Cultural appropriation is nonsense

One of the greatest pieces of nonsense to come out of the loony left recently has been the idea of 'cultural appropriation'.
what utter utter nonsense this is. Anyone want to defend this hokey?

 

Well the most obvious example being how whites are depicted as the saviours and creators of civilization (israelites/aegyptians) when we all know that it was blacks.

 

Nothing more American than pizza! Except it's a Napolitan flatbread with a few vegetables on top, born of poverty. (They may have aquired it from the Greeks, who had a similar food, and occupied Napoli for some time.)

 

Pizza is a good example. Ever had Pizza in Italy? It's crap. America took the basic idea and BAM! It got juiced up and made a great meal The US has done that to a lot of different types of foods; take the basic idea and add a lot more flavor.

 

A better example is Budweiser. The original European Budweiser is nectar. Adulterated and Americanised, sold in Europe as Bud, to prevent fraud and protect the Czech brand in case of fraud, its gnats (*)(*)(*)(*).

 

I've been brewing beer for over 30 years. I'm always been a beer snob. That being said, I've been to a Budweiser brewery and had it fresh on tap. It's a decent beer that way. Mass produced and modified to suit the taste buds of boobus, it's gnats ****. Then again, I've had European beer that is no better than (*)(*)(*)(*), so complaining about "Americanization" of one particular style is just unearned pretention.

 

Well I would agree with you about the beer. I've had Czech Budvar while in Europe and it's a delight compared to American Budweiser, but that's not what we're talking about. That's a name copywrite issue. No one ever claimed that Budweiser is in any way related to, or copied from the Czech beer. So that really has nothing to do with the topic.

Something tells me a Pizza Hut fan got owned!

 

I won't defend the concept of cultural appropriation. That is a non-issue to me. For instance I don't care if a White woman wears corn rows or a White musician becomes a rapper or R&B singer.

But some people are claiming that minorities getting acting roles for traditionally White characters is also a form of cultural appropriation. The latest controversy I heard of involved negative reaction of comic book fans to the actress Zendaya allegedly getting the role of Mary Jane Watson in the new Spider-Man movie. Mary Jane Watson is portrayed in the comics and most media as a light-skinned (White) red-head. Zendaya is biracial (Black-White). How do you feel about stuff like that Sab?

 

Peroni!

 

I do think people can consume or use aspects of a culture without necessarily respecting or even acknowledging the culture who produced it. Most if not all rock music evolved from African-American (and by proxy West African) musical traditions, yet that hasn't stopped white supremacists from co-opting it and making racist rock a thing. And you got to admit that is hypocritical and ungrateful regardless of who does it. I don't know if that covers the entire umbrella of cultural appropriation, but it seems to lie at the core of many appropriation charges.

 

I couldn't agree more.

The anger we see about ‘cultural appropriation’ is ridiculous. People have built upon the ideas of others forever. That’s how things progress. But there are a lot of ingnorant young people who think anything they, or their people, do is somehow sacred, and should not be touched. Maybe these people are so sensitive because thay have accomplished so very little, historically. Sadly, many of these kids are in college. Good luck educating these folks.

Huffington Post often has posts about this stupid stuff. It’s getting harder and harder to read that site because of all their bullcrap.

 

There's an Italian club that I go to which serves Bud and Peroni. I usually go for the P. They do have the dark version, as well.

And, I've had much worse in Europe, especially in Eastern Europe. My girlfriend's father lived on a tiny farm in Transylvania. His favorite drink was some local brew in which he'd mix copious sugar. It was made by Ursus, I think, which, coincidentally, produces Peroni for the Romanian market.

 

I "drank" Peroni back in the 70's. You would get a six of bottles and the color would range from light green to brownish in the individual bottles.

I can't speak to Peroni today but back in 1977 it was just awful.

 

Is this an attack or a defence of it? Pizza in the US was introduced by Italian-Americans.

 

I don;t think what you described in the second paragraph is cultural appropriation . I think it is absurd to change characters to pander to political correct demands. I mean when you look at the fury when Nina Simone was cast it really is just pathetic.

However cultural mixing is great. Indeed the most interesting developments in music happen at the intersections of culture..All popular music of today is based on cultures mixing.

 

Rock music evolved from a MIX of African, Cuban and Scots-Irish Music . I cant think of a single white supremacist rock band . I'm sure some exist but they are unknown to most people. On the other hand rap artists are often racist (*)(*)(*)(*)s yet rap owes a great deal to the call and response of baptist ministers reading from the Iambic Pentameter of Shakespeare contained in the King James Bible.

Which is why you can rap Shakespeare

 

I don't see any pandering to politically correct demands. This word politically correct gets thrown around by conservatives too often. How in the world is making a historically White character Black politically correct? These producers are changing the race of characters at their own discretion. There is no petition to do it, they just do what they want. In the case of comic book characters I think they should stay as true to the source material as possible especially when what is written and portrayed in the comic works. If there are changes they should make sense. In the case of changing a character's race I don't see a reason to do it. But on the other hand if the race of the character is not important to the story then what is the problem? If a producer sees a talented actor say Samuel L Jackson and they think they are good for a part like Nick Fury then isn't the talent of the actor more important than the race? Fury was originally White in the comic books but so what? There is nothing wrong with him being re-imagined as Black. I don't consider it cultural appropriation either because race is not a culture.

Now if Black comic book characters like Blade or Spawn were re-imagined as White I could see complaints only because Blacks are a minority in America and there are plenty of White characters out there.

I don't have a problem with changing the race of a character when race is not important but it would be more progressive and logical to just come up with characters who are minorities instead of changing the race of established characters.

 

I loved the Wizard of OZ but I also love the Wiz with Queen Latifa as the wizard.

 

Rule 11 thread closure

Shangrila
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