Thank you.Pretending to respect different cultures, and appropriating bits and pieces of their language and ideas without understanding or respecting them to look "woke" or whatever, drives me up the fucking wall. It is also way too common.
As the son of two African immigrants, it is infuriating how people who swear they are allies and believe in multiculturalism are so quick to compartmentalize bad behavior or deflect criticism for it. Whether it was the black kids on the basketball court yelling about how my cousin must be fighting lions and tigers in the jungle; the frat boys who tried to recruit me at college who ended up getting suspended for wearing blackface at a Halloween party; the dumbass white girl who would puff her stomach out and joke about being a "starving African baby"; people in our own damn neighborhood yelling at my Mom to go home when they heard her speaking her own language; and so on. All of this happening in very liberal areas of New York, no less.
It's a truly surreal thing, hearing all types of ignorance and fuckery about the Continent from whites who listen to rap music and use black slang AND black people who would offer vague praise of "the motherland" they've never been to and know nothing about. And it's pretty much part and parcel for any race or culture that isn't considered "standard".
"Yoga and the Maintainence of White Womanhood"
- Thread starter DosaDaRaja
- Start date
That seems reductive but I’m not going to force you to reflect if you don’t want to.
Nah. I'll keep listening to the ones that make sense and point out the ridiculous hyperbolic ones for the idiots that they are.
Why did Isaac Newton get to decide how gravity works?
he didn't, he figured that shit out on his own. Why do I get to decide? Everyone gets to decide. Did you honestly read that entire article and not question whether you get to decide that you agree with the premise? That because the person who wrote it is non-white and invoked the word "racism", it should be automatically be assumed to be true? Must be nice never having to think, ever
User banned (3 days): aggressive insults
I'm sure that would make it simpler, you racist piece of shit.
Classic SugarNoodles response.
You should run a hack blog like the author of this "article".
I didn’t know I was getting notoriety. I’m fine staying right here, thanks.
This thread is already going places.
Just a nice and civil discussion.
User banned (3 days): hostility, derailment, history of similar behaviour
Could do both.
But yeah, definitely stay here. You're basically a caricature of this sites political views at this point, I'd be lying if your posts aren't at least entertaining.
User Banned (2 Days): Pattern of hostility + baiting other members into arguments
You poor, poor moderate :( :( :(
Same.
My wife goes to a yoga class twice a week with a group of friends, and I’m sure it’s only for the health & social aspect.
no one wants to look like a bad person, being "liberal" for some people is now viewed as the "good" and modern one, this is amplified with the media, so you have people that never really get was is about being liberal or wanting justicie for minorities, but hey it looks good.
Edit: Actually never mind. Not worth it.
I'll just say that there are a lot of people ITT showing their asses pretty clearly from their ridiculous reactions to this article. If you can't even be bothered to listen to POC when they tell you about their experiences, don't pretend you're actively anti-racist in other threads.
I'll just say that there are a lot of people ITT showing their asses pretty clearly from their ridiculous reactions to this article. If you can't even be bothered to listen to POC when they tell you about their experiences, don't pretend you're actively anti-racist in other threads.
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Judging by the defensive responses, I think the author hit a nerve and maybe is on to something.
Anyway Club Pilates membership near me: 135 a month, so 1650 a year.
No dog in this fight, I never thought it was good excersice.
Anyway Club Pilates membership near me: 135 a month, so 1650 a year.
No dog in this fight, I never thought it was good excersice.
Nope It’s about yoga as cultural appropriation, which is something I’ve been hearing a lot lately. I only used me as an example because ya now, I can only speak for myself.
"Tradition" or not, how is parroting stuff whose cultural context you don't understand any different to what the article is arguing against?
I've noticed a trend of "listening to PoCs only when they agree with my preconceived bias" instead of "listening to the multiple Indian-Americans in this thread point out how full of BS the article is."
Once again - read the slate article linked earlier. This cannot possibly be cultural appropriation, because Indians are the one trying to spread it in the US. Like, we deliberately gave this to y'all and the west in general so you could make it part of your culture. We don't particularly care how it changes once we've given it to you, because we aren't afraid that the "American" yoga will corrupt our culture somehow. Indian culture is specifically really big about sharing our culture with others (and seeing how it is changed / shaped to fit into that culture) - like, that's a huge part of it to us. So for anyone, even another Indian-American, to be like "omg why are you taking our culture" and to pooh-pooh it is actively fighting against what the actual folks whose culture it is wants. That's why it strikes a nerve with me.
Labor - yeah, not gonna lie, kinda weird, but maybe they run fundraisers every now and then or something.
Judging from the reactions, the author struck a nerve. I know what she's talking about because I've seen it. Its insufferable and drives me up the fucking wall. SF is full of white women like this. If you do yoga because you enjoy it and/or it helps you with back issues, and you partake without adding mystical orientalism like a dash of sambal oelek... this article ain't geared towards you, you ARE NOT the the type of person the author is talking about.
She wasnt too far off comparing yoga studios that enable this behaviour to country clubs. Country clubs have always been associated with exclusivity, barring minorities, networking, and most importantly: maintaining the status quo.
That's what theses yoga studios (again not ALL yoga studios, just the yoga studios that add phony new age spiritualism mixed in with eastern spirituality, there's enough of these that its a problem) do, maintain the status quo that white women can cherry pick aspects of other peoples' culture to look "woke" and get more likes on Instagram or whatever brownie points they yearn for. Adding that dash of orientalism makes these women feel exotic and unique and open minded in they're otherwise mundane lives. They have no respect for these cultures at all but are only interested in how good it makes them look. But because they're women, they can use their white femininity to evade responsibility for their actions. If you're thinking of that one article and that one thread that got closed by mods, yeah, this is like that.
Its not just white women that are responsible for this, though they are the majority. When I was in Louisiana I had the misfortune of hanging out with this diverse group of upper middle class 20 somethings in the French Quarter. Over drinks this one Brazilian chick was bragging about using Peyote during a roadtrip in Mexico and that it made her "feel closer to the universe."
Peyote is a hallucinogenic that's used in indigenous rituals and rites in certain tribes, for example the Navajo use it for their Ghost Dance. Now under Mexican law only the Wixárika people can consume peyote, this has led to a rise in drug tourism. The resulting "peyoteros" has led to the cacti becoming endangered. If the plant disappears, the entire Wixarica culture disappears. So I was pretty pissed that this Brazilian chick had chosen to trip balls with something that is considered sacred in another culture. When I called her out on her shit, she said, it was okay for her to take peyote "because there's not many indegenous groups left that use it."
It was fucking surreal and infuriating beyond belief hearing someone say that.
She wasnt too far off comparing yoga studios that enable this behaviour to country clubs. Country clubs have always been associated with exclusivity, barring minorities, networking, and most importantly: maintaining the status quo.
That's what theses yoga studios (again not ALL yoga studios, just the yoga studios that add phony new age spiritualism mixed in with eastern spirituality, there's enough of these that its a problem) do, maintain the status quo that white women can cherry pick aspects of other peoples' culture to look "woke" and get more likes on Instagram or whatever brownie points they yearn for. Adding that dash of orientalism makes these women feel exotic and unique and open minded in they're otherwise mundane lives. They have no respect for these cultures at all but are only interested in how good it makes them look. But because they're women, they can use their white femininity to evade responsibility for their actions. If you're thinking of that one article and that one thread that got closed by mods, yeah, this is like that.
Its not just white women that are responsible for this, though they are the majority. When I was in Louisiana I had the misfortune of hanging out with this diverse group of upper middle class 20 somethings in the French Quarter. Over drinks this one Brazilian chick was bragging about using Peyote during a roadtrip in Mexico and that it made her "feel closer to the universe."
Peyote is a hallucinogenic that's used in indigenous rituals and rites in certain tribes, for example the Navajo use it for their Ghost Dance. Now under Mexican law only the Wixárika people can consume peyote, this has led to a rise in drug tourism. The resulting "peyoteros" has led to the cacti becoming endangered. If the plant disappears, the entire Wixarica culture disappears. So I was pretty pissed that this Brazilian chick had chosen to trip balls with something that is considered sacred in another culture. When I called her out on her shit, she said, it was okay for her to take peyote "because there's not many indegenous groups left that use it."
It was fucking surreal and infuriating beyond belief hearing someone say that.
I've noticed a trend of dismissing a person's valid experience outright simply because other people of their so-called "race" haven't had the same experience, because everyone with the same skin color is apparently also the same person. Come on ffs, these are kindergarten rebuttals.
NYC is a very segregated and racist city. Don't ever get it twisted.
"listen" has often meant "agree with someone's opinion", because to listen and then not agree is evidence you didn't really listen, so go back and listen again.
That's unfortunately what we as white people tend to do. The correct response to the woman should have been "I apologize, I did not consider that, I will be more considerate in the future", what is so hard about that? To us of course it's a small deal, we do it so often it's just business as usual, if you're a minority individual seeing it every day for years eventually that thing that seems so small is just another jenga block on the tower for someone else. There's more to the story as far as the *why* the culture is being appropriated but at the end of the day it would be cool if more people were down with just apologizing.
Whether or not logical analysis is applied consistently (and for everyone who isn’t a professional philosopher it probably isn’t) has no bearing on the validity of that analysis.
What is your goal in speculating about the poster’s motives?
Yeah, same here. That or they've started DDP Yoga because there's only so many times you can hear Jericho saying it before giving it a shot as if to appease the podcast man.
I don't know if in my case it's because everyone I know does DDP Yoga which is as far away from anything resembling spiritualism as it's humanly possible, but yeah everyone I know only does it for the physical benefits, including myself. It helped me with a lot of joint pain I was feeling and is super good for sports that require a lot of flexibility.
Like I've never heard of people who act like what the article describes. I don't doubt they exist, I'm just surprised because I hadn't encountered anyone like that in my life before.
That’s true. The entire “listen because of surface demographics” is based on minorities all being in lockstep, which is silly. The author is also Indian American and I disagree with her strongly because her argument completely ignores the history of yoga in the West as well as denies the agency and strength of our culture because she’s upset at (what I suspect) is struggling to find identity in the US as a first gen Indian immigrant (something I also struggle with).
Anyway I made my two cents known so I’m done arguing in the thread - PMs are open though.
This is sarcasm right? :-/. I can’t tell here anymore lol
That's what I was saying. I have no problem with you disagreeing with her but I do have a problem with people calling this faux outrage and doing everything in their power to completely discredit what she's saying simply because they can't relate to how she feels about it. I don't think that's a very good approach to these sorts of issues regardless of whether one agrees or not.
This is an issue I keep seeing almost every time there's a discussion about cultural appropriation and I honestly don't get it. Maybe you think her experience is skewed and not based on facts, but so what? It's still her genuine experience assuming she's not making it all up (which is a weird claim to make) and I think that providing the facts (in this case about your own perception of western Yoga proliferation) is more than enough. Not saying you specifically, just anyone dismissing these types of articles off-hand in general.
Clearly the individual cases she presents of what happened to her (with being fired over the Namaste joke and the pictures of starving Indians) are out of order. I imagine everyone can all agree to that at least.
I don't think they're dismissing her experience (at least i hope not) but rather her seperate argument about appropriating yoga being a bad thing..
I certainly think that not every single case of appropriation ever is bad. A lot of Indians and/or Indian-Americans ITT seem to believe that there's nothing inherently wrong with yoga being commercialised. Though I also certainly think any yoga place that does what the ones she describes she saw in the article does is being offensive.
I think the overall point that the poster you're quoting and others like them are focusing on is that even though Yoga is being commerialised and approriated, that was always the intent. That Indians brought Yoga to the west in order to be appropriated.
I don't think they're dismissing her experience (at least i hope not) but rather her seperate argument about appropriating yoga being a bad thing..
I certainly think that not every single case of appropriation ever is bad. A lot of Indians and/or Indian-Americans ITT seem to believe that there's nothing inherently wrong with yoga being commercialised. Though I also certainly think any yoga place that does what the ones she describes she saw in the article does is being offensive.
He makes a long post explaining why he doesn't think it is cultural appropriation and this is your response? What the fuck?
A good question. But I learn karate for the value the martial art provides me and the package it is in is inconsequential.
I think it would be disrespectful to take someones teaching (my Okinawan instructors and precursors in this case) and wrap my own western bow on it. Practicing the way they teach is far more respectful than that alternative.
I mean, that's how learn language. Someone teaches you how to use words until you internalize their meaning. Imagine going to a karate class and when the instructor tells you to bow going "whoa whoa whoa buddy, I'm an American and that's not my culture!" Just kind of a ridiculous situation and most people, especially in a class situation, are just going to take whatever they're being taught at face value. It's really just kind of a weird thing all around but honestly not racist in and of itself. Making a stink about this stuff is kind of missing the forest for the trees in terms of the actual problematic racism imo. Fix the wage gap so that POC are taking the same classes as the white women and this stuff will sort itself out naturally. Telling white women not to say namaste is just hand wringing and doesn't fix the fact that whether they say it or not they're still in an insulated bubble
As an aside, reading through Pluto right now and it's good stuff. You read the Astroboy material is based on by any chance?
Isaac Newton didn't discover gravity works. Just that such a phenomenon exists. We still don't know how it works.
Just saying
I suppose the question is whether you're doing Karate as a way of exploring Okinawan culture or whether you paying an Okinawan to receive martial art instruction on your terms. Put this another way, are you being invited to participate in a cultural act on your instructor's terms or are they performing those acts because white society expects Karate instruction to be wrapped up with a stereotypical cultural bow?
For an interesting analysis on cultural voyeurism see here.
That's not what I meant. More above.
I've read some Tezuka (Ode to Kirihito, MW, Ayako, Buddha, Blackjack) but never Astroboy. There's a current omnibus that collects everything -- and I've considered picking it up -- but it's a badly done shrunk-down paperback cheapie and so I've avoided it. Like many people though, I grew up watching dubs of the 80s anime. It's pretty cool.
Have you read 20th Century Boys? It's pretty great stuff from Kurasawa.
I think I know what the author is getting at even though maybe she's mixing some things together and muddying stuff.
Behaviors can feel culturally appropriative even when the "export" itself was meant for worldwide consumption. Just because Yoga is exported for western consumption, it doesn't make the other stuff she pointed out happening as unconnected or without cause for side-eye (i.e. pics of starving indian people as A E S T H E T I C, bastardized language use, weird performative virtue antics).
The Yoga activity itself is neutral and not necessarily racist to participate in even if you're non-indian or whatever, but the WAY people perform within this "space" can make it so. So no, if you are not this way, you're fine. If you are weird pretend woke and talking up your spiritual connectedness to India and starving kids and namaste-ing out the ass then maybe you're being a huge tool and using Yoga as an outlet for your ignorant or unawarely racist self etc. I think that's what the author is attempting to get at anyway?
Behaviors can feel culturally appropriative even when the "export" itself was meant for worldwide consumption. Just because Yoga is exported for western consumption, it doesn't make the other stuff she pointed out happening as unconnected or without cause for side-eye (i.e. pics of starving indian people as A E S T H E T I C, bastardized language use, weird performative virtue antics).
The Yoga activity itself is neutral and not necessarily racist to participate in even if you're non-indian or whatever, but the WAY people perform within this "space" can make it so. So no, if you are not this way, you're fine. If you are weird pretend woke and talking up your spiritual connectedness to India and starving kids and namaste-ing out the ass then maybe you're being a huge tool and using Yoga as an outlet for your ignorant or unawarely racist self etc. I think that's what the author is attempting to get at anyway?
I'd call bullshit on this if it was about any other country than the USA. People seem so confused. Maybe improve education?
Weird story.
'feel closer to destitute and starving street children in India"
I mean, there are people who are stupid like that. But that's one person in a large group ,at most. I hope.
Weird story.
'feel closer to destitute and starving street children in India"
I mean, there are people who are stupid like that. But that's one person in a large group ,at most. I hope.
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