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Cultural Appropriation...Am I going mad?

IITYWYBMAD

This detestable term has come into vogue recently. Yes, I'm familiar that the term has existed for some time, but it appears that it's (mis)use has now grown to be a first point of call for the masses, when it comes to everything from dreadlocks to SJW's getting offended about kids going to birthday parties dressed as cowboys and Indians.

Am I missing something here?

Where dose cultural appropriation sit with social diversity/inclusion?

I'm getting really sick of people claiming cultural 'ownership' of something associated with their ancestors, while at the same time demanding to be treated as an equal in their 'adopted' country.

This is not a discussion about race, more about cultures and heritage.

Where does it stop? And why are we tolerating it?

Some examples

http://www.playbill.com/article/theatre-cancels-aida-amid-concerns-over-cultural-appropriation

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/play-canceled-after-white-student-cast-as-main-character

https://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/31/living/white-dreadlocks-cultural-appropriation-feat/index.html

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Lux23

Cordell wrote: »

I don't think there is a blind actor that can match Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman.

How do you know? When was the last time you watched a film with a blind actor? Plus, he entertaining in that film but hammy af.

Captain Red Beard

Lux23 wrote: »

I hate when white actors are cast in roles that aren't white, there is no excuse for it. I also hate non-disabled actors playing people with wheelchairs or cisgender folk playing trans characters.

Actors act, that's their thing.

Lux23

Captain Red Beard wrote: »

Actors act, that's their thing.

So, if Mick Collins was played by a Nigerian lad you would be totally OK with that?

Ri_Nollaig

Lux23 wrote: »

Or they could just get actors with existing disabilities to play the roles? Do you think they don't exist?

Why thought?
They are acting! thats kinda the idea!

Unless its a very obvious disability and that particular character must have it, i.e.
Peter Dinklage in Game of Thrones.

As for James Bond, it would have been silly to have had a black Bond in the 60s but its not based in the 60s anymore, I hope Idris Elba is the next Bond after Craig.

wexie

Lux23 wrote: »

Or they could just get actors with existing disabilities to play the roles? Do you think they don't exist?

I don't know? Do they?

I can think of exactly one movie off the top of my head that featured an actress with a disability and that movie was about her having a disability.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_a_Lesser_God_(film)

How Soon Is Now

I miss the good auld days when we didn't have worry bout this ****e.

mcmoustache

Lux23 wrote: »

But Daniel Craig had no problem running around Madagascar in Casino Royale? Do you think there are no black MI6 operatives at all?

Where did I suggest that? Of course there are black agents. I think you may need to learn to read because if that's what you picked up from what I wrote, there's something wrong with your comprehension skills.

BrokenArrows

Lux23 wrote: »

I hate when white actors are cast in roles that aren't white, there is no excuse for it. I also hate non-disabled actors playing people with wheelchairs or cisgender folk playing trans characters.

Are you serious?

Its acting. The entire point of it is to ACT ie. be somebody you are not.

The only one i slightly agree with may be the race one. However even that is not really an issue in my opinion. They are in it to make money and if hiring white Hollywood stars who give the product some publicity then so be it.

If Hollywood want to make a movie about some Japanese comic using white actors then who cares. If they want Japanese people in it then the Japanese film industry can make it.

As for hiring disabled people for disabled role... That might be an admirable ambition but if the goal is to make a good movie then you need a qualified actor and the pool of disabled actors with the same disability as required for the role would be pretty small.

The trans issue is a non starter. Does that mean if you are trans you cant play straight roles too?

CaptainPants

I can see how it applies if youre taking something that's sacred to another culture and taking the piss out of it, or putting in a profane context. So I can see how a tattoo of Buddha on your arse-crack might annoy a Thai person or whatever. But taking musical styles, flavours and spices from other cultures? That's pretty much how culture is made:

Hamburgers, Frankfurters: German inventions, now US icons
Rock Music: Based on blues which was based on West African pentatonic music.

Have you ever noticed by the way that, its almost never the people from that culture themselves who get pissed about Cultural Appropriation? Its usually some upper-middle class white American with a silly degree whose name ends in 'studies'.

Cordell

Yes, I was thinking about Idris Elba as the next Bond, he's way better suited than Daniel Craig will ever be!
But let's hope it's not Samuel L. Jackson, bond, james motherf bond, motherf.

brevity

I think "whitewashing" can definitely be a problem as it's disingenuous.

Tom Hanks playing MLK would definitely raise an eyebrow or two.

There is also this:

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

But I think it's a Hollywood thing

CrankyHaus

While it's a bit long, writer Lionel Shriver brilliantly ridiculed "cultural appropriation" in a talk that had the usual suspects up in arms :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/sep/13/lionel-shrivers-full-speech-i-hope-the-concept-of-cultural-appropriation-is-a-passing-fad

o1s1n

brevity wrote: »

Tom Hanks playing MLK would definitely raise an eyebrow or two.

It's a bit of a moot point though. If that happened it would be panned as completely ridiculous.

megaten

OP have looked up what Cultural Appropriation means or are you just reading random articles on the internet and then posting it here to annoy everyone with your ****e.

Harry Palmr

If Larry Olivier played Muhammad Ahmad in Khartoum now that would be rightly seen as unacceptable blackface but you can be sure if a Yank was cast as General Gordon again (was Charlton Heston in 1966) it would be only a matter for grumbles and would go ahead.

Bandana boy

Lux23 wrote: »

I hate when white actors are cast in roles that aren't white, there is no excuse for it. I also hate non-disabled actors playing people with wheelchairs or cisgender folk playing trans characters.

However, I don't get how a white person wearing dreadlocks is cultural appropriation and if anything shows a lack of awareness about European cultures like the Celts or Vikings.

You must have hated Morgan Freeman in the Shawshank R
Tom Cruise in Born of the 4th of July
Leo di Caprio in Romeo and Juliet
Daniel Day Lewis in my left foot
Samuel l Jackson in the Avengers
Diana Ross in the Wiz

And hundreds of others !!!

Campogna

Personally, if Hollywood were to cast a white person as a black historical figure, e.g. Nelson Mandela, then I think it's wrong (and too easy) to criticize it for being racist or cultural appropriation. I think instead it should be labelled unprofessional with a lack of attention to detail and no one should watch it.

It is not Hollywood's responsibility to cast people accurately and in a way that best pays tribute to a character, it is the audience's responsibility to not make these movies profitable by NOT watching them.

Similarly, if a film studio is adapting a book and does not capture the most vital elements of the story that made the book good then they have every right to do that. It lies with the audience to not watch the movie and critics to rate it poorly.

Perhaps I fail to see these issues through the scope of race and culture but frankly I don't see these things as pertinent. By looking at these issues like that I think you boil down people to very basic elements of humanity. If Scarlett J. is the actor best qualified to give a realistic interpretation of the character from that Japanese movie then by god go for it. However, if there were obvious Japanese actors available who could have made the movie feel more genuine then that is the studios fault for being unscrupulous and its too easy to accuse them of being racist, they simply made poor creative decision.

Maybe my take on the issue is quite flawed and I have tunnel vision but I find myself thinking back to the H&M controversy a while back. The t-shirt they released, while being intensely racially insensitive, was not seen as harmful by the employees who allowed it to be released because it is a Swedish company and they simply do not see things that way there. Yes it was a poor creative decision and they were rightly criticized but there was also a massive over-reaction whereby people destroyed stores and screamed racism.

DEFTLEFTHAND

The thing with the dreadlocked geek and black tutor on the uni campus was quite amusing.

The geek at one point states that dreadlocks were in fashion in ancient Egypt, to which the tutor starts grinning and saying yeah now where is Egypt.

Has this lady ever met an Egyptian? Or any North African for that matter?

Try referring to one as 'black' and see what happens.

They'd beat the living sh1t out of you.

suicide_circus

dreadlocks were worn by people from ancient greece to the aztecs and india to west africa

megaten

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

The thing with the dreadlocked geek and black tutor on the uni campus was quite amusing.

The geek at one point states that dreadlocks were in fashion in ancient Egypt, to which the tutor starts grinning and saying yeah now where is Egypt.

Has this lady ever met an Egyptian? Or any North African for that matter?

Try referring to one as 'black' and see what happens.

They'd beat the living sh1t out of you.

You know people move about over the course of history yeah?

Do you think Ulster Scots just flowered out of the ground or something?

metaoblivia

Cultural appropriation is one of those things that exists but has been blown way out of proportion. My best example of actual cultural appropriation would be non-Native Americans wearing Native American war bonnets or headdresses. A war bonnet is not just a piece of traditional clothing - it's a sacred adornment that must be earned, like a medal of honor. Because of this, seeing a war bonnet worn as a fashion accessory is offensive to a lot of Native Americans (http://apihtawikosisan.com/hall-of-shame/an-open-letter-to-non-natives-in-headdresses/). It's not the same a non-native wearing Native American jewelry as a fashion accessory because jewelry is intended to be worn as a fashion accessory.

However. As with so many things, people take it too far. Now, white people twerking is cultural appropriation. Dreadlocks are cultural appropriation (never mind that many European cultures have a tradition of braiding and locking hair). A girl wearing a qipao - a Chinese dress "culturally appropriated" from the West! - is cultural appropriation. Weirdly, there's a lot of overlap between people who promote a multi-cultural society and people who take the cultural appropriation shtick too far. Cultural appropriation is the natural by-product of a multi-cultural society. It's good to be sensitive about some things, but when you have to justify eating chicken curry by first explaining your knowledge of curry and its role in Asian cultures, then it's gone too far.

DEFTLEFTHAND

megaten wrote: »

You know people move about over the course of history yeah?

Do you think Ulster Scots just flowered out of the ground or something?

The Ancient Egyptians were not sub saharan blacks.

[Deleted User]

metaoblivia wrote: »

Cultural appropriation is one of those things that exists but has been blown way out of proportion. My best example of actual cultural appropriation would be non-Native Americans wearing Native American war bonnets or headdresses. A war bonnet is not just a piece of traditional clothing - it's a sacred adornment that must be earned, like a medal of honor. Because of this, seeing a war bonnet worn as a fashion accessory is offensive to a lot of Native Americans (http://apihtawikosisan.com/hall-of-shame/an-open-letter-to-non-natives-in-headdresses/). It's not the same a non-native wearing Native American jewelry as a fashion accessory because jewelry is intended to be worn as a fashion accessory.

This is actually a fantastic example of some of the rare times the term makes sense.

Venom

BrokenArrows wrote: »

Are you serious?

Its acting. The entire point of it is to ACT ie. be somebody you are not.

The only one i slightly agree with may be the race one. However even that is not really an issue in my opinion. They are in it to make money and if hiring white Hollywood stars who give the product some publicity then so be it.

If Hollywood want to make a movie about some Japanese comic using white actors then who cares. If they want Japanese people in it then the Japanese film industry can make it.

As for hiring disabled people for disabled role... That might be an admirable ambition but if the goal is to make a good movie then you need a qualified actor and the pool of disabled actors with the same disability as required for the role would be pretty small.

The trans issue is a non starter. Does that mean if you are trans you cant play straight roles too?

I could kind of see where the upset over Johansson playing the Major in Ghost in the Shell movie was coming from but the latest outrage over the Dante “Tex” Gill role makes no sense seeing SJ would be playing a lesbian woman who dressed as a man but was refered to as a she.

Personally I think Lea DeLaria from Orange is the New Black would of fit the role better, seeing how much she looks like Gill.

Campogna

metaoblivia wrote: »

Cultural appropriation is one of those things that exists but has been blown way out of proportion. My best example of actual cultural appropriation would be non-Native Americans wearing Native American war bonnets or headdresses. A war bonnet is not just a piece of traditional clothing - it's a sacred adornment that must be earned, like a medal of honor. Because of this, seeing a war bonnet worn as a fashion accessory is offensive to a lot of Native Americans (http://apihtawikosisan.com/hall-of-shame/an-open-letter-to-non-natives-in-headdresses/). It's not the same a non-native wearing Native American jewelry as a fashion accessory because jewelry is intended to be worn as a fashion accessory.

However. As with so many things, people take it too far. Now, white people twerking is cultural appropriation. Dreadlocks are cultural appropriation (never mind that many European cultures have a tradition of braiding and locking hair). A girl wearing a qipao - a Chinese dress "culturally appropriated" from the West! - is cultural appropriation. Weirdly, there's a lot of overlap between people who promote a multi-cultural society and people who take the cultural appropriation shtick too far. Cultural appropriation is the natural by-product of a multi-cultural society. It's good to be sensitive about some things, but when you have to justify eating chicken curry by first explaining your knowledge of curry and its role in Asian cultures, then it's gone too far.

Didn't think of this even. Would there even be a solution to something like the Native American thing? It is so disrespectful for stuff like that but it won't stop an ignorant person or straight up arsehole from flaunting stuff around and usually good-intentioned people who mean to pay respect to a culture are invariably criticized anyways.

Chris_Heilong

A phrase used by people who treat other races like children that need to be protected instead of just treating everyone the same and enjoying life.

metaoblivia

Campogna wrote: »

Didn't think of this even. Would there even be a solution to something like the Native American thing? It is so disrespectful for stuff like that but it won't stop an ignorant person or straight up arsehole from flaunting stuff around and usually good-intentioned people who mean to pay respect to a culture are invariably criticized anyways.

Native Americans are powerless to do anything substantial about it. Their numbers have been depleted by millions. Many tribes don't even exist anymore and their cultures are lost. They were forced onto the worst lands in the U.S. Only two Native Americans are currently serving in Congress, both from Oklahoma (their tribes aren't native to Oklahoma, of course - they were marched there on the Trail of Tears).

All they can do is say that most of them find it offensive when non natives wear war bonnets as fashion accessories and hope that people respect that. They also encourage people who really want to learn more and admire Native American culture to buy art, jewelry and goods made by Native Americans. They definitely want to share their culture and keep it alive. They just also want a little bit of respect from our end, which, given everything they've been through as a people, I don't think is asking much.

Pat Mustard

A white man playing a black man and a man of normal intelligence playing a mentally disabled man. Shocking.

Time to stamp out this practice with appropriate fines for first offences and/or prison sentences for repeat offenders.

Something also needs to be done about Tom Cruise's fake Oirish accent in Far and Away. 'Tis xenophobia of the highest order, to be sure to be sure.

Ipso

suicide_circus wrote: »

dreadlocks were worn by people from ancient greece to the aztecs and india to west africa

Which thy appropriated from Yautja.

Irish Guitarist

Here's three Japanese women playing a cover of The Beatles version of a Chuck Berry song. Does that count as cultural appropriation?