Now replace "wear the dress" with abortion, and I wonder you come out on her choice? Is that the moment that your cup runneth over with offense?
The girl did nothing wrong, if she wants to wear the dress then its her choice. Screw the liberals who think they can tell her what to wear. All these people offended really need to find something more productive to do in life. This cultural appropriation is just nonsense.
This has less to do with cultural appropriation and more to do with ABCs feeling disconnected from their roots. There is a lot of pent up resentment from the effects of racism and any display of Asian culture gets amplified x1000 when it is done in a not perfect way (which means only done by an Asian).
IMO it is a bit disingenuous for ABCs to claim it is wrong for a non-Chinese to wear a qipao in an appropriate way when the Chinese people say it is OK.
I tend to think American-hyphenated identities are ethnicities all of their own. I've sometimes heard actual Irish and Scottish people express a measure of bafflement at the attitudes or ideas of their hyphenated-American distant relatives. Likewise I don't think one would expect Asian-Americans to see things the same way as actual Chinese or other Asian nationals. So I don't think it's quite fair to say Chinese Americans shouldn't feel a certain way because Chinese Chinese don't feel that way. Those are two very different groups with very different circumstances and histories.
Jeremy Ram?Jeremy Lam doesn't get to cry cultural appropriation til he changes his name to a Chinese one.
Now replace "wear the dress" with abortion, and I wonder you come out on her choice? Is that the moment that your cup runneth over with offense?
I tend to think American-hyphenated identities are ethnicities all of their own. I've sometimes heard actual Irish and Scottish people express a measure of bafflement at the attitudes or ideas of their hyphenated-American distant relatives. Likewise I don't think one would expect Asian-Americans to see things the same way as actual Chinese or other Asian nationals. So I don't think it's quite fair to say Chinese Americans shouldn't feel a certain way because Chinese Chinese don't feel that way. Those are two very different groups with very different circumstances and histories.
That's the question. I'm of Irish descent. My ancestors left that blessed land five generations ago. I can't claim to be of Irish culture nor speak for Irish culture.I don't expect them to have identical views, but core ideas should be similar such as what things are important/sacred in the culture, otherwise how can you even claim it as your culture?
Now replace "wear the dress" with abortion, and I wonder you come out on her choice? Is that the moment that your cup runneth over with offense?
You're seriously comparing a dress to abortion? Those are totally different issues. There is NOTHING wrong with her wearing the dress, obviously you would prefer a burka.
Cultural appropriation is a thing, and it is something we should be mindful of. Cultural appropriation is what happens when we take something important to a culture and make it into something stereotyping or demeaning of that culture in order to symbolizes the entire culture. Aunt Jemima is cultural appropriation. But there is a difference between cultural appropriation and cultural assimilation. This girl wore a 'Chinese' dress because she liked it, liked the way it looked on her, and wanted to look pretty for her prom. The 'Chineseness' of the dress was at best an after thought, because it has been almost completely assimilated into our culture.
So who's culture was being appropriated? The Chinese Chinese? The American Chinese?I tend to think American-hyphenated identities are ethnicities all of their own. I've sometimes heard actual Irish and Scottish people express a measure of bafflement at the attitudes or ideas of their hyphenated-American distant relatives. Likewise I don't think one would expect Asian-Americans to see things the same way as actual Chinese or other Asian nationals. So I don't think it's quite fair to say Chinese Americans shouldn't feel a certain way because Chinese Chinese don't feel that way. Those are two very different groups with very different circumstances and histories.
So who's culture was being appropriated? The Chinese Chinese? The American Chinese?
So basically, if anyone takes offense, then it is off limits? Can I start protesting the Vietnamese Baptist Church down the street?Well, it's important to both of them, but I don't think its about some sort of objective; verifiable fact of ownership as being about how people _feel_ about something, due to their particular experiences. I guess the thing is that (some) Chinese-Americans have a different relationship to that culture than do the Chinese in China. It has a different significance for the first of those than the second.
I mean, Lord knows, the racial politics around Asian people (meaning, East Asians) in the US is something I find difficult to figure out, because (it seems to me) it's pretty specific to the US experience. Never really thought about it till briefly lived in the US. Racism against black people seems to happen, and have somewhat similar expressions and origins, in many different countries, but there seems to be something very context-specific about the sort of complaints behind this row. Any tensions between white people in Europe and Chinese are likely to be quite different in origin and are going to come out differently over different issues.
Would this be a big deal if social media didn't exist?..Back in the 80's, this girl could have worn this dress to the prom without a second notice.
I mean, the problem stemmed from her posting pics on social media, ssssooooo......Would this be a big deal if social media didn't exist?..Back in the 80's, this girl could have worn this dress to the prom without a second notice.