accordion or whatever so people make fun of it, they yell at them for making noise, it's considered music for simpletons and trash people. And then there's a folk revival in Poland and a man who always used to enjoy the Roma music he listened to starts playing that type of music and makes it BIG. He's hugely popular, selling out concerts and CDs and he tours around Europe and begins to beget other German or Danish artists who play Roma music, maybe taking it and putting their own spin on it. And meanwhile the Roma don't have any popular artists, still get yelled at wherever they go, are never mentioned in interviews with this big Polish artist or said off-handedly. He never names any Roma people, never does anything to stop prejudice against Roma, never really acknowledges them outside of interviews. This is appropriation.

And finally let's look at a closer example to the OP of this thread. Say you are in a Middle Eastern country and you are a man. You are a Shiite Muslim and so is 90% of the country. And your country really, REALLY does not like Sunni Muslims. They're basically second class citizens. You look the same, you were born in the same country, but...they don't believe the same stuff. You though, you've never ever been prejudiced against them. Some of your best friends are Sunni Muslims and you have never spoken a bad word against them. Hell, you regularly eat over at your best friend's house and love his cooking. It's really popular among the Sunni community and they have to make it themselves most of the time because restaurants that serve it don't get good business. And if they ask for it at regular restaurants then they get weird looks or told to leave or to order something else. Your friend is comfortable with you coming over but he's had people before who have looked down on him for it before or reacted poorly because it's made with cheap ingredients and whatever he manages to get from the market. You love it so much YOU start making it! And man, you love it so much you want to share it with the world! Your friend is not sure about this and doesn't want to join you on this venture. But man, you just...you gotta let people know! So you host gatherings where you make this food and people think it's so unique and interesting! You have a pretty good job so you get only the best ingredients, maybe even put your own spin on it! Bring some into the office and it's a hit! You get know for making a mean dish and even some friends try their hand at it. But all this time, no one's called you poor or dirty, no one acted disgusted when you fed them it, all the recognition you got was free and clear! And it was for YOU.

As I said, some of the particulars may be off and for that I do apologize but I think this might help people understand this a bit more instead of defaulting to believing this kind of shit only happens in the US. It's more obvious here because of our history or the demographics of our population but if you're in a country like Poland where 96.9% of people are like you and you say you've never heard of this being a problem in your country...do you really think you'd ever hear about it from those 3.1%? If 96.9% of the population controls the way information is spread and regarded and treated?
 
Oct 27, 2017
4,018
Florida
A hijab isn't at all equivalent to those examples though. What you posted is either a fictional character or an actual role. A hijab is a religious garment worn by muslim women. So if a person decides to wear a hijab (a religious garment that Muslims women to this day face persecution and abuse over) as a Halloween piece, when asked who they are for halloween, what's their answer?

I've seen muslim women/girls trick or treating with their kids and siblings, so the Halloween dress up would be indistinguishable from someone that's a muslim taking part in the festive that night. So you think it's ok for someone to cosplay as a muslim women for a night, in the same countries where they're yanking the hijabs off of actual Muslim girls and women and targeting them for hate crimes by virtue of their head piece?

I dont think violence or hatred are ever ok. I also think we're morphing this conversation a bit too far to Halloween, which is a different subject entirely.

https://www.google.com/amp/amp.albawaba.com/loop/here’s-how-middle-east-views-halloween-761454
 

Haze

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,784
Detroit, MI
I have literally no idea of what you're talking about (about "boxer braids"), so I just googled it and it came out on a bunch of fashion websites as something that is barely attributed to Kim Kardashian.

Yeah, you're right this is pretentious white people picking up stuff without regards. Apologies for mixing it up with common braids.

Just an example:

https://magazine.lorealprofessionne...ficio-boxer-braids-vs-coda-di-cavallo_a2232/1





Fuck off L'Oreal, western braids are clearly a different style that starts lower on the hair, around the neck, also way less intricate.

Right and this is just one example. This kind of things happens so often, especially in America where the white portion of society is dominant but takes and commodifies all of its new trends from marginalized groups and these things were often in the past derided until they become hip for white people.
 

Deleted member 50374

alt account
Banned
Dec 4, 2018
2,482
Right and this is just one example. This kind of things happens so often, especially in America where the white portion of society is dominant but takes and commodifies all of its new trends from marginalized groups and these things were often in the past derided until they become hip for white people.
Yeah, I see your point; also note that they call it by the english name, where they could've just used a perfectly italian name for it. Clearly a case of blind fashion trends.
 
Oct 28, 2017
1,865
So an example of cultural appropriation would be to take a norse god, make him a blonde hippie with wings on his helmet and apply him for membership in an american crime fighting group?

I know you're being facetious but there is, in fact, a very small subset of academic literature concerned with 'Borealism' - otherwise known as the appropriation of Nordic culture.
 

ishan

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
2,192
I'm having a bit of trouble reading what you said. Not sure if you're angry or agreeing. It sounds like you're telling me i never learned any history.
I'm not trying to shame your english (i'm not American or english either), i'm just trying to understand so we can continue in a dialogue.
oh No no Im agreeing with you .I feel people who think white supremecy is right due to "modern science being invented by europeans" are just unaware that over the years many cultures have contributed etc. They just have to think beyond the past 2-3 hundred years. Thats why I find them ignorant and silly rather then get that offended by them.

Of course the whole concept of any race being superior is stupid and has lead to disgusting and troubling behaviour. I was just pointing out that their entire premise of "whites are better because we invented shit" is flawed in the first place. Lots of cultures have invented stuff and have been the most powerful apex civilizatin in the world at varying times in history.
 

Amibguous Cad

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,033
I know you're being facetious but there is, in fact, a very small subset of academic literature concerned with 'Borealism' - otherwise known as the appropriation of Nordic culture.

I think "Thor" actually would be a pretty good example of cultural appropriation, except that I've never heard of modern-day pagans claim that it was a problem. Paganism is syncretic anyway, it can combine with a bunch of different traditions and cultures, including American pop cinema, and anyone actually worshiping Thor today is probably happy to admit they're reconstructing ancient worship based on incomplete and unreliable sources, so even their worship is still a modern reinterpretation of the idea, anyway.

I'm sure there are some academics that are concerned about cultural appropriation, and I have no idea what happens on the white supremacist side of Norse paganism, but for 'mainstream' practitioners I don't think this is a going concern.
 

D i Z

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,085
Where X marks the spot.
I think "Thor" actually would be a pretty good example of cultural appropriation, except that I've never heard of modern-day pagans claim that it was a problem. Paganism is syncretic anyway, it can combine with a bunch of different traditions and cultures, including American pop cinema, and anyone actually worshiping Thor today is probably happy to admit they're reconstructing ancient worship based on incomplete and unreliable sources, so even their worship is still a modern reinterpretation of the idea, anyway.

I'm sure there are some academics that are concerned about cultural appropriation, and I have no idea what happens on the white supremacist side of Norse paganism, but for 'mainstream' practitioners I don't think this is a going concern.


That entire conversation is nonsense. The film is based of the comic representation that has been around for generations. Mofo's are digging, but not digging that deeply. This "I'm oppressed too" bs is stupid and needs to stop.
 

Amibguous Cad

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,033
That entire conversation is nonsense. The film is based of the comic representation that has been around for generations. Mofo's are digging, but not digging that deeply. This "I'm oppressed too" bs is stupid and needs to stop.

I'm not exactly sure why you're trying to drive a wedge between a religious minority and a racial minority, but it's stupid, and it needs to stop.
 

Kelsdesu

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,468
Selling 40z beers (in the bag) at your hipster tapas restaurant or has bullet holes in it is cultural appropiriation with a side of diet racism.
 

bluie_

Member
Oct 28, 2017
54
That entire conversation is nonsense. The film is based of the comic representation that has been around for generations. Mofo's are digging, but not digging that deeply. This "I'm oppressed too" bs is stupid and needs to stop.

This is a rather dumb take, because the comic would be just as culturally appropriating, obviously.

And it is cultural appropriation, it's in fact the very definition of it, because we now have a generation of scandinavians growing up where marvels version of the thunder-god is the version they think of when they think of thor, and not the one from their own cultural heritage. Oppression was your own projection.
 

bluie_

Member
Oct 28, 2017
54
I think "Thor" actually would be a pretty good example of cultural appropriation, except that I've never heard of modern-day pagans claim that it was a problem. Paganism is syncretic anyway, it can combine with a bunch of different traditions and cultures, including American pop cinema, and anyone actually worshiping Thor today is probably happy to admit they're reconstructing ancient worship based on incomplete and unreliable sources, so even their worship is still a modern reinterpretation of the idea, anyway.

I'm sure there are some academics that are concerned about cultural appropriation, and I have no idea what happens on the white supremacist side of Norse paganism, but for 'mainstream' practitioners I don't think this is a going concern.

You don't actually have to be a pagan, or any sort of religious to consider the Norse pantheon part of your cultural heritage.
 

Dankul

Member
Nov 14, 2017
15
Recently encountered an what I considered to be a blatant example of this. There is a popular Thai restaurant in Portland, probably the most popular according to Yelp. The white chef went to live in Thailand for a bit and came back to open a restaurant with a decor of a Thai village where all his staff where's stereotypical "villager" uniforms. This part I don't really mind.

However, the chef says on a newspaper interview that he has the only authentic Thai restaurant in town despite there being many Thai restaurants owned by Thai chefs in Portland. The restaurant tries to be trendy by serving more "exotic dishes" and playing old country style Thai music that most Thai people don't even listen to let alone play in a restaurant. The icing on the cake is that the food is not even close to being an authentic flavor that most Thai people would enjoy.
 
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Benita

Banned
Aug 27, 2018
862
That entire conversation is nonsense. The film is based of the comic representation that has been around for generations. Mofo's are digging, but not digging that deeply. This "I'm oppressed too" bs is stupid and needs to stop.
Cultural appropriation is ok if it's been happening for a long time?

Also, nobody is using Thor to suggest that they're "oppressed too". They're using him to show how dumb this whole thing is.
 

D i Z

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,085
Where X marks the spot.
Cultural appropriation is ok if it's been happening for a long time?

Also, nobody is using Thor to suggest that they're "oppressed too". They're using him to show how dumb this whole thing is.

Not really. If they had an actual issue they would use something that made actual sense. But they use Thor, but don't call out his grown popularity because of the films, or his use in other places like the new God of War. When you're grasping at straws you get the thinnest most useless straws to work with.
 

Benita

Banned
Aug 27, 2018
862
That's some real valuable conversation right there
Uncalled for.

Maybe not the best idea to use your partner or your relationship as a shield, dunno what you think that proves in the broader scope of things.
"Here is my interracial experience which may be pertinent to a thread entirely about culture"

"YOURE USING YOUR RELATIONSHIP AS A SHIELD"

Nah, that's not what that means at all.

Not really. If they had an actual issue they would use something that made actual sense. But they use Thor, but don't call out his grown popularity because of the films, or his use in other places like the new God of War. When you're grasping at straws you get the thinnest most useless straws to work with.

Nope. If you go by the prevailing definition in this thread, Thor is a textbook example.
 
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Wackamole

Member
Oct 27, 2017
16,935
oh No no Im agreeing with you .I feel people who think white supremecy is right due to "modern science being invented by europeans" are just unaware that over the years many cultures have contributed etc. They just have to think beyond the past 2-3 hundred years. Thats why I find them ignorant and silly rather then get that offended by them.

Of course the whole concept of any race being superior is stupid and has lead to disgusting and troubling behaviour. I was just pointing out that their entire premise of "whites are better because we invented shit" is flawed in the first place. Lots of cultures have invented stuff and have been the most powerful apex civilizatin in the world at varying times in history.
Ahhh right. Yeah i agree.
 

Cocaloch

Banned
Nov 6, 2017
4,562
Where the Fenians Sleep
lA white culture can appropriate from another white culture (Brits from Scots for instance). The key point and defining characteristic that everyone continually misrepresents and keeps missing because they're either not paying attention or willfully ignorant, is when a DOMINANT culture who is in control of the country/city/whatever's society and culture takes something from a MINORITY culture.

Hmmmm

So let's take the example I said above of English people taking something from Scots. Say that Scottish people are a minority in England and England frowned on kilts. And then suddenly some English so and so in high society wears one and they are SO BRAVE and trend-setting. And kilts are now in fashion! Kilts are worn by Brits everywhere, they don't prevent people from getting jobs, they don't get people beat up in the streets or called names, they don't "out" you as a Scottish person because it's okay for YOU to wear them now! But go back in time a bit and before all this if you, as a Scottish person, wanted to wear your kilt in London or at job interviews or while walking by some pubs would you receive the same treatment? Would it be okay for you to wear your culture's garments there during a time when it wasn't the fashion trend of the English themselves? Both of them are white. Both speak the same language. But one of them is still able to direct the flows of culture in their society.

Hmmmmmmm
 

Deleted member 50374

alt account
Banned
Dec 4, 2018
2,482
oh No no Im agreeing with you .I feel people who think white supremecy is right due to "modern science being invented by europeans" are just unaware that over the years many cultures have contributed etc. They just have to think beyond the past 2-3 hundred years. Thats why I find them ignorant and silly rather then get that offended by them.

Of course the whole concept of any race being superior is stupid and has lead to disgusting and troubling behaviour. I was just pointing out that their entire premise of "whites are better because we invented shit" is flawed in the first place. Lots of cultures have invented stuff and have been the most powerful apex civilizatin in the world at varying times in history.

There is also "scientific" racism, which resulted in the horrors of Nazism and racist laws in Italy and Germany. That pseudoscience is now recognized as bullshit, but it was one of the many shit theories back in 1890s to 1920s, and was used against Mediterraneans (thought as an inferior mixed race compared to aryans), Africans, Jews and Sinti. I find it particularly scary that this racial profiling is now being echoed in the algorithms that are employed in some courts in America, which ProRepublica found actually producing racist results against basic logic.

Historically speaking, the Roman empire that is adored by Nazis was even actually quite "brown", and spawned from populations that spreaded across the Mediterranean Sea. Greeks were quite darker than we think they were (yes, Brad Pitt is exactly the opposite) and Romans absorbed them just like they absorbed Carthage, Egypt, the modern Turkey. Their legacy was upheld by the Byzantine Empire that became then the Ottoman Empire and then Turkey. Ancient Greece was like, super cool to Romans (like very fancy, Greek was the cool language, not Latin), and Greece was actually part of a bunch of civilizations that spawned around the middle east and spread west and east. Romans did invent a bunch of cool architectural stuff, but they took most of their culture, religions, culture, science etc. from those populations. And we now know that from history, even if it's not always clear enough. But if you believe the myth of the foundation of Rome, the founders were originally from Troy, which is in Turkey - not aryans. So even if white assholes pretend some sort of shit white privilege, Romans thought of themselves as born from the Mediterranean, not the cold winters of Sweden.

So like, up to the 800 D.C. or something, Germanic populations that are the core part of the white power identity were considered uncivilized barbarians because Romans just like Greeks were racist to poeple who weren't in the empire, but you could've been a dark skinned or a black roman, though being a citizen was uncommon by itself.

My own ancestral ancestors are a mix of the native populations of Sardinia that were almost ethnically cleansed once Romans finally could conquer it, Phoenicians and Romans that migrated to the island. We've been considered brutish, low IQ, hairy and short since before Romans even conquered our island. We kept our regional identity and language, but being defined as retarded sheep fuckers is still a common stereotype and it was hard for my parents to even find housing. Up to the late 1800s the socioeconomic situation was pretty bad.

So, in the end, white supremacy has no foundation on either history, science, morality or anything really. Even their core identity is not white, and what they consider their precursors were in fact more related to latinos (Spain and Italy) and northern africans (Algeria, Egypt, Lybia) and middle easterns (Greeks, Turkishs, Armenians, and the populations of the modern Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq, where western civilizations actually come from). Germans were nomadic and relatively behind what people accomplished in the Middle East.

To even bust some more bubbles... Arabs and Hindi were advancing in maths, science while we were doing shit wars in Europe. Columbus didn't fucking discover shit, and Greeks had quite a lot of that astronomy down centuries before. Without Arabs math couldn't have progressed and much of the discoveries of 1300s and 1400s wouldn't have happened.
 

Pet

More helpful than the IRS
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
7,070
SoCal
Recently encountered an what I considered to be a blatant example of this. There is a popular Thai restaurant in Portland, probably the most popular according to Yelp. The white chef went to live in Thailand for a bit and came back to open a restaurant with a decor of a Thai village where all his staff where's stereotypical "villager" uniforms. This part I don't really mind.

However, the chef says on a newspaper interview that he has the only authentic Thai restaurant in town despite there being many Thai restaurants owned by Thai chefs in Portland. The restaurant tries to be trendy by serving more "exotic dishes" and playing old country style Thai music that most Thai people don't even listen to let alone play in a restaurant. The icing on the cake is that the food is not even close to being an authentic flavor that most Thai people would enjoy.

According to some people in this thread, he owns a successful business though so it's totally okay.
 

lint2015

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,811
As an Arab dude who lived all of his life in Arab countries, of course.

I'm guessing I'm just missing something or just outright ignorant, but outside of blatantly offensive examples like this one wiki cites, I don't get why - for example - would people be angry at a white girl wearing a Chinese style dress to her prom.

So yeah I don't really get the concept. Could anyone explain it to me?
Well that's because there wasn't actually anything wrong with the example you give, except some people looking for a reason to complain.

If you can understand why the native American headdress is wrong, then you do actually get cultural appropriation.
 

yepyepyep

Member
Oct 25, 2017
704
I think what people should discussing is whether things or actions can be culturally insensitive. Cultural appropriation is an inherently dumb term because its application is way too broad and is something that happens naturally, it has its place in how cultures change and transform. I mean you have weirdos in this thread saying cooking another cultures food is theft lol.
 

floridaguy954

Member
Oct 29, 2017
3,631
Cultural appropriation is a phenomenon where one culture partakes in the art and traditions of another culture. The results of this can be good, negligible, or bad, which depends on factors such as (but not limited to) the sociopolitical relationships between the two cultures, the survivability of the original custom, the differences in financial feasibility when multiple cultures partake in the same activity, and so on.

Here's a hilarious example from an even more hilarious thread: Jamie Oliver's jerk rice. Here we have a white British man slapping his name on a cheap microwavable product called jerk rice, which is rice flavored with jerk seasoning, a Jamaican staple.

Only, it's not.

Jerk is not a flavoring. It is a cooking method of meat intended to make the protein tender to the point that it can be pulled apart with the hands, or "jerked" from the bone. Rice isn't a meat. You can't jerk it. It's like trying to fry water.

Here, the original custom and its meaning has been lost entirely in order for a white man (who generally enjoys the benefits of being higher than Jamaicans in a racial context) to profit from a culture not his own. Furthermore, Jamaican internet-goers who found the story who tried to explain why the product was nonsensical were completely ignored in lieu of many white people calling them outraged, politically correct, or accusing them of being racists when "it should have been about sharing food." People were seriously caping for some shitty rice because black folks told a white guy he was doing It wrong. That was cultural appropriation in the most negative sense.
Fucking preach. But watch how you'll barely get quoted by those who really need to read your (or similar) posts.

On the other hand: the world is bigger than America. European culture is very different and much more a melting pot. The UKs favourite meals include Chicken Tikka and Balti, both fusions of Asian and UK cultures. We're a mongrel race and proud of it (the odd Kipper excepted).

Sometimes I feel like Americans assume everywhere has the weird racial tensions it does. Not saying racism doesn't exist elsewhere obviously but it's not the same as the States. This leads to ridiculous things like the UK BLM movement adopting "hands up don't shoot" against a famously unarmed police force.

I feel there's a great irony in Americans complaining about cultural appropriation while refusing to recognise that not all cultures are like theirs.
It's fucking laughable that you think Europe is immune to the negativity that cultural appropriation brings.
 

floridaguy954

Member
Oct 29, 2017
3,631
I'm guessing this works of you come to the conclusion that the driving force of the melting pot some kind of exploitation of minorities?


This doesn't seem like a solid argument. Why is the idea of melting pot driven by false respect?
You do realize that the United States quite literally derived it's 'melting pot' from the legal exploitation of minorities. There were even protections for this exploitation in the US Constitution before it was amended out.

The idea of a melting pot on the white majority's terms isn't a melting pot at all.
 

Toxi

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
17,550
It's pretty obvious why it's a problem when you look at the food industry. Guess how many of the leading salsa producers in the United States have Mexican-American ownership? Then look at how much they profit compared to Mexican-American-owned salsa businesses, while using "ethnic" names and imagery.
 

Akira86

Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,589
lol 'exotic'... Is everyone in this thread a teenager? I wasn't bragging about having sex with my girlfriend of many years... It's pretty normal.
48150.jpg
 

bluie_

Member
Oct 28, 2017
54
Not really. If they had an actual issue they would use something that made actual sense. But they use Thor, but don't call out his grown popularity because of the films, or his use in other places like the new God of War. When you're grasping at straws you get the thinnest most useless straws to work with.


jfc this dude. no matter how popular marvels thor gets, it's still cultural appropriation - that's the entire point. it gets so popular that it replaces the original.

of course the use in god of war would also be cultural appropriation, again it's text book - the entire series is, because the use of greek mythology is also cultural appropriation.

but you don't want to acknowledge that such a clear example is appropriating another culture, because why exactly? maybe because you like marvel a bit too much and you really only care about it when it affects you directly?

that's okay, really. but then you should really acknowledge that other people don't find using a hairstyle that you personally think is for your culture only to be an egregious offense.