Gawdammit. I can't sleep. Two days into a hiatus and now I have to break it to get this nonsense out of my head.
JB wrote a post about Appropriation on the 3rd; and Ozymandias wrote another yesterday ... and in his he quoted this benchmark on the subject by Lindsay Ellis. Whereas I can't sleep because people are wrong on the internet.
Look, I get it. Cultural appropriation is a relatively new bugaboo and people are scrambling around trying to define it according to what the appropriator of some other culture is doing ~ and this is particularly fed by anger surrounding sport teams like the Indians and the Redskins. But ... this is a complete misreading of the social phenomenon, sorry.
Let me redefine the term for you, as a departure from definitions you're likely to hear. Cultural appropriation happens when the people of that culture appropriate their OWN culture, draw a line around it, then argue politically that because its OURS, no one else is entitled to any part of it, nyeh!
For example, when white people decide that only white people are entitled to protection from the law, or the right to vote, or the freedom to live in what neighborhood they wish, or the right to bear arms, or any other right that white people casually decide that African, Oriental, Muslim, Hispanic or whatever people you choose to name are not entitled to that specific benefit. Like when a Norwegian can arrive in America and expect to stay with their family in a hotel, while a Mexican is separated from their children and all other privileges of being treated as a human.
It is the white people appropriating whiteness, and calling that right of appropriation a matter of "cultural integrity" or "purity" or whatever other bullshit we care to name, as a justification for selfish, brutal, racist or otherwise crap behaviour.
And this is no different when a Native Canadian tells me I can't write a fiction novel with a Native Canadian in it, because I'm not Native Canadian, or when I'm told I can't possibly understand what it means to be a mother because I'm not a woman, or when a transsexual tells me I can't understand what it mean to be non-binary because I am, in fact, binary. The appropriation is by the culture weaponizing that culture as a means to silence free speech and free access to the total human experience.
Every other argument is an extension of that weaponization, that pretends to decide that there is a "line" between neutral something and offensive something. The line is obvious: you step over it when it's my motivation to control you ... and if no motivation to control you exists, then you're free to do as you like.
At least, until someone figures out a way to weaponize something you've been doing for decades, but is now suddenly offensive and unacceptable.
I am the first to argue, do no harm. Blackface is mockery, pure and simple, and anything that is mockery or much like it is harm, and I'm opposed to that. My writing a positive non-white character, or a woman for that matter, into a story as a protagonist is not mockery and I won't be held accountable for it.
And I am the first to argue that another person's notion of behaviour is deserving of respect, as long as it does no harm. I won't defend the ritual mutilation of children supported by religion nor the abuse of animals ~ I don't give a shit how old the religion is or how deep the bias is.
Above all, I will not be silenced or coerced into silence by the guilt of someone weaponizing their culture as a means to stop me from enjoying the benefits of their culture.
That's a line I won't accept.
P.S.,
Sorry for this. The post was writing itself again and again in my head, not letting me sleep, when I should at least have been trying to figure out the expositional patterns of chapter 26. Hopefully, I can reobtain my focus on things that actually matter.
In the 8 years I have been reading this blog, this must be the first time I wholeheartedly agree with everything you just wrote AND the way you wrote it. Please don't do that too often, I need my opinions to be challenged ;)
ReplyDeleteNow please get back to writing !
I will ... I am ... but I need to bury this subject first.
ReplyDeleteHere's the thing:
If we can pretend I'm a minority culture for the moment, to make the point ... take notes, now. In order for me to have a say-so in how my culture is approached by other people, I have to get them to buy into the argument that I have some privilege over that culture that they don't have.
That privilege is power; it's the power to dictate over other persons this small part of the human experience, that my culture lays claim to by virtue of having devised its sentiments and rituals separately from others.
But how do I acquire this privilege? I'm born to it. It is bequeathed unto me by birth. I didn't make the culture, I was invested into it as a child and that's my claim to the power it gives me over other persons.
So it is hereditary power. Power derived from birth.
Excuse me, but we ousted that sort of power quite some time ago. We discarded Divine Right as a method of determining power when we granted EQUALITY to everyone. No one is divine. No one has a right to power they've been born to. The whole fabric of this argument of appropriation is based upon a defunct principle that this democracy is founded upon abolishing.
People will argue that they have a right to own their culture, that their culture gives them power and that challenging their culture robs them of their power. But that is the exact POINT. Democracy is not founded on HAVING power, but SHARING power. Those who argue their power depends upon their control of it are demogogues, whatever their feelings or their motivations. They're absent the sentiment of generosity of that culture, to the benefit of every human being who has a right to the benefits of ALL the work that ALL human beings have contributed to the grand experiment.
This (especially your comment) are good ways of putting it.
ReplyDeleteThe cultural appropriation movement has always felt xenophobic. It seems like an attempt to ignore how cultures evolve, and pretend that culture is a static thing, easily defined and protected.
Your comment's point that it is about power has been the missing link, for me.