Novelist hopes militancy against "cultural appropriation" will pass
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JunkMonkey
Lord High Vizier of Nowt
I suggest we get the UN to organise a scheme whereby one nation gets to be the World's Joke Butt for the year. No more Irish/Polish/Armenian (etc.) jokes. Each year the UN allocates one nation, eg The Maldives, as this year's joke victims. Everyone makes Maldivian Jokes for the year. The Maldives get paid a sh*tload of money from the rest of the world for the privilege of not being laughed at.
JunkMonkey
Lord High Vizier of Nowt
My first name's Irish but my second name is English (actually originally Norman French) I may have to ostracise myself - twice.
AnyaKimlin
Confuddled
Northern Scotland isn't represented enough in the media to have a stereotype.
The Scotland you're talking about is South of Perth.
Mountain Goats was full of Scottish stereotypes but all of them were Glaswegian.
About the only people who don't want to are half the Northern Irish....
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I know you should never read the comments thread but I stumbled upon this amazing bit of text in reply. It's either an excellent parody or a really good example of just how divorced from reality this kind of thing is. Imagine that you are a member of some minority group, perhaps not a native English-speaker, and this was being put forward on your behalf:
"The key to going beyond the issue’s accusatory is to understand colonialization/globalization as a consolidating of cultures into a monoculture. The hegemonistic western culture would indeed put up a fight if it’s identities were ‘incorporated’ into and eventually supplanted by mayan, pan-african, etc. hegemony. Evidence of just such a necessarily consolidating dynamic is found in the premises of the argument of ‘participation’... Western civilization is no longer lumberingly hegemonistic but is, instead, nefariously hegemonistic."
Hegemony, dynamic, colonialization... this fills the bingo card up on its own. The thing is, the person who wrote this obviously isn't illiterate. It sort-of makes a kind of sense if you can cut the words down to size. But so what? Why is this "hegemonistic", rather than just a bit unsophisticated? Nobody is physically forcing all Africans out of their home countries and into a super-state. For me to imagine China with one or two (or even a dozen) mental images is probably a vast simplification. But does it harm the Chinese? I don't think so. I think it's the way the human mind works. And what is so evil about this "monoculture", anyway? Isn't that the integrated society we've been trying to create since the 1950s?
JunkMonkey
Lord High Vizier of Nowt
I'd send it off to Private Eye's 'Pseude's Corner' and win yourself a tenner.
It's striking how difficult it is to distinguish between the two. If I were to say:
"The struggle of the proletariat is not confined to securing dignity for labour in the face of the monstrous appetite of capital and neo-colonial hegemony, but to throw off the false consciousness that individuals in the Western patriarchy adopt with all the trapping of bourgeoisie materialism. The means of production in the modern world is not simply about material resources stolen through the toil of the proletariat, but the very cultural constructs that make such theft not only possible, but idealise that theft and the sociopathic values of industrialists and their lackeys who control the cultural narrative."
...most people would be at a loss to whether I'm being earnest or taking the piss.
And like the student Marxist movement of the 60s, society at large will eventually puncture the pretensions of identity politics activists with ridicule.
Sadly I knew a fair number of people who talked like that (they had been fans of Trotsky and when Glasnost' happened they switched with the elegance of synchronized swimmers to being economic liberals, but they still talked the same way).
A lot of the romance stereotypes are about Scotland north of Perth -- lots of running around (and more) in the heather and suffering from the invidious laws imposed by the south. Which brings me to: it feels as if part of the excitement about the highlands is the attack on the culture -- so children were beaten for speaking their own language in school, men were forced to wear whatever clothes the government thought appropriate, roads were built to make the areas accessible to armies. Ultimately, people were cleared off the land and fled to other countries. Romantic oppression.
It's taking the real suffering of a people -- a suffering they're still recovering from and reacting to today -- and making it into someone else's story. A backdrop or a thriller. It's difficult to see that done without being annoyed.
For cultures where people are still under-represented and mistreated by the dominant group/culture, the translation of their history or culture into someone else's story must be hard to take, especially when it's done badly, or pieces of it are ignored. I read a while ago about Japanese Americans whose history within the US was ignored -- many had been imprisoned as enemies during WW2, but the YA novelists using them as convenient non-white characters didn't know any of that stuff and hadn't bothered to find out or check with anyone that their depictions ran true.
(re good writing about your own culture -- I thought Iain Banks did a good job of writing about Scotland from the inside, using things that are recognisable and familiar without using them as fetishes. Not everyone needs the enthusiasm of the tourist to appreciate an environment -- and now I write that, I expect it's part of the issue: I hate almost all books which are essentially tourist trips through other people's countries (there was one about Oxford that made me retch -- it had vampires in too) but it's especially tiresome when it's my country. If my culture was continually being shown that way -- from the outside -- without the easy familiarity someone like Iain Banks brought to it (or the Edinburgh code lots of Trainspotting was written in), it would probably send me cross-eyed with despair and rage).
A lot of the romance stereotypes are about Scotland north of Perth -- lots of running around (and more) in the heather and suffering from the invidious laws imposed by the south. Which brings me to: it feels as if part of the excitement about the highlands is the attack on the culture -- so children were beaten for speaking their own language in school, men were forced to wear whatever clothes the government thought appropriate, roads were built to make the areas accessible to armies. Ultimately, people were cleared off the land and fled to other countries. Romantic oppression.
It's taking the real suffering of a people -- a suffering they're still recovering from and reacting to today -- and making it into someone else's story. A backdrop or a thriller. It's difficult to see that done without being annoyed.
For cultures where people are still under-represented and mistreated by the dominant group/culture, the translation of their history or culture into someone else's story must be hard to take, especially when it's done badly, or pieces of it are ignored. I read a while ago about Japanese Americans whose history within the US was ignored -- many had been imprisoned as enemies during WW2, but the YA novelists using them as convenient non-white characters didn't know any of that stuff and hadn't bothered to find out or check with anyone that their depictions ran true.
(re good writing about your own culture -- I thought Iain Banks did a good job of writing about Scotland from the inside, using things that are recognisable and familiar without using them as fetishes. Not everyone needs the enthusiasm of the tourist to appreciate an environment -- and now I write that, I expect it's part of the issue: I hate almost all books which are essentially tourist trips through other people's countries (there was one about Oxford that made me retch -- it had vampires in too) but it's especially tiresome when it's my country. If my culture was continually being shown that way -- from the outside -- without the easy familiarity someone like Iain Banks brought to it (or the Edinburgh code lots of Trainspotting was written in), it would probably send me cross-eyed with despair and rage).
I have done the writing-about-my-own-culture thing in Inish Carraig (and in Waters and the Wild next year). Now, bear in mind I'm not writing about the Irish culture (for good reason - it's largely alien to me, although I'm currently researching a book set in Donegal but the main characters will be tourists and I never stopped to wonder why until now) but the Northern Irish culture.
I suspect when it comes to teeth-grindingly awful depictions of a country, little Norn Ireland must be up there. We're all star crossed terrorists fighting for the good of Oirland, or hard-eyed maddos in orange sashes, or steely killers of every variety etc etc. Truly, we spend a fair degree of time laughing at attempts to capture and understand us (and, yes, @Hex the romanticism of the Troubles exists and is, for someone who grew up through them, frustratingly terribly awful.)
It's hard writing about your own culture (especially one as divided as mine). Get one thing wrong and it stands out ten times more. In my case, give credence to one view more than another and people know your political and religious affiliation. I would say most NI people who read Inish Carraig know which side of the divide I'm from - just as I'd know theirs from the same kind of book.
Those nuances can never be captured without being familiar with the place. People can research all they like and google what it's like to be a prod in NI and they will come out with the notion they're all pro-Orange and go to bonfires every July - because the nuances (I struggle to say truth - many do attend the bonfires. I used to when I was younger and the sound of a single flute carries smoke-edged memories with it.) They won't get the real knowledge of the lines of viewpoints here - and I struggle to get that about people of the other religion from me. (I do suspect it's harder for me because of how close I write mu characters - with a little more distance I could gloss over more)
But is it important I had my voice and not some Holywood blockbuster appropriating NI for an alien invasion (although, Mr Spielberg, if you're interested...)? I think it was - because in true voices lie truths that add to the pot of understanding, especially in divided/hidden places. Am I offended if a blow-in writes a story set here? Of course not. But if it was at the expense of the genuine voices, then I would be terribly, terribly sad.
I suspect when it comes to teeth-grindingly awful depictions of a country, little Norn Ireland must be up there. We're all star crossed terrorists fighting for the good of Oirland, or hard-eyed maddos in orange sashes, or steely killers of every variety etc etc. Truly, we spend a fair degree of time laughing at attempts to capture and understand us (and, yes, @Hex the romanticism of the Troubles exists and is, for someone who grew up through them, frustratingly terribly awful.)
It's hard writing about your own culture (especially one as divided as mine). Get one thing wrong and it stands out ten times more. In my case, give credence to one view more than another and people know your political and religious affiliation. I would say most NI people who read Inish Carraig know which side of the divide I'm from - just as I'd know theirs from the same kind of book.
Those nuances can never be captured without being familiar with the place. People can research all they like and google what it's like to be a prod in NI and they will come out with the notion they're all pro-Orange and go to bonfires every July - because the nuances (I struggle to say truth - many do attend the bonfires. I used to when I was younger and the sound of a single flute carries smoke-edged memories with it.) They won't get the real knowledge of the lines of viewpoints here - and I struggle to get that about people of the other religion from me. (I do suspect it's harder for me because of how close I write mu characters - with a little more distance I could gloss over more)
But is it important I had my voice and not some Holywood blockbuster appropriating NI for an alien invasion (although, Mr Spielberg, if you're interested...)? I think it was - because in true voices lie truths that add to the pot of understanding, especially in divided/hidden places. Am I offended if a blow-in writes a story set here? Of course not. But if it was at the expense of the genuine voices, then I would be terribly, terribly sad.
I would like to see these viewpoints expressed more publicly to be fair @Jo Zebedee and @Hex
Why? i hear everyone ask? Because northern irish and scottish people are still grouped into the privelaged white majority. And yet, here you are with the same views as oppressed people who are not white. Almost as though the colour of your skin isn't an issue, but the issue of something greater in human nature. The tribalistic nature of humanity. You vs me. Us vs them. Black vs white. God vs, another god.
The only way to get past this extremely sad state of affairs is globalisation. True globalisation, not the purely greed driven version that politicians and the super rich spout. True unity. Where it simply doesn't matter where you are from, or where you go. What the colour of your skin is, or the god you worship, is as irrelevent as what socks you are wearing.
All this 'you cant do that because you arn't in my club' is bu**s*** of the highest order. And that goes for EVERY club, from the mega rich supremacists down to the smallest minority group. If you exclude people from your culture, then you are as guilty of segregation as anyone else who does the same thing. Culture should be shared, by all the human race. Not forgotten, not forbidden, not trampled on, but shared. We are a SINGLE race - human. Anyone who believes otherwise, because I live on the other side of an imaginary border to them, is a bigot, pure and simple.
I know this isn't the popular view, but it is the only view that actually promotes equality.
In the past, mistakes were made, by ALL sides. It is time to move on from those mistakes and create a better society. And we ARE moving on, slowly. We just need to be working towards real unity. All of us. That means the minorities also need to be working towards unity. We all know that misrepresentation and stereotyping are harmful, but so is isolating yourself from representation by crying 'cultural appropriation' when someone tries to write about, or join in with, something from a different culture to their own.
Why? i hear everyone ask? Because northern irish and scottish people are still grouped into the privelaged white majority. And yet, here you are with the same views as oppressed people who are not white. Almost as though the colour of your skin isn't an issue, but the issue of something greater in human nature. The tribalistic nature of humanity. You vs me. Us vs them. Black vs white. God vs, another god.
The only way to get past this extremely sad state of affairs is globalisation. True globalisation, not the purely greed driven version that politicians and the super rich spout. True unity. Where it simply doesn't matter where you are from, or where you go. What the colour of your skin is, or the god you worship, is as irrelevent as what socks you are wearing.
All this 'you cant do that because you arn't in my club' is bu**s*** of the highest order. And that goes for EVERY club, from the mega rich supremacists down to the smallest minority group. If you exclude people from your culture, then you are as guilty of segregation as anyone else who does the same thing. Culture should be shared, by all the human race. Not forgotten, not forbidden, not trampled on, but shared. We are a SINGLE race - human. Anyone who believes otherwise, because I live on the other side of an imaginary border to them, is a bigot, pure and simple.
I know this isn't the popular view, but it is the only view that actually promotes equality.
In the past, mistakes were made, by ALL sides. It is time to move on from those mistakes and create a better society. And we ARE moving on, slowly. We just need to be working towards real unity. All of us. That means the minorities also need to be working towards unity. We all know that misrepresentation and stereotyping are harmful, but so is isolating yourself from representation by crying 'cultural appropriation' when someone tries to write about, or join in with, something from a different culture to their own.
Well, no. I am white and privileged (although not male ...) and have a voice. Although I posted above - more in response to the cultural posts - I am very clearly not equating myself as anything other than privileged.
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It's the moving on, the abandoning of vendettas and feuds, that's the important and difficult thing. The trouble is that dodgy politicians and vocal weirdos like holding grudges, because it makes them money or lets them feel important. There does come a tipping-point, as I think happened in Ireland, where the majority of people think "This just can't go on".
One of the worst things of this cultural appropriation stuff is that it says, quite specifically, that I can't understand, say, the life of a Peruvian farmer - not just that it will be difficult for me (it's difficult for me to understand the life of anyone other than myself, actually) but that it is somehow a moral wrong for me to try. Re-reading The Stepford Wives recently, which revolves around 1970s feminism, I was struck by the belief of the heroine (and presumably the author) in a general sisterhood of women. That seems touchingly naive now: it's doubtful whether such a sisterhood would be seen to exist in any country today, and it certainly wouldn't exist between women of different nations. To say that a woman in Saudi Arabia has the same rights as a woman in America would presumably be cultural imperialism, which doesn't help the Saudi woman very much.
One of the worst things of this cultural appropriation stuff is that it says, quite specifically, that I can't understand, say, the life of a Peruvian farmer - not just that it will be difficult for me (it's difficult for me to understand the life of anyone other than myself, actually) but that it is somehow a moral wrong for me to try. Re-reading The Stepford Wives recently, which revolves around 1970s feminism, I was struck by the belief of the heroine (and presumably the author) in a general sisterhood of women. That seems touchingly naive now: it's doubtful whether such a sisterhood would be seen to exist in any country today, and it certainly wouldn't exist between women of different nations. To say that a woman in Saudi Arabia has the same rights as a woman in America would presumably be cultural imperialism, which doesn't help the Saudi woman very much.
Me neither. My point was that although I am privileged, misrepresentations of my culture still get on my nerves. If I were not in this privileged position, I imagine that they would irritate me more.
I admire your vision of a global culture but I have two immediate thoughts about that:
First, there's a lot to be said for my culture -- a lot of richness and interest that would be lost if it was subsumed into a bigger whole, and I don't want to lose it. I don't think being Scottish means I can't also be a member of a bigger group -- the UK, the EU, the world.
Second, when a global culture is created, whose will it be? The people who are privileged and who have the right to take what they want from everyone else's cultures and histories, and decide if these are worth including and how they should be understood? I expect that if we found ourselves being absorbed into a world culture that was alien to ours -- say Thai or even Russian -- we would struggle not to get lost in it.
It is very easy to say, from the position of being privileged voices in the dominant culture, that everyone else should accept globalisation and stop being so divisive, but if it's our culture that will dominate, of course it doesn't seem like much of a loss. Perhaps it seems like more of a loss from other people's perspectives?
(e.g. would we be happily absorbed into a global culture where women didn't have many rights, kids would be married at 13, we segregated genders and we all spoke Chinese?)
I admire your vision of a global culture but I have two immediate thoughts about that:
First, there's a lot to be said for my culture -- a lot of richness and interest that would be lost if it was subsumed into a bigger whole, and I don't want to lose it. I don't think being Scottish means I can't also be a member of a bigger group -- the UK, the EU, the world.
Second, when a global culture is created, whose will it be? The people who are privileged and who have the right to take what they want from everyone else's cultures and histories, and decide if these are worth including and how they should be understood? I expect that if we found ourselves being absorbed into a world culture that was alien to ours -- say Thai or even Russian -- we would struggle not to get lost in it.
It is very easy to say, from the position of being privileged voices in the dominant culture, that everyone else should accept globalisation and stop being so divisive, but if it's our culture that will dominate, of course it doesn't seem like much of a loss. Perhaps it seems like more of a loss from other people's perspectives?
(e.g. would we be happily absorbed into a global culture where women didn't have many rights, kids would be married at 13, we segregated genders and we all spoke Chinese?)
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Just to pick up on a few points made on this page. In rural China they teach the children at school to learn English and to aspire to go to a London University and get a Western education. Is this the fault of the West that our universities are world renowned? They also teach the children Chinese calligraphy and values but I did still find it odd, considering that many would not even travel outside their province, never mind be able to travel to a different country. In Cuba they despise anything American and yet they desperately want anything capitalist and love American cars, American food, baseball and TV. I think these kind of conflicts and confusion is at the heart of what you are speaking about, and these ones, at least, are not due to advertising, but just driven by a fundamental need to improve yourself and to escape from poverty.
There is another point. When countries gained independence from colonial powers, and this is especially true in African from European powers, the first leaders on the independent countries were all people who had been educated in the West. They therefore had been taught history and values from a European perspective and they carried that with them over to the government of the new country. It is only now that new generations of leaders who were born and educated in those countries are coming to power that they are forging new identities and discovering their countries own identity and culture. Remember that these countries had empires, histories and cultures long before they were colonised. This was suppressed by the West because it suited us to think of ourselves as civilizing natives, rather than enslaving them and raiding their resources. I don't feel personally responsible or a need to apologise for this. It was nothing to do with me. Even my own ancestors were being religiously and ethnically persecuted at the time for being Presbyterian covenantors and Huguenots by the powers that be.
I do think you should always write about what you know. if you research your subject well, speak to local people and immerse yourself in that culture, then I don't think you can be accused of appropriating a culture. The more that culture is written about, surely the better it will fair? What is wrong is a kind of mock-culture or Disneyland appropriation. There is a lot of this in dance and the arts.
There is another point. When countries gained independence from colonial powers, and this is especially true in African from European powers, the first leaders on the independent countries were all people who had been educated in the West. They therefore had been taught history and values from a European perspective and they carried that with them over to the government of the new country. It is only now that new generations of leaders who were born and educated in those countries are coming to power that they are forging new identities and discovering their countries own identity and culture. Remember that these countries had empires, histories and cultures long before they were colonised. This was suppressed by the West because it suited us to think of ourselves as civilizing natives, rather than enslaving them and raiding their resources. I don't feel personally responsible or a need to apologise for this. It was nothing to do with me. Even my own ancestors were being religiously and ethnically persecuted at the time for being Presbyterian covenantors and Huguenots by the powers that be.
I do think you should always write about what you know. if you research your subject well, speak to local people and immerse yourself in that culture, then I don't think you can be accused of appropriating a culture. The more that culture is written about, surely the better it will fair? What is wrong is a kind of mock-culture or Disneyland appropriation. There is a lot of this in dance and the arts.
Yet again, we seem to be confusing things with ideas. While people do become emotionally attached to ideas -- and so can feel genuinely hurt -- when Person B else takes up** an idea from Person A, the original stays with Person A, whatever Person B does with that idea.
Oddly enough, the transmission of ideas is usually considered to be a good thing. We call it education. Countries, when they can afford to do so, pay to have their children -- and adults -- educated. It is seen as a Good Thing. And it is. The idea that we should teach people about how others live is also seen as a good thing. To say, at the end of such teaching, "Hands Off! It's not for you!" is essentially daft and, in a way, quite cruel.
It's only seen not to be daft through the lens of Privilege, where some people's cultures -- the culture of people who are privileged -- can be shared*** because, well, they're Privileged, but others' culture is protected, is placed in some sort of reservation.
The most worrying aspect of this whole thing is that it seems to emanate most strongly from educational institutions, particularly higher education, places where people should be being helped to learn how to learn and not, one would hope, to learn how to see the world as some sort of cultural museum, with the exhibits careful kept behind impenetrable barriers, to be seen but not to be experienced****.
** - As someone mentioned above, we do allow certain restrictions (patents, copyright) -- time limited restrictions -- with regard to new ideas thought up by one person (or a group of persons) so that they get a chance to benefit from them having that good idea. But eventually that protection runs out. (The enormous amount of time that this persists after the death of the owner of a copyright is ridiculous... except, perhaps, when the copyright owner dies young leaving dependents with nothing but that copyright.)
*** - Japanese musicians can, quite happily, listen to, play and write "western" classical music and people (quite rightly, in my view) see this as a good thing, not cultural appropriation. Now Japan is a democracy and one of the richest countries on the planet; a lot of "western" music classical music comes from relatively poor countries in Central and Eastern Europe which were, when Japan was taking up their music, more or less totalitarian states. In what way were they Privileged compared to the Japanese? They weren't. (Note: I know Japanese people were seen, by at least one horribly racist country, as "honorary whites", but I hope no-one here would think that this is a good reason to say that no "cultural appropriation" could be happening in this example; a better one is to dismiss "cultural appropriation" as the wrong solution to the problem of bad representations of The Other, whoever The Other happens to be.)
**** - I think the "experienced" bit is important. People who say, for example, "Watching a sport is simply not as good as participating in it," are correct. Living life as a series of vicarious experiences (other than those one is allowed to participate in) is no life at all. And where there are rules about allowing -- and, more particularly, not allowing -- certain experiences, they are going to result in: 1) a lot of people not even bothering to look, but stick to living with the things they're allowed to, diminishing their chances of empathising with people different to themselves; 2) a lot of people deciding that just because someone says that they can't do something, it's a very good reason to do it (which is perhaps not the best way to experience the culture of other people, people who've been taught to believe that this culture is theirs and theirs alone).
Oddly enough, the transmission of ideas is usually considered to be a good thing. We call it education. Countries, when they can afford to do so, pay to have their children -- and adults -- educated. It is seen as a Good Thing. And it is. The idea that we should teach people about how others live is also seen as a good thing. To say, at the end of such teaching, "Hands Off! It's not for you!" is essentially daft and, in a way, quite cruel.
It's only seen not to be daft through the lens of Privilege, where some people's cultures -- the culture of people who are privileged -- can be shared*** because, well, they're Privileged, but others' culture is protected, is placed in some sort of reservation.
The most worrying aspect of this whole thing is that it seems to emanate most strongly from educational institutions, particularly higher education, places where people should be being helped to learn how to learn and not, one would hope, to learn how to see the world as some sort of cultural museum, with the exhibits careful kept behind impenetrable barriers, to be seen but not to be experienced****.
** - As someone mentioned above, we do allow certain restrictions (patents, copyright) -- time limited restrictions -- with regard to new ideas thought up by one person (or a group of persons) so that they get a chance to benefit from them having that good idea. But eventually that protection runs out. (The enormous amount of time that this persists after the death of the owner of a copyright is ridiculous... except, perhaps, when the copyright owner dies young leaving dependents with nothing but that copyright.)
*** - Japanese musicians can, quite happily, listen to, play and write "western" classical music and people (quite rightly, in my view) see this as a good thing, not cultural appropriation. Now Japan is a democracy and one of the richest countries on the planet; a lot of "western" music classical music comes from relatively poor countries in Central and Eastern Europe which were, when Japan was taking up their music, more or less totalitarian states. In what way were they Privileged compared to the Japanese? They weren't. (Note: I know Japanese people were seen, by at least one horribly racist country, as "honorary whites", but I hope no-one here would think that this is a good reason to say that no "cultural appropriation" could be happening in this example; a better one is to dismiss "cultural appropriation" as the wrong solution to the problem of bad representations of The Other, whoever The Other happens to be.)
**** - I think the "experienced" bit is important. People who say, for example, "Watching a sport is simply not as good as participating in it," are correct. Living life as a series of vicarious experiences (other than those one is allowed to participate in) is no life at all. And where there are rules about allowing -- and, more particularly, not allowing -- certain experiences, they are going to result in: 1) a lot of people not even bothering to look, but stick to living with the things they're allowed to, diminishing their chances of empathising with people different to themselves; 2) a lot of people deciding that just because someone says that they can't do something, it's a very good reason to do it (which is perhaps not the best way to experience the culture of other people, people who've been taught to believe that this culture is theirs and theirs alone).
I didn't imply that cultures should be merged into one superculture, just that culture should be shared, understood and enjoyed by all. Unity doesn't mean subsumed into a greater thing, it means working together, ideally at a position of equality. Countries could, and should keep their flavour and unique ways, but not jealously guard them. For instance, I love Japan and its ways, speak a little Japanese and have learned a great deal of their culture. Have I stolen it from them? Lessened their culture by learning it? No. Have I in some way caused offense, by learning a martial art, or by watching Japanese films or reading their works? No.
I was being ironic when I pointed out that Hex and Jo were saying the same things as minority cultures do, not implying that you arn't in a privileged position (though I hate the term privileged, my family certainly do not feel privileged by comparison to wealthy people, just as poorer people do not feel privileged compared to my family, it is a relative term). I have pointed out about the fact I am ginger, the daily abuse, the casual insults, the physical and emotional assaults when I was a child. These 'micro aggressions' as they get termed, on TV, on the radio, in literature, it pervades society and yet - no one cares, this is not hate crime apparently, yet where is the difference to having black skin? I personally am not offended, I don't care. I use it as an example often though, because it serves a point. So, am I privileged to be white and live in the UK? To a degree yes, I do not have war on my doorstep, my children are not starving (though sometimes I have to choose between buying decent food, or fuel to work). But am I privileged enough to go on vacation every year? To buy my kids nice things? Or did I suffer abuse because of hair colour? Or being short? Or the fact that I had to have free school meals as a child, where the meal ticket was bright pink instead of blue like everyone else had? Where was my privilege then?
But I digress, this is about culture. How valuable is a culture that you will not share? How will you be remembered when they look back at history and see insular societies, staring out from the locked gates of their culture? I prefer a brighter future. If we all cared to leave the world in a better shape than we found it, perhaps we would be further along as a species.
I was being ironic when I pointed out that Hex and Jo were saying the same things as minority cultures do, not implying that you arn't in a privileged position (though I hate the term privileged, my family certainly do not feel privileged by comparison to wealthy people, just as poorer people do not feel privileged compared to my family, it is a relative term). I have pointed out about the fact I am ginger, the daily abuse, the casual insults, the physical and emotional assaults when I was a child. These 'micro aggressions' as they get termed, on TV, on the radio, in literature, it pervades society and yet - no one cares, this is not hate crime apparently, yet where is the difference to having black skin? I personally am not offended, I don't care. I use it as an example often though, because it serves a point. So, am I privileged to be white and live in the UK? To a degree yes, I do not have war on my doorstep, my children are not starving (though sometimes I have to choose between buying decent food, or fuel to work). But am I privileged enough to go on vacation every year? To buy my kids nice things? Or did I suffer abuse because of hair colour? Or being short? Or the fact that I had to have free school meals as a child, where the meal ticket was bright pink instead of blue like everyone else had? Where was my privilege then?
But I digress, this is about culture. How valuable is a culture that you will not share? How will you be remembered when they look back at history and see insular societies, staring out from the locked gates of their culture? I prefer a brighter future. If we all cared to leave the world in a better shape than we found it, perhaps we would be further along as a species.
WaylanderToo
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an interesting point on this is that from what I can gather the Japanese (generically speaking) are quite actually racist themselves. The question is is racism 9ironically) one of the true uniting features of humankind?
O/T @Ursa major - just curious here. Whenever you add examples you always start with 2 asterisk (asteries? asterisks?) rather than just the one... why?
It is the nature of humanity. Bigotry isn't a peculiar defect of Western cultures; it's baked into the genes of everyone on the planet. It's made up of two innate and powerful features of the mind:
* The urge to group people
* The urge to internalize all that is good and externalize all that is bad.
The way forward isn't to vilify one group or culture. That's just more of the same. which is why identity politics activists so often use the language and tactics of the those they oppose - they have essentially the same mindset. The way forward is to recognize these powerful innate urges wherever they manifest and to denounce them.
Yes. A Canadian writer of Asian descent rejected identity politics over 20 years ago by reflecting on the three ways a person fits into society:
- As a unique individual with her own value.
- As part of a sub-group, whether that's race, gender, nationality, or whatever.
- As part of the human race.
Just to say that I don't hear anyone saying that people cannot write other people outside of their experience - simply to do so in a considered manner, especially when there is a history of oppression and/or discrimination, or the subject otherwise invites sensitivity.
The extreme examples Shriver cites in her speech strike me as "White Knight" actions - I would be very surprised if the student bodies trying to ban Yoga, or the wearing of sombreros, were predominantly Indian or Mexican.
The extreme examples Shriver cites in her speech strike me as "White Knight" actions - I would be very surprised if the student bodies trying to ban Yoga, or the wearing of sombreros, were predominantly Indian or Mexican.
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