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Cultural appropriation and day-to-day life


Nephil Thief

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I would change the Redskins name. It's not like plenty of other professional sports teams haven't changed their names, especially in the DC area (e.g. Bullets/Wizards, Expos/Nationals). That said, I do not see the Florida State Seminoles, Atlanta Braves, Kansas City Chief or Cleveland Indians as a problem, as long as the logos/mascots are done in a respectful manner, which hasn't always been the case.

 

How exactly does one "respectfully" use someone else's ethnic identity as a sports mascot? Especially while being a citizen of the country that tried to wipe them out? I'm trying to see your perspective on this - honest - but the "respectful" part seems pretty iffy to me.

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For one thing, not using Native American names would contribute towards erasing their memory and contributing to the genocide more than using them does. My high school had an Italian mascot, there is a college near where I live now that has a German mascot. One of the UC system colleges has a hispanic mascot. Several schools have variations on religious leaders. In the LA area, there are Sheikhs, Moors and Rajahs. It all comes down to how you use it. With the exception of the Redskins where the term is a definite problem, the issue is usually the logo tending to emphasize cultural stereotypes. I suppose that I can take the point that the team names "Indians" and "Arabs" are bad, but despite one State having Chieftains on its unacceptable names list (since as someone with Scottish ancestry I do not find it offensive) I think that Chiefs, Braves, Warriors, Sheikhs, etc are fine. One college changed their native american warrior to a roman warrior. How is that better?

 

Of the Native American team names that I listed, Florida States' probably makes the most sense since the Seminole tribe was native to Florida. Also, the Seminole tribe supports the use of their name by the University, so I am not sure why anyone else is worked up about it.

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For one thing, not using Native American names would contribute towards erasing their memory and contributing to the genocide more than using them does.

O.o

 

Um, we're not talking about not using the names at all. We're not talking about any kind of recognition, formal or otherwise. We're not talking about discussion, news, history, or memorials. We're talking about a for-profit sports team built on a spirit of competition and domination that is not wholly unrelated to the one that led us to destroy the people who lived here before us.

 

My high school had an Italian mascot, there is a college near where I live now that has a German mascot.

What were the actual mascots? The Italians and the Germans, or do you mean the mascots drew on those cultures?

 

One college changed their native american warrior to a roman warrior. How is that better?

1. We have no history of attacking or exploiting the Romans. We don't have any history with them at all.

2. Roman descendants are still with us, of course, but it's been millenia since the height of Roman civilization. Those years lend the subject some distance.

3. Rome was in a position of power and hence not vulnerable to hate language in quite the same way as suspect classes. That, by the way, is also why we don't have any weird stereotypes about Roman warriors, whereas teenagers are still sometimes taught from descriptions of Gaulish warriors written by Roman outsiders who didn't understand their traditions.

 

Also, the Seminole tribe supports the use of their name by the University, so I am not sure why anyone else is worked up about it.

That's a pretty strong argument. I can't think of any other case where a name is so specific that there really is a single extant body that can answer for it, and the body approves it. Cool.

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How exactly does one "respectfully" use someone else's ethnic identity as a sports mascot?

 

If it were me, I'd stay away from it entirely.

 

Let me tie this back to the original thread question with a thought I haven't heard as much on as I'd like (and one that deeply bothers me).

Intention aside, accurate representation should be a primary factor in considering whether something is appropriate. So, for example, this St. Patrick's Day in Denver as I was getting on the light rail, I passed someone in a kilt playing Scotland the Brave on bagpipes. I would pass five other people wearing kilts that day. No doubt they would join a host of others getting unfathomably hammered that night. It should be horrifying that most Americans associate St. Patrick with being the god of beer instead of the man who brought Catholicism to Ireland (and can't tell the difference between Scotland and Ireland).

 

But the same is true for a multitude of other things. The Buddha was not a jolly fat man, he was a wizened ascetic monk. A chocolate-egg-laying rabbit did not visit the children of the world on Easter. Saint Nicholas has nothing to do with Santa. Same goes for Saint Valentine. You could make the argument, after this string that we just have no idea how religion works or who religious figures were. But honestly, if you put on a stereotypical Indian costume (tan skin, big headdress, etc.) as a mascot is it any different?

 

Representations of a culture by producing a narrow, shallow view of one aspect of the culture without context in the name of "doing it honor" is an abhorrent concept. It's like fiction, but saying "these people were really like this" and ends up just being degrading and damaging...both to the members of the culture's pride and the outsider's understanding of it really was.

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There is a difference between Chiefs, Braves, Indians, whatevers and Redksins. Only one of those is actually explicitly a racial slur. If the Redskins became the Piscataways, with the permission of the Piscataway Nation it would be a nod to local Native culture. It would not raise hackles. Too difficult to coordinate? No currently extant tribe claims the name Chesapeake/Chesepian, meaning no negotiation, and the bay by that name is locally prominent even without a history lesson.

 

—Alorael, who can't imagine anyone even trying to use other major ethnic pejoratives as a name for something. Somehow this one gets a historic pass? It's ridiculous.

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Alright, I should have searched this a while ago instead of asking whiny question. Live and learn.

 

http://www.blackgirl...-appropriation/

 

^^^ This actually makes it pretty clear which of my written universes are definitely appropriate, and which may be alright.

 

Likewise

 

http://www.blackgirl...black-art-free/

 

^^^ How to at least not be a total unrepentant jerk toward other people's cultures.

Edited by Tevildo
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Tevildo: Urk.

 

I'm afraid that just because I'm white, it doesn't mean I have time or energy to fight actively for every disadvantaged segment of global society. I'm sorry, but just because one people are miserable doesn't mean I'm not justified in being miserable too. The fact that I grew up listening to The Four Tops (I just bought one of their CDs for the first time) doesn't mean I'm obligated to throw my entire freaking existence into getting the black folk out of poverty. Maybe struggling hard every day to overcome crippling, invisible mental and physical illness, not to mention being as queer as queer gets (the only category I fit in doesn't exist anymore on Google as of a couple weeks ago), isn't enough to make my empathy good enough, I don't know. But I don't tell anyone they have to go and wear a shirt that says "I <3 Schizos" while doing outrageous stunts to benefit NAMI in order to be my goddamned friend. That's a horrible, insulting, and degrading, not to mention presumptuous, thing to ask of anybody. They just have to say, "I don't understand, I know I can't understand, but I care about you and want you to be happy." That's reasonable. I sign petitions and occasionally make calls to senators and that's all I'm going to do and all I can do because my life is hard too and the fact that I have monetary comfort doesn't change that. Get the NAACP after me with a lawsuit if you want. I'll curl up in a ball and scream and cry and attack the bloody bailiff until they drag me out, and I won't be doing it "just for attention."

 

Sorry for going off the wall but when people start talking about "categorism" it gets to me before too long.

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Tevildo: Urk.

 

<snip>

 

Ouch. Sorry. Hope I didn't trigger any anxieties.

 

The way I see it though, I should be listening to what these people have to say. I mean, you don't have to, that's your business; but I should. I should at least listen, even if at the end of the day I still don't agree with all of it.

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No, it wasn't you, it was the subject in general combined with aforementioned mental and physical illness giving me hell these past several days.

 

Okay - I should probably have warnings when I post links to really ranty articles though.

 

Hope you feel better soonish.

 

(BTW: been there, done that. I recently wasted three or four years of my life in OCD-and-clinical-depression-land. If you want to rant, well, I'm here.)

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Alright, I should have searched this a while ago instead of asking whiny question. Live and learn.

 

http://www.blackgirl...-appropriation/

 

^^^ This actually makes it pretty clear which of my written universes are definitely appropriate, and which may be alright.

Tevildo, it seems like you feel really, really guilty about being white. Stop it. It's not helpful to anyone.

 

Part of the reason that you feel really, really guilty about being white is that you read things like this link. This author is Very Offended about something, but when you dig into the details, there's a problem. Her central point appears to be that white people should not write stories with nonwhite protagonists. Along the way, this author appears to make a number of other bad points and bad assumptions.

 

There is something to be outraged about that is adjacent to what this author says. It is true (and awful) that women and people of color do not get a fair shake when they would like to be screenwriters and directors in Hollywood. Look at some numbers and it's hard not to see prejudice pretty instantly. This is a problem, and it needs to be fixed.

 

But this author doesn't appear to have identified that problem. Instead, this author tries to say that white people shouldn't write about nonwhite characters. This seems pretty overtly racist to me. By all means, read things like this piece, but read them critically, just as you would read anything else. Listening doesn't mean agreeing, and there's a lot to disagree with in this piece.

 

-----

 

And yes, Sindu makes some motions in the direction of a reasonable point: when someone from outside a culture writes about that culture, that person should not portray the culture in a stereotypical and racist fashion. Of course, the same is true of someone from inside that culture. Authors in general, regardless of background, shouldn't portray an entire culture in a stereotypical and racist fashion, partly because it's offensive and partly because it's bad writing. Stereotyping and racism might have been a legitimate criticism of Bold Riley; I don't know, because I haven't read the graphic novel.

 

But read carefully: that's not Sindu's point. Sindu wants "a story that was written for me by people like me" (my emphasis). That is, she doesn't want a story written by white people at all. Why? Because she's a flagrant racist.

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@Kelandon

 

I had a post but the board eated it... Let's try again:

 

a. Guilt doesn't really enter into it right now, and in any case my supposed guilt is not your business.

 

b. Bias != racism. Racism serves the white supremacist power structure, which Sindu is not doing in that article.

 

I've read people insisting that it's actually impossible for non-white people to be racist, and they get a lot of attention in doing so. It frightens me because I want to be an ally but there are too many vocal people who will shout me down if I say anything.

 

I've honestly given up trying to be "an ally", I'll settle for just not being a total jerk; and maybe doing the right thing on rare occasions. Fact is I'm just not a very nice person.

 

My advice, though, is: don't look for the position of "being an ally." That will drive you (and other people) bananas. Just try to be nice to people.

 

Then again, my advice should be taken with many, many grains of salt.

 

Re being shouted down, I'm guessing you're familiar with that feeling. Probably so are the people who might do the shouting. I don't really have much useful to say there, just the observation that there are social stresses for everyone.

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I've read people insisting that it's actually impossible for non-white people to be racist, and they get a lot of attention in doing so. It frightens me because I want to be an ally but there are too many vocal people who will shout me down if I say anything.

There are plenty of examples of non-white people being racist against members of their own group. A prominent example in the US is darker skin blacks against lighter skin blacks that and vice a versa. The caste system in India is slowly going away, but there what your family is matters instead of skin color.

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So, the problem here is that there are two fairly different understandings of what racism is.

 

First -- let's call it the broad understanding -- is that racism encompasses any decision made based on race.

 

But there is also the systemic understanding -- that racism only applies to be decisions based on race within the context of a system of oppression.

 

We could also call those the libertarian and liberal understandings, at least in the U.S.

 

The thing is, they are both useful ways of thinking about racism. Racism within the context of a system of oppression has a very, very different impact than a race-based decision outside of that context does. OTOH, looking more atomically at race-based decisions is pretty relevant too. I think it's kind of ridiculous to try and erase one or the other ways of using the word, as people on both sides of the debate often try to do.

 

Personally, I think the important thing is to use "racism" and "racist" in such a way that recognizes that there are atomic similarities, but also critical differences, between the two different cases. So I think Kel makes an important point by separating out the direction Sindu moves towards (questions of stereotyping and authenticity) from what she explicitly says (no white writers, apparently). I don't think it's useful to write her off as a racist -- that blurs the important distinction, IMO -- but seeing both pieces of what she's saying is pretty important.

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I've never been able to see the insistence on using the word racism to apply exclusively towards systemic racism as anything but a wholly pedantic grab towards rhetorical control. Deliberate ignorance of how people actually, most commonly, use it.

 

Whether you wanna call it racism or bias, Tevildo, Kel's right; that article is not good because of it. :p

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I've never been able to see the insistence on using the word racism to apply exclusively towards systemic racism as anything but a wholly pedantic grab towards rhetorical control.

 

That's exactly what it is, and there's a point to that IMO. The point is focusing the attention on what is actually the relevant social problem. I mean, sure, you could have a different (and equally nasty) social order, but right now we don't.

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Language control is not an argument or a reform. It's a political tool. Forgive me for considering it venal, simplistic, and unconvincing. There are actual reasons to ignore the great majority of reverse-discrimination claims, and "they don't technically count in this overly-specific definition of the word that I am using and that people do not generally use" is not one of them.

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"Political tool" is very much the point here, I think. Society skews massively one way; some people are deliberately changing the language because they want to skew it a bit the other way, so it's less horribly unfair. I don't really see a problem with that.

 

Edit: also IMO, that they're willing to use such political tools should be a good measure of how (rightfully) unhappy they are.

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I have yet to see how two wrongs make a right. Methods do matter. Racism, classism, sexism, etc are simply wrong no matter where you are in the power structure.

 

Also, any attempt to define the power structure in terms of race maybe mildly accurate in a statistical point of view, but it is grossly inaccurate on an individual basis. We do after all have a President who happens to be African American (individually most powerful person in country) who if he were racist would be in a position to do a great deal of damage on that basis.

 

Based on her tweets, I would classify Dr. Gundy as a racist. There are many who give her a pass on racism because of her skin color. I think that they are wrong. Not that it matters to my point of view, but for those who say that only those with power can be racists, as a professor, she is in a position of authority, with relatively little accountability.

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I have yet to see how two wrongs make a right. Methods do matter. Racism, classism, sexism, etc are simply wrong no matter where you are in the power structure.

 

Can't say I disagree. However...

 

Also, any attempt to define the power structure in terms of race maybe mildly accurate in a statistical point of view, but it is grossly inaccurate on an individual basis. We do after all have a President who happens to be African American (individually most powerful person in country) who if he were racist would be in a position to do a great deal of damage on that basis.

 

You're engaging in tokenism there. Please don't do that. As you say, two wrongs don't make a right.

 

Based on her tweets, I would classify Dr. Gundy as a racist. There are many who give her a pass on racism because of her skin color. I think that they are wrong. Not that it matters to my point of view, but for those who say that only those with power can be racists, as a professor, she is in a position of authority, with relatively little accountability.

 

To be honest I don't do Twitter at all. (Colossal waste of time in my experience...) I'll take a look.

 

Edit: err wait, what? Who's "Dr. Gundy"? Who are you talking about?

 

Edit 2: actually no I won't take a look. Whoever you're talking about, she doesn't need me to declare her not-racist.

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I know what the point of it is. I agree with the general aim. That doesn't make it correct. People simply do not operate on that definition of racism. They do not use the word that way. Blank-faced insistence that they must is a lot of trouble and a lot of confusion and a lot of frustrating pedantry (and being a frustrating pedant is no way to make people listen to you. . .) for the sake of a trite dismissal where an actual answer actually exists.

 

You're engaging in tokenism there. Please don't do that. As you say, two wrongs don't make a right.

 

That's. . . not tokenism. Tokenism is when you include minorities in your group purely for the sake of appearing inclusive. Edgwyn's post is not even halfway related to what that particular paragraph of wikipedia is talking about, which is even more specific. What? That didn't happen here at all. Edgwyn said that the President(for example) is very powerful. It is generally bad for powerful people to be in some way unfair, whether their particular idiosyncrasies match general societal ones or not. Edgwyn said this to point out that individual actions do actually matter. Because, y'know, people can actually directly effect other people. What else is systemic racism but trends in individual actions, after all. Mostly, white people are shitty to black people. And, generally, they're more powerful, as power in daily life goes, and so their actions effect other people more. Rarely, however, the position is reversed, and that is also bad. Acknowledging the basic possibility of that scenario and moving on does not deligitimize anti-racism. Blithely ignoring it makes you look like an idiot.

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So, I agree with some of what Nalyd is saying. It's crazy to tell people they're using it wrong when they're using it the way many people do. However, I also don't think anyone set out to deliberately redefine racism. I think it was a shift in understanding that sprang from shades of meaning present in the word as it is commonly used, after being exposed to a lot of critical discussion.

 

But let me be clearer: I do not think that the word "racism," as it is commonly used and widespreadly used, cleaves without exception to the bare bones definition of "decisions made based on race." Consider a few examples.

 

First, medical decisions. There are only so many scenarios where race is a useful characteristic to consider rather than a cheap proxy for something else, but there are some: consider screenings for genetic conditions that are very rare in the general population but more common in particular ethnic or racial groups. Recommending such a screening is a decision based on race, but I don't think almost anyone would call that racism. What's missing? Well, there's no harmful intention and no judgment based on bias rather than reality and no harmful effect (direct or indirect, in itself or as a pattern affecting millions). So I think that, essentially universally, there is room to delimit "racism" based on some other factor.

 

Second, affirmative action. Although there are no doubt many who call it racist, there are also many who do not call it racist despite acknowledging that it is a deliberate, race-based judgment with a negative impact on a race. The exact numbers here vary over time but neither those who consider it racist, nor those who don't, are a splinter of the population. And when you have a huge chunk of the population that understands a word differently -- 30%, 40%, 50%, whatever the split is -- the reality is that's part of how the word is used in actual speech by actual native speakers. That's part of the language.

 

The exact definition of "part of a system of oppression" might be put together by academics and activists, but use of the word only along those lines? That's a lot broader. It's not universal, and it's asinine to pretend it is or to try and force it on others. But it's not illegitimate either; it's just as asinine to reject it as an objective misuse of language. It's not.

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Also, any attempt to define the power structure in terms of race maybe mildly accurate in a statistical point of view, but it is grossly inaccurate on an individual basis. We do after all have a President who happens to be African American (individually most powerful person in country) who if he were racist would be in a position to do a great deal of damage on that basis.

From a statistical point of view it's overwhelmingly accurate, not mildly accurate. It's frankly hard to find any demographic statistics on power holders that don't back up a strong correlation between race and power holders.

 

If you imagine that generalities are supposed to apply uniformly to every individual or event, then I suppose it would be "grossly inaccurate on an individual basis". But that's not how it works. If I produce a list of all the soldiers that survived Gettysburg and Antietam it does not mean that it is "grossly inaccurate on an individual basis" to call those battles bloody or say that they had a high death toll. And the survival rates of those battles are a lot higher than the proportional representation of black Americans in the Presidency, however you slice it. Unless you somehow think that position will be occupied by a black person forever -- which looks pretty unlikely given the current contenders for that spot -- we're really looking at 1 president in 44. You want to ignore past history and look only at this exact moment in time? Fine; the numbers in Congress aren't much better. CEO's of top companies? Richest Americans? A lot worse.

 

It is grossly inaccurate to apply any generality as if it is a universal. Do you actually think that's what people are doing when they point out how racism is embedded in our power structures? Most people aren't saying the whole power structure is racism, just that there's a piece of it in there.

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I was going to make a post earlier, but then Slarty popped up and stole most of my points. I'm going to post anyway, just to spite him.

 

The goal of an argument is to convince other people to accept your point of view (or occasionally to be convinced of the point of view of other people). As such, it's in your best interest to make yourself understood. There is no universal, definitive, unbiased vocabulary to use. Issues with dictionaries aside, words will have multiples connotations depending on the audience. Instead, you've got to make do with the intersection of your vocabulary and your audience's vocabulary, and clarify things whenever something might be unclear. Protip: race is one of those topics where you'll need to do a lot of clarification.

 

For what it's worth, I'm on board with using 'racism' to refer to systemic oppression on the basis of race, and using a word like 'prejudice' to refer to other aspects of racial bias. But like Nalyd and Slarty are saying, this isn't universal usage, and it probably isn't even the usage of the majority. Using shorthand within a community with shared definitions is fine, but (re)defining terminology during an argument will just make you come across as moving the goalposts or reframing the narrative.

 

I don't think you lose anything by using unambiguous terms from the get-go. In fact, I'll go one step further. I think it's worth knowing when to use certain shibboleths and when to avoid them. Knowing which dogwhistles might come up, and being aware when you are using them yourself. For instance, some people will instinctively reject what you're saying if you use a term like 'patriarchy', but in my (very limited) experience I've had better luck describing the concept without using the term, talking about 'pressures' and 'expectations'. That way, you circumvent bringing up the concept of that shadowy cabal of sinister men that those crazy feminists believe in. On the other hand, using shorthand when you're amongst feminists is totally fine.

 

(I suppose there's a good argument to be made for collectively trying to change language so that it better addresses things that are ignored or poorly described. I try make an effort to learn whatever local 'dialects' pop up, but I'm not sure it's worth it introducing controversial terminology within the scope of a single argument.)

 

Making a post about clarity in arguments at this hour was probably a mistake.

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1. I fully agree that Twitter is a waste of time. I am not on it. Dr Gundy is the incoming Boston University professor who was in the news for her Tweets.

 

2. I can understand the definition difference that you have explained between Racism and Prejudice though I think that more common usage is for Racism to be a subset of prejudice, with Racism being prejudice based on race, sexism being prejudice based on sex, etc. In any case, I fail to see a moral difference between Racism and Racial prejudice and it often seems to me that racial prejudice is ignored or laughed away while only Racism is punished. I believe that both should receive the same treatment.

 

3. I agree, of course, that testing for say sickle cell based on race (or more accurately based on genetics) is a non-negative use of racial profiling. In a statement that I am sure will not surprise anyone, I do not agree that Affirmative Action is non-negative. To me it seems like a negative use of race with a negative impact and that some of you will tell me that it is being done in a system of oppression.

 

4. Of course the next President will not be "African American" based on the current candidate pool. Secretary Clinton may or may not have shot enough holes in her own foot to prevent the next President from being a female, which is an even larger demographic that has never been President. Using the 1 of 44 presidents argument (or the CEOs or the Congressmen), while mathematically valid also completely ignores the dramatic improvements in the last 216 years that have occurred and continue to occur. Statistics are snap shots in time. Trends are far more important. If you are going to tell me that things are not improving fast enough, I will not disagree with you (though I might disagree as to why and how to fix the situation).

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@Edgwyn: re Saida Gundy's tweets, I actually do feel like she crosses a certain line when blaming slavery on "Europeans" as a whole. Maybe not racist exactly, but it kind of smacks of biological racialism, which I consider un-Kosher regardless of origin. Also I prefer to be held accountable for my own sins - which are plentiful enough, thanks - rather than the sins of my ancestors.

 

(Especially seeing as slavery, right now, is a serious global issue that figures into a huge number of supply chains. GoldenGirl started a thread about this once - a thread where, if I recall correctly, I showed a deep lack of scruples myself. Hopefully I've learned better by now.)

 

So yes, on that, I kind of see where you're coming from.

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Also I prefer to be held accountable for my own sins - which are plentiful enough, thanks - rather than the sins of my ancestors.

There's a difference between blaming yourself for what your ancestors did, or holding yourself responsible for it -- and acknowledging the advantages you've had as a direct result of your ancestors' sins. Presumably, along with that acknowledgement, comes some desire to rectify the situation.

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Indeed. I start each day with a prayer of gratitude for Adolf Hitler. Without him, there would have been no post-WW2 emigration, my parents would never have met, and I wouldn't exist! And why stop at a death toll of fifty to eighty million? Think about how many people would owe their existence to us if we started World War Three!

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If you are going to tell me that things are not improving fast enough, I will not disagree with you.

This at least is a pretty important point to agree on, so it's nice to see we all have some common ground there.

Honestly, it's miraculous that things are improving at all, at the moment.

 

@Edgwyn: re Saida Gundy's tweets, I actually do feel like she crosses a certain line when blaming slavery on "Europeans" as a whole. Maybe not racist exactly, but it kind of smacks of biological racialism, which I consider un-Kosher regardless of origin.

I'm not really sure how what the situation would be where it isn't racist, really. My family didn't get to the US until around 1905ish and didn't have a thing in the world to do with slavery before they moved here. Forgive me if I don't immediately see the need to apologize for being white just because other people, who were also white, exercised cruelty over those without the power to stop it.

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There's a difference between blaming yourself for what your ancestors did, or holding yourself responsible for it -- and acknowledging the advantages you've had as a direct result of your ancestors' sins. Presumably, along with that acknowledgement, comes some desire to rectify the situation.

 

Well yes, that's kind of what the OP was about. Though admittedly I've been doing a bad job of it.

 

(Disclaimer: I just woke up. I might be a bit discombobulated.)

 

I'm not really sure how what the situation would be where it isn't racist' date=' really. My family didn't get to the US until around 1905ish and didn't have a thing in the world to do with slavery before they moved here. Forgive me if I don't immediately see the need to apologize for being white just because other people, who were also white, exercised cruelty over those without the power to stop it.[/quote']

 

I think the idea is basically what Slartibus says above - that we tacitly benefit from the behavior of those who were cruel. She's not demanding an apology, she's demanding that we try to fix this problem. I just feel it's incorrect to pin it racially on Europeans rather than on white people. Very nitpicky perhaps, but yeah.

 

OTOH, maybe I shouldn't be nitpicking someone who's been there, done that, because I haven't. I don't know.

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I'm not really sure how what the situation would be where it isn't racist, really. My family didn't get to the US until around 1905ish and didn't have a thing in the world to do with slavery before they moved here. Forgive me if I don't immediately see the need to apologize for being white just because other people, who were also white, exercised cruelty over those without the power to stop it.

uhhh... 1905, aka what historians call "the nadir of american race relations"? a time at which a massive flood of immigrants attempted to integrate into white supremacy in a foreign and xenophobic country by positioning themselves as agents of violent racism, stepping through a groove cut into the white american psyche by the late history of slavery? sharecropper times, jim crow times, grandfather clause times?

 

and let's not even get into the fact that american railroad and steamer companies of that time put out massive advertisement campaigns in europe promoting the ready availability of good agricultural land under laws which were set up to dispossess natives, sometimes straight-up referring to it as "good indian land". for many central european nationalities, this promise, directly or indirectly, is the entire reason a population exists in america.

the homestead infrastructure supporting this was a direct outgrowth of the tension over slavery and an attempt to construct a counterproject to plantation slavery without redefining what america was about.

 

or, like, the fact that your family immigrated into a country that was in the process of shooting civilians and looting their resources in the philippines? this is also a thing.

 

i guess i just wanna say this is a really morally reckless claim and you should be careful about making it.

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*sighs*

My family did not have a role in the United States territorial acquisition of the Philippines in 1898. As far as I'm aware, The Jim Crow laws of the early 20th century were basically the revenge of an angry southern electorate and I can't see how I might be directly or indirectly responsible for that. Nor for the effects caused by Manifest Destiny, nor for being the causes of slavery (which was my original point, that you have conveniently side-stepped). I might also add that just because I'm white doesn't mean my family had an easy time and didn't face discrimination of their own.

 

So, again, still not seeing a direct connection or how your argument makes more sense than saying "You moved to Germany in 1939, therefore you caused WWII". The US has done a number of deplorable things. This does not mean that I caused them, and furthermore unless you can find a papertrail, there's no way that you can say that I benefited from "shooting civilians and looting their resources in the Philippines".

 

Let's...not do the blind guilt by association thing.

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@Neb - I think gem helper is talking about being complicit, not being *directly* responsible.

 

e.g. I am complicit in US war crimes - my tax money funds unethical (and often quite frankly illegal) things abroad.

 

I could refuse to fund my country's drone strikes, use of torture, etc. but then I'd be in prison. The fact that I know this is a problem, and am not behind bars right now, basically says that I'm considering my freedom more important than other people's lives. The best you could say is that I'm banking - and banking very, very hard - on being more useful to humanity while out of jail.

 

To paraphrase Iain Banks, a guilty system allows no innocence.

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@Neb - I think gem helper is talking about being complicit, not being *directly* responsible.

 

I could refuse to fund my country's drone strikes, use of torture, etc. but then I'd be in prison. The fact that I know this is a problem, and am not behind bars right now, basically says that I'm considering my freedom more important than other people's lives. The best you could say is that I'm banking - and banking very, very hard - on being more useful to humanity while out of jail.

 

I'm not clear on how this argument is different from the notion that "Muslims should apologize for what they did on 9/11". Well, they didn't do anything on 9/11. Extremists/militants did, certainly. It was politically and religiously motivated, certainly. But Islam, as an organized religion, didn't order it or condone it in any way and, similarly, cannot be held responsible. The organization that sponsored them can, but that doesn't mean that each practitioner of Islam around the world owes an apology to the US.

 

Sorry I didn't have an relatives who got elected to Congress and could have ended segregation sooner or prevented the Vietnam war, but it's asinine to say that I should feel guilty about it up to one hundred years after the fact when I'm only "responsible" for it by proximity in the first place.

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@Neb: guilt isn't the point. (In retrospect, my comment about a "guilty system" was probably a poor choice of words.) The point, IMO, is recognizing that seemingly small aspects of behavior also carry ethical weight; and can cumulatively contribute to the world being a better place, or a worse one.

 

(Noting also that the US, at least, seems addicted to the Big Man school of history; which is, more or less, a load of rubbish. No person exists in a vacuum.)

 

But yeah - while one obviously can't make perfect ethical choices every time, it's better to know the situation; so that one can, at the very least, make slightly more informed choices.

 

(IMO anyway. Frankly my choices are still awful and stupid 99% of the time.)

 

[Edit: obviously some people do more than just "make slightly more informed choices." Sorry all.]

Edited by Tevildo
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I'm not clear on how this argument is different from the notion that "Muslims should apologize for what they did on 9/11". Well, they didn't do anything on 9/11. Extremists/militants did, certainly. It was politically and religiously motivated, certainly. But Islam, as an organized religion, didn't order it or condone it in any way and, similarly, cannot be held responsible. The organization that sponsored them can, but that doesn't mean that each practitioner of Islam around the world owes an apology to the US.

 

Muslims in general also didn't benefit from 9/11 (quite the opposite), which is kind of a salient difference here

 

people who migrated to the US in the early 20th century to live on stolen land benefited very directly from its theft even if they weren't personally responsible for the theft

 

if your way of life is dependent on violence that has been and is being done on your behalf then you don't get to turn a blind eye to that violence imo

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Yeah, the kind of ethical complicity we're talking about here isn't about being directly involved in carrying out oppression, but rather passively benefiting from it, and not acting to stop it.

 

This kind of complicity is rarely deliberate and often it's something that people are not very aware of. I don't think it makes any sense to judge or condemn anyone (living or dead) over it. But when we're looking at the dynamics of an oppressive situation, and what allowed that situation to persist, it's pretty relevant.

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@Slartibus

 

Very much agreed re not judging/condemning people over it. OTOH I feel like the other direction has to be emphasized too: just because something should not be punishable, it does not follow that it's morally acceptable. When one tacitly and knowingly supports imperialistic warfare (for one example), that is a kind of corruption.

 

Edit: to be clear though, I don't feel it's my business to take inventory of "how complicit" other people are; I just thought it was kind of needful to point out the above.

Edited by Tevildo
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I think historical guilt and complicity and all that just muddies the water. At this point it doesn't matter whose ancestors did what. I think it's equally ludicrous to say Americans are collectively guilty of war crimes because of atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan. Leaving beside the question of defining war crimes, many Americans argued against the wars, voted so as best to not engage or continue the wars, and demonstrated against the wars. Yes, they paid taxes, too, but not paying taxes is not a reasonable choice. It's not an effective way to bargain and the personal cost is high.

 

In any case, let's take an example: reparations for slavery. I think even the name is a red herring that gets everyone tangled up in history. Is recompense owed for the crimes over a century ago? That's a knotty issue, but also irrelevant, because we can also look at the need for repair for harms done on an ongoing basis, societally and systematically. Amelioration of segregated housing, reparations for racist policing, we have all kinds of active issues that require redress. Once we're on an even current footing we can examine making right the wrongs of the past.

 

—Alorael, whose family was mostly being oppressed elsewhere while blacks were being oppressed as slaves. He still has an advantage right at this very moment because his ancestors came from Eastern Europe and not Africa. That is the problem.

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1. Cultural achievements are owned by the race that creates them. E.g., "twerking" is property of the Negroid race.

 

2. Of course, the above does not hold for evil (privileged) races, only for good (oppressed) races.

 

THIS IS WHAT SELF-PROCLAIMED PROGRESSIVES ACTUALLY BELIEVE.

 

On a more serious note: Without the first assumption, the whole giant on clay feet called "cultural appropriation" just falls flat on its face.

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1. Cultural achievements are owned by the race that creates them. E.g., "twerking" is property of the Negroid race.

 

2. Of course, the above does not hold for evil (privileged) races, only for good (oppressed) races.

 

THIS IS WHAT SELF-PROCLAIMED PROGRESSIVES ACTUALLY BELIEVE.

 

On a more serious note: Without the first assumption, the whole giant on clay feet called "cultural appropriation" just falls flat on its face.

Again illustrating my point that the phrase "cultural appropriation" is terminally unclear and needs to be replaced with something that more accurately captures the phenomenon. The quoted post should not be possible. The only reason it's possible for someone to say this is that the poster doesn't understand what the phrase means. We can blame the poster, but frankly, I blame the phrase.

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You need to spread the word, because I haven't seen anyone else use the phrase the way you do.

 

Isn't anyone prepared to condemn Miley Cyrus for her twerking? Oh well, let's see what we have managed to scrape together in this thread, after three pages: The Washington Redskins and quinoa. The first is basically a guilt-by-association fallacy:

 

"Redskin" is a racial slur.

Racial slurs are bad.

The name and mascot of the Washington Redskins are, like, cultural appropration!

Therefore, cultural appropriation is bad.

 

Compare:

Hitler was a vegetarian.

Hitler was evil.

Therefore, vegetarianism is evil.

 

And quinoa...OMG...increased export income for the producer countries wouldn't be a problem if the local elite would share enough of it with the peasantry. They could import a variety of food, medicine and other things needed by the poor. But, of course, the local grandees aren't pale-skinned enough to be evil. The Great Satan (US of A) exports a lot of food - subsistence farming isn't all it's cracked up to be.

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