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The biggest BYU scandal of all time (sarcasm alert)


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https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=11740 This news article is making the rounds. On a 1-10 scale, in your opinion, how offensive is the cultural appropriation or misappropriation in this post. Take heart, BYU has offered a formal apology. You can read more about this in the links below. BYU_(1).jpg

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I could not say. I am not Hispanic. Now, if were in the middle of summer and those boys were wearing straw hats and faded, ragged overalls with bare feet and faded red bandanas around their necks inviting me my my redneck, hick, farmer youth to come on down to the watermelon patch to help eat a watermelon underneath a shade tree, I would not be offended one bit, as long as I got that watermelon. 😊

Glenn

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7 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I am offended that they picked the wrong country flags for tacos. What are they teaching in BYU these days?

Obviously not geography.

(Actually I would not be surprised if the students went to one store at the last minute that was out of Mexican flags, so they grabbed what they thought was in the very general vicinity rather than taking more time to track down a store that had them...or something similar.  It wasn't that they assumed tacos came from these countries or didn't care, but flag availability and not taking enough time to figure out they should drop the idea of flags if it wasn't Mexico that determined their choice.  The idea was to create a certain atmosphere of celebration, something moveable in their advertising---they could wave them as they danced to attract attention---so they wanted flags and they settled for next best when best wasn't there like expected.  Otoh, they might have gone for color coordinating as I noticed the flags worked well with their individual attire...if that was the reason, I vote to expel them immediately).

Edited by Calm
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If someone could show me someone in Argentina or Bolivia or even Mexico complaining about this oh-so-crass example of cultural appropriation I would consider it a good idea to stop and apologize. It is generally a good idea to defer to those in the culture to decide what is an offensive and exploitative use of it.

It is more likely that the online uproar came from young caucasian Americans eager to be offended on someone else's behalf for a strong shot of self-righteous pride in their bold selfless actions typing a few words into Twitter.

And the only reason it got any media coverage is from older self-righteous caucasians wanting to self-righteously bash their oh-so-sensitive Millenial counterparts for being idiots.

45cbe779b5c75152db15e37cc629d660479a47ae

Edited by The Nehor
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2 hours ago, Calm said:

(Actually I would not be surprised if the students went to one store at the last minute that was out of Mexican flags, so they grabbed what they thought was in the very general vicinity rather than taking more time to track down a store that had them...or something similar. [...]

My assumption was that the flags were probably from their respective missions. If that's the case, then it's pretty likely that the two of them have more lived experience with Latin culture than the vast majority of people complaining about them. 

 

 

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18 hours ago, carbon dioxide said:

This "cultural appropriation or misappropriation" is garbage.  Too many people are looking to be offended.  I say do what you want. If it offends people, that is their problem.  Life is too short to please everyone and guess what? You never will please everyone so don't bother trying. Just live life and and fun.

For me, it gets offensive when people act like they are honoring a culture when they are treating it as a source of souvenirs, especially if there is little effort to learn the significance at any real depth.  If they want to display things that remind them of their experience or they think are beautiful, then why not as long as they are not sacred to a culture as long as that is how they express their engagement of it.  If someone goes into a culture and takes an idea out of it to make money off of it, that I dislike, but if it is their own culture and not sacred, it is their right imo (and here I think of my experience with Russians and many being eager to sell us old coins and ethnic clothing....though one woman refuse to serve us in a hat store; I always felt awkward about icons, especially individually made ones).

Valuable works of art that are collected that are one of a kind or quite limited are in a separate class imo because removing those for personal or museum ownership from a culture prevents the culture from enjoying/engaging with them. I don't think people not of a culture have a right to assume protector status of a culture if by doing so they are preventing individuals of that culture from interacting with that aspect of their heritage.  I get there is a certain world heritage so that outsiders might feel it necessary to step in when works are being destroyed like the Buddhas of Bamiyan (to take this to a serious level), but I have mixed feelings about that even though the destruction of such saddens me.

 Mass produced, nonreligious items being sold to tourists doesn't prevent anyone from the original culture from enriching their cultural heritage experience.

And last I checked neither flags nor tacos were sacred items (though some people feel that way so, but they should be offended by those who make those cheap tiny, tacky flags imo rather than the people who buy them) and those boys don't appear to be trying to make a statement about how much reverence they have for the Mexican culture either.

Edited by Calm
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4 hours ago, carbon dioxide said:

This "cultural appropriation or misappropriation" is garbage.  Too many people are looking to be offended.  I say do what you want. If it offends people, that is their problem.  Life is too short to please everyone and guess what? You never will please everyone so don't bother trying. Just live life and and fun.

Bring back blackface and do a satirical minstrel show. People should ironically wear temple garments over their clothing in Utah as a fun gag. Let’s do offensive caricatures of People from China. Wear a Nazi uniform and visit a Jewish synagogue. Go into a Native American religious ceremony wearing a loincloth and chant the gibberish from early westerns in a mocking fashion. It is really their problem if they get offended.

Just live life and have fun!

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Can’t wait until they offer free kielbasa, pierogis, golabkis, and bigos. Let’s see if any Poles get offended.

Edited by Bernard Gui
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Cultural appreciation is more what it is.

As for cultural appropriation, I'm half German, part French and English and smidgen of Native American.  So, I can freely have Oktoberfest, eat quiche (yuck), fish and chips, and wear a feather, and the rest of you hosers can just eat your hearts out that you can't be as cool as me!

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4 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Can’t wait until they offer free kielbasa, pierogis, golabkis, and bigos. Let’s see if any Poles get offended.

Maybe if they start waving around Russian flags as part of it....

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1 hour ago, Stargazer said:

Cultural appreciation is more what it is.

As for cultural appropriation, I'm half German, part French and English and smidgen of Native American.  So, I can freely have Oktoberfest, eat quiche (yuck), fish and chips, and wear a feather, and the rest of you hosers can just eat your hearts out that you can't be as cool as me!

It is not the food that was the problem or the article would be about a boycott of Taco Bell imo, but the caricaturing/stereotyping of the people (sombreros) and then linking the food to countries that lack any heritage with the food, acting as if there was some significant connection when there wasn't and all being done by white guys that appear to have no cultural heritage connection.  It shows a certain lack of caring while pretending to care it is important (the flags were likely meant to honor the centers of creation of the food or to at least place it in its historical context...but they instead misinformed).  

Was it significant enough to cause harm, was it meant to diminish Mexicans in some fashion, did it deprive Mexicans of their ability to effectively celebrate their culture among themselves and with others as well as teach others about it, was it more cliché than insult?

I think it was trivial enough that making it news likely has made it easier for people to dismiss serious cultural appropriation.

They were most likely Americanized tacos which are not authentic Mexican tacos (though what that is may vary from region to region), which if that is being protested more or less ignores the interaction of immigrant populations with dominant cultures to create new versions of products from both cultures.  Is it wrong for immigrants to take a staple of their new home and give it their own twist?  If not, the reverse seems appropriate as well...as neither claims to be the origin of the product, but gives credit and respect for where they got the idea.

Edited by Calm
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20 minutes ago, Calm said:

It is not the food that was the problem, but the caricaturing/stereotyping of the people (sombreros) and then linking the food to countries that lack any heritage with the food, acting as if there was some significant connection when there wasn't and all being done by white guys that appear to have no cultural heritage connection.  It shows a certain lack of caring while pretending to care it is important (the flags were likely meant to honor the centers of creation of the food or to at least place it in its historical context...but they instead misinformed).  

Was it significant enough to cause harm, was it meant to diminish Mexicans in some fashion, did it deprive Mexicans of their ability to effectively celebrate their culture among themselves and with others as well as teach others about it or was it more cliché than insult?

I think it was trivial enough that making it news likely has made it easier for people to dismiss serious cultural appropriation.

What if you found out this man has no german heritage whatsoever, but was only Irish and French.  Would you be offended?

Kurz1Lederhosen_bb319849-b0e3-4f77-9200-57c715004a31_1024x1024@2x.jpg?v=1534467526

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4 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Bring back blackface and do a satirical minstrel show. People should ironically wear temple garments over their clothing in Utah as a fun gag. Let’s do offensive caricatures of People from China. Wear a Nazi uniform and visit a Jewish synagogue. Go into a Native American religious ceremony wearing a loincloth and chant the gibberish from early westerns in a mocking fashion. It is really their problem if they get offended.

Just live life and have fun!

Wouldn't you say that those are perhaps slightly more disrespectful than offering free tacos?

=============================

You may be too young to remember the old TV comedy Hogan's Heroes.  One of my favorites growing up.  Many of the actors portraying German soldiers were Jewish.  Perhaps a form of cultural appropriation we can all get behind.  Posting this just because I thought it was worth knowing.

  • Colonel Klink, camp commander: Werner Klemperer. Born in Germany. Family emigrated to the US just as Hitler was coming to power.  "Klemperer, conscious that he would be playing the role of a German officer during the Nazi regime, agreed to the part only on the condition that Klink would be portrayed as a fool who never succeeded."
  • Sgt Schultz, bumbling, lovable sergeant of the guard: John Banner.  Born in Austria.  His immediate family emigrated to the US just after Germany took over Austria.  All of his family who stayed behind in Austria died in concentration camps. Banner on Schultz: "Schultz is not a Nazi. I see Schultz as the representative of some kind of goodness in any generation."
  • General Burkhalter, Colonel Klink's superior officer: Leon Askin.  Born in Austria.  Emigrated to the US in 1940.  
  • Major Hochstetter, SS Officer: Howard Caine.  Born in the US.

All of the above served in the US armed forces during WW2.

Besides the German characters, one of the POWs, Corporal LeBeau, a French POW, was portrayed by Robert Clary, who, interestingly enough, was a French Jew who was a holocaust survivor held at Buchenwald.

===========================

As you can see, it is ALWAYS appropriate to culturally appropriate Nazis (and I'd add Communists to this), as long as it is done to ridicule and diminish them.

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48 minutes ago, SouthernMo said:

What if you found out this man has no german heritage whatsoever, but was only Irish and French.  Would you be offended?

Have I ever said I was offended by cultural appropriation?

Recognizing something is likely cultural appropriation is not equivalent to being offended, even if the definition is limited to inappropriate or unacknowledge borrowing...in essence cultural plagiarism.

I think the only cases that have significantly troubled me are when treasures have been looted and others claim ownership of what should belong to the original community, but that may be stealing heritage as opposed to appropriation which is more about custom and practices than artifacts...but artifacts can be intimately tied to customs, so the line may be confused.

Taking specific ideas from a culture and making a buck off of it, especially if value is presented as due to belonging to that culture can be disrespectful, but that can be disrespectful when done by a member of the community at times...but for example I wouldn't condemn someone from the West who studied Chinese acupuncture because they saw value in it and then came back and practiced it here and advertised as a student of authentic Chinese acupuncture as long as respect was shown to the original culture and its contributions weren't trivialized when adaptations were made to help it fit into its new setting.  Learning and sharing public knowledge and experiences is how we create a greater community, if done with respect and an effort to understand, then I think that is a reason to be proud, not offended.  Now if private practices were appropriated without consent and then put on display...I would have a problem with that.

Edited by Calm
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2 hours ago, Calm said:

It is not the food that was the problem or the article would be about a boycott of Taco Bell imo,

Yeah, I guess so, but I've seen videos showing Italians eating at Olive Garden getting upset that the food there is called Italian, which according to these folks, it is a horrible misnomer.  And chop suey isn't Chinese, apparently, nor are fortune cookies.  It seems to a problem to some people, at least.  See my post below this one, where I mention Jamie Oliver getting into hot water over his rice. Pun intended.

Quote

but the caricaturing/stereotyping of the people (sombreros) and then linking the food to countries that lack any heritage with the food, acting as if there was some significant connection when there wasn't and all being done by white guys

What if it were being done by asian guys?  Would that be just as bad?  Note that all the anger at cultural appropriation seems to be directed at white people, but if a Japanese person were to open a Mexican restaurant in Mumbai, India, would that be too much?  Kind of joking here...

Quote

that appear to have no cultural heritage connection.  It shows a certain lack of caring while pretending to care it is important (the flags were likely meant to honor the centers of creation of the food or to at least place it in its historical context...but they instead misinformed).  

Was it significant enough to cause harm, was it meant to diminish Mexicans in some fashion, did it deprive Mexicans of their ability to effectively celebrate their culture among themselves and with others as well as teach others about it, was it more cliché than insult?

I think it was trivial enough that making it news likely has made it easier for people to dismiss serious cultural appropriation.

US culture (or for that matter the UK) is such a cultural mishmash that nobody can do anything that doesn't appropriate some culture or other.  My wife, who is British, likes German culture a lot, and owns a number of traditional Bavarian/Austrian Dirndl dresses.  

phyllis-dirndl_bgr-thumnail.jpg

She wore one to church last Sunday.  Another sister, who is actually German, coincidentally was wearing a dirndl as well.  Going by the cultural insanity about cultural appropriation now happening in the US, this German sister should have been outraged, or at least "triggered" by my wife's cultural appropriation.  How dare she wear German cultural clothing!!  But no, she was delighted.  I gather it is something along the lines of imitation is the sincerest form of something or other.

Edited by Stargazer
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There was a video a while back that showed a black woman at some university (in San Francisco) getting all worked up about a white guy wearing his hair in dreadlocks, basically assaulting him over it.  The video went viral about 2 1/2 years ago.  Except that it turns out that dreadlocks are not exclusively black african.  She just assumed they are.  Ironically, this woman is clearly wearing western style clothing.  And by "western" I mean European, and she is clearly not European.  Why is she not dressed in some african-origin clothing?  Dare I wear a dashiki or a guayabera shirt, when I'm neither black nor hispanic?  How much more insane are we going to get?  

I can see how it would be offensive for someone not connected to the culture to mock it.  But the cultural appropriation insanity going on today seems to deny anyone the right to wear clothing, cook food, play music or play games that don't belong to their own culture.  So now we get outrage over:

  • a "cis" female actor (Scarlett Johanson) playing a transgender man in a film.  Hollywood apparently is supposed to find a woman who has transitioned to a man in order to play this person.  Johannson also got in hot water over playing a canonically Japanese cyborg in "Ghost in the Shell"
  • famous British chef Jamie Oliver introducing "jerk rice" in his line of various flavored rice dishes.  It's apparently offensive to Jamaican people: “Jerk originated from Jamaica and they would be offended by this”.  Presumably because he's white or not Jamaican?   Or is it offensive because it doesn't contain scotch bonnet peppers and allspice?  <--- I am dead serious about this -- it isn't merely "inaccurate", it is "offensive"!
  • Elizabeth Taylor playing Cleopatra in the 1963 film. Yes, folks, a white woman shamefully culturally appropriated the Egyptian queen.  "Elizabeth Taylor, a white woman, assumed the role of Cleopatra VII, the Queen of Egypt. The film is full of the glitz and glam stereotypical of 1960s films, but Elizabeth Taylor’s portrayal of Cleopatra is deeply problematic."  Except that Cleopatra was actually white, specifically Greek. 
  • Coldplay doing a music video for the song "Hymn for the Weekend" because it contains footage shot in India --- apparently this is cultural appropriation because the members of Coldplay are not Indian, yet here they're apparently mocking Bollywood films?  Go ahead, maybe you can find the deep disrespect apparently found in the music video: Coldplay - Hymn for the Weekend.

How much more insane are we going to get?  How dare Japanese musicians appropriate European culture -- shamelessly (and beautifully) performing Beethoven's 9th Symphony??

Edited by Stargazer
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