Native Americans sic Wendigo on JK Rowling for "cultural appropriation"

[bigfield]

The value of any act lies in the positive effects it has for the actor. Why would you imagine that value to be less because people value other things more? For example, I value my life more than drawing Mohammed and putting my name to the drawing publically. Are you suggesting that if I can be cowed (by credible threats of violence) out of drawing Mohammed that means it's wrong to draw Mohammed?

I was specifically referring to the value of the actor as a contributor to a society's culture.

An actor who is easily cowed offers little value to society; if an museum bows too readily to the demands of complainants then the director ought to be fired and replaced with someone with more backbone, lest the museum become irrelevant.

Similarly, if an author were to change their work to please anyone with a poorly-argued complaint about that, then their value as a writer and the value of their work would be greatly diminished. Who would give a damn about Rowling if she revised the Harry Potter series to please fundamentalist Christians?

If it takes credible death threats to stop you from publishing a work, you are hardly comparable to actors who are cowed by far, far lesser dangers.

CA mythicists are bullies. It's true that each person has to decide for herself whether doing something is worth the bullying. But the problem is the bullies, not the marginal value of whatever they're bullying you over.

You've previously called me a bully based on nothing but extremely mild words on a forum; you use the term too readily.

In terms of marginal value, my opinion is that some institutions such as the museum are doing a poor job of judging the marginal value of their choices. They overestimate the costs of their actions, and underestimate the value of showing the proverbial finger to obnoxious, incoherent protesters.

 

[laughing dog]

Yes it's relevant. People can be made to feel guilty about indulging in things that there's no reason for them to feel guilty over. Every time a CA mythicist manages this, they've made the world a worse place.

Once again, your indignation blinded you to the point. Taking a selfie while playing dress up is innocuous as is one's other options - masturbation by children is not innocuous because it is learning about one's body and how it works (something important) and there are not many options in that regard.

Better options can be exercised without taking away existing options.

Again, irrelevant to my point. Sometimes taking away an option spurs creativity instead of inhibiting it.

And in any case, that did not happen. The museum did not 'replace' the selfie sessions. It just took them away.

The museum did not take away any selfie options. It took away the selfie of a stupid dress up option.

Tone policing me won't make a difference to whether I can persuade somebody that braiding your hair is not a shameful thing to do.

You are wrong. People dismiss hissyfits.

No, the same can't be said. The CA mythicists want to stop people from engaging in activities that harm nobody. I want the CA mythicists to stop pestering people for engaging in harmless activities.

Outside of your hysterics, these people cause no real harm, other than in your imagination.

I'm trying to stop something harmful. The CA mythicists are not.

Wrong on both counts.

 

[Metaphor]

Taking a selfie while playing dress up is innocuous as is one's other options - masturbation by children is not innocuous because it is learning about one's body and how it works (something important) and there are not many options in that regard.

Innocuous as in causing no harm.

Sometimes taking away an option spurs creativity instead of inhibiting it.

There's no 'creativity' involved. Museum punters weren't asked to come up with 'creative' ways to interact with the piece, they were given the option to play dress up and pose with the piece. That option was taken away.

Of course, they already had the option not to do that if they didn't want to.

The museum did not take away any selfie options. It took away the selfie of a stupid dress up option.

C'mon laughing dog. Are we now going to quibble over how to describe the option that the museum took away? We both know what the context was and we both know exactly what I meant.

And by the way, the fact that you think the option is stupid is not relevant. It's innocuous. If people want to engage in it, is that any skin off your nose? And if people want to engage in it and are now no longer able to, basic psychology and behavioural economics tells us that will be a net negative.

Wrong on both counts.

We're clearly at an impasse.

Hurt feelings alone do not count as the kind of harm that justifies asking people to stop engaging in the behaviour that caused the hurt feelings, and they never have been.

 

[laughing dog]

There's no 'creativity' involved. Museum punters weren't asked to come up with 'creative' ways to interact with the piece, they were given the option to play dress up and pose with the piece. That option was taken away.

No one needs to be asked to do something creative or to react to art. If you want to claim anyone to take the claim that losing the chance to play dressup and take a selfie is real harm, then you need to admit that your notion of "harm" is encompassing as to be virtually meaningless.

C'mon laughing dog. Are we now going to quibble over how to describe the option that the museum took away? We both know what the context was and we both know exactly what I meant.

So?

And by the way, the fact that you think the option is stupid is not relevant. It's innocuous. If people want to engage in it, is that any skin off your nose?

No, just like if people wish to complain and agitate about CA, there is no skin off your nose. Your double standard is glaring to a number of people in this thread.

And if people want to engage in it and are now no longer able to, basic psychology and behavioural economics tells us that will be a net negative.

I'd wish you'd stop with the behavior economics stuff, because it does not tell us squat about this.

We're clearly at an impasse.

Hurt feelings alone do not count as the kind of harm that justifies asking people to stop engaging in the behaviour that caused the hurt feelings, and they never have been.

Then you need to heed your own advice and stop these hissy fits over cultural appropriation.

 

[Metaphor]

No one needs to be asked to do something creative or to react to art. If you want to claim anyone to take the claim that losing the chance to play dressup and take a selfie is real harm, then you need to admit that your notion of "harm" is encompassing as to be virtually meaningless.

I don't need to admit any such thing, laughing dog. I'm not in the habit of proclaiming falsehoods to be the truth.

No, just like if people wish to complain and agitate about CA, there is no skin off your nose. Your double standard is glaring to a number of people in this thread.

It isn't a double standard for the reasons I've already mentioned and I'm not getting into again.

I'd wish you'd stop with the behavior economics stuff, because it does not tell us squat about this.

If you're willing to contend that people are better off by having options taken away, that's your call. I think it's a stupid call to make but I'm not the one making it.

Then you need to heed your own advice and stop these hissy fits over cultural appropriation.

They're not 'hissy fits'. They are threads that mock the cultural appropriation mythicists.

And the more pushback and bad arguments I get in reflexive defence of the mythicists, the more it seems the threads are a good idea.

 

[laughing dog]

I don't need to admit any such thing, laughing dog.

True, there is no compulsion, but intellectual integrity will compromised.

I'm not in the habit of proclaiming falsehoods to be the truth.

As has been demonstrated many times in this thread, you are in such a habit.

It isn't a double standard for the reasons I've already mentioned and I'm not getting into again.

Here is another example of your habit of professing falsehoods as truth.

If you're willing to contend that people are better off by having options taken away, that's your call. I think it's a stupid call to make but I'm not the one making it.

Taking options away may or may not make someone better off. It is stupid to unilaterally claim that is makes someone worse off. And is simply wrong to claim that psychology and/or behavioral economics indicates it necessarily makes someone worse off.

They're not 'hissy fits'. They are threads that mock the cultural appropriation mythicists.

They come off as hissy fits.

And the more pushback and bad arguments I get in reflexive defence of the mythicists, the more it seems the threads are a good idea.

If you wish to look like a YEC pitching a hissy fit, that is your call.

 

[Metaphor]

Taking options away may or may not make someone better off. It is stupid to unilaterally claim that is makes someone worse off. And is simply wrong to claim that psychology and/or behavioral economics indicates it necessarily makes someone worse off.

Taking options away makes people worse off on average. I can scarcely believe you can even countenance denying it.

If you wish to look like a YEC pitching a hissy fit, that is your call.

I find it very sad laughing dog, that you agree with me that white women braiding their hair have done nothing wrong, that Rowling has done nothing wrong in re-imagining skin-walkers, and yet you feel the need to oppose every thing I say about cultural appropriation. I find it sad that you equate complaining about the incessant buzzing of street corner preachers with the false gospels that the street corner preachers peddle. I find it sad that you don't care whether innocuous options are taken away from people, or worse, imagine that it's a break even situation and that people won't be worse off on average.

I can take some comfort, I think, in that the odious, entitled ideas of the CA mythicists appear to have strong traction only in the inwards-looking echo chambers on college campuses.

 

[laughing dog]

Taking options away makes people worse off on average.

We are not talking about "on average".

I can scarcely believe you can even countenance denying it.

I can believe you will say just about anything while in the throws of a hissy fit.

If you wish to look like a YEC pitching a hissy fit, that is your call.

I find it very sad laughing dog, that you agree with me that white women braiding their hair have done nothing wrong, that Rowling has done nothing wrong in re-imagining skin-walkers, and yet you feel the need to oppose every thing I say about cultural appropriation. I find it sad that you equate complaining about the incessant buzzing of street corner preachers with the false gospels that the street corner preachers peddle. I find it sad that you don't care whether innocuous options are taken away from people, or worse, imagine that it's a break even situation and that people won't be worse off on average.

That's okay. I find your sanctimonious hissy fit sad. I find pitiable your dismissal of real people's feelings of loss that you are unable to understand while bitching about the loss of the possibility of a dress up selfie.

 

[Potoooooooo]

from a Native American Newspaper

 

[Tom Sawyer]

That would be kind of a cool story.

 

[Metaphor]

This is the exact kind of cartoon I would make to dismiss the concerns of the cultural appropriation mythicists.

 

[Eldarion Lathria]

Keene has culturally appropriated a European name, culturally appropriated a European language, culturally appropriates European clothing (We're CULTURES, not COSTUMES,), culturally appropriates European technology, and whines about cultural appropriation.

Cultural appropriation is a bullshit stick used by POC bullies to beat up on white liberals and white liberals to beat up on themselves.

Why is Korean Hip-hop not cultural appropriation.

Eldarion Lathria

 

[Bomb#20]

What if the shoe was on the other foot? Golly, that would be like...

Western civilization would never stand for such a thing.

 

[Deepak]

His full filmography is here. He's almost had as many on screen appearances as Amrish Puri

 

[Potoooooooo]

That would be kind of a cool story.

Probably go a bit like this