"Cultural Appropriation"

[The Grand Nudger]

I presume you are talking about Rachel Dolezal. I don’t know all the specifics other than the headlines. It appears she was presenting herself as something she wasn’t in other to attain something she could not otherwise get from a group of people for whom certain criteria were important. It seems to me that Ms. Dolezal engaged in a kind of fraud but that is between her and the people she was apparently trying to fool.

Sure, but it's pretty much a textbook example of cultural appropriation played out - uncommonly, as an individual act.  If a person understood -this- sort of thing to be cultural appropriation, both the problem and the offense become fairly apparent...wouldn't you agree?  

Now you seem to be hung-up on the notion that appropriation is different from exchange. What you’re doing is using those words in an economic sense and sneaking in the idea that people and groups can have ownership rights to cultural products. How exactly does that work? What is the mechanism of exchange? From whom does the purchaser buy the rights or gain permission to use a cultural product. In most nations, there are legal mechanisms to grant ownership rights to a limited range of cultural products through copyrights, trademarks, and patents.

I'd hardly say that I'm hung up on anything..no ones appropriating my shit.  I'm not sneaking anything in.  Explicit in the idea of cultural appropriation is some sense of ownership over one's own culture, at least in some scenarios.  As I already said..if a person doesn't see that or agree with that or find it compelling in a given situation...then they won't see a problem even when they see cultural appropriation......?

So what is your opinion about the Portland ladies that were shamed into closing their taco stand? It seems to me that two enterprising and resourceful ladies in Portland managed to replicate the traditional recipe for tortillas by asking questions and careful observation, even if it did involve snooping around. So what were they supposed to do? Pay royalties? To whom? And with whom could they have negotiated?

Not aware of the specifics, but off the cuff I'd probably think it was nonsense.  OFC, I'm not one of your "sjws"...so....?

Now what is sometimes is objectionable is trivializing, disrespecting, or desacralizing symbols that are important to others. With respect to dream catchers, I went on made-in-china.com and saw that one could buy all kinds of dream catcher merchandise. Dream catcher ear rings for $0.80 each with a minimum 1000 piece order. Dream catcher temporary tattoos for $.10 each with a minimum 3,000 piece order. And my personal favorite for this discussion…a yoga matt with a dream catcher image printed on it ($9.89 each for a minimum 50 piece order)…a Chinese product for practicing Hindu rituals decorated with a Native American symbol! Do these trivialize the ceremonial aspect of dream catchers? Yes. (btw I don’t think uber-liberal Minimalist worries too much about the meaning his avatar had to ancient Egyptians.)

Hmn, trivializing a sacred object is a real problem, but stealing and exploiting sacred objects of other cultures...the very essence of cultural appropriation......isn't?  Something seems amiss.

But just as often people trivialize their own culture. When I was at the Vatican, there were venders selling everything from jigsaw puzzles of the Sistine Chapel, to plastic Rosary beads, to beer bottle openers with cameos of Pope Francis. That’s not an act of oppression; it’s just the very human tendency to make vulgar and trivialize things that should be authentic and sacrosanct.

-which isn't what cultural appropriation is, so I don't know why we're going on about it at length..but hey...continue......

That is the nature of symbols, their meanings shift under different circumstances. The economic model doesn’t apply. Use and context are what matter. Marcel Duchamp puts a urinal in a gallery and elevates it to an artistic statement. Serrano photographs a crucifix submerged in a yellow fluid and titles it “Piss Christ”. Is it offense? Yes. Does it trivialize and disrespect a traditional Christian symbol? That’s one way of looking at it. Would its significance been different if the title was “Pineapple Juice Christ”? Absolutely.  

In a free society, people are free to be as annoying or disrespectful or inconsiderate as they want to be. The problem is when some people arrogate to themselves to be the sole arbitors of what symbols can and cannot mean, how they can be used and who can use them and then use threats of violence and force of law to impose their interpretation onto everyone else.

Are you finished?