White people need to stop saying 'namaste'.

[Toni]

I do understand it. I don't ridicule my relatives who object to gay marriage.

It's them doing the ridiculing. Of gay people. Who want to "appropriate their culture."

Sorry, but I don't think you have met my relatives. They don't ridicule gay people. Mostly, they try to pretend they don't exist or are some Democrat conspiracy or are just confused and need to be prayed over. They (or some of them) are outraged at the idea of gay people enjoying the God given sanctity of marriage because they believe it is against God's word and the Bible. They believe that marriage is between one man and one woman, no many how many times you must get divorced to achieve that. And if gay people can get married, then why can't Uncle Harold marry his dog? Because that's the same thing.

This is not the same thing as ridiculing gay people. It may be ridiculous but it is not the same thing as ridiculing gay people.

Sorry. Saying "namaste" without complete authenticity is NOT ridicule.

Not something I claimed.

 

[Metaphor]

I'd take it much more personally if I didn't watch you do it to the article quoted in the OP, as well as other articles you've posted in the past.

You are obsessed with the idea of 'authenticity', even when something has never proclaimed itself to be 'authentic', even though the idea of 'authenticity' is practically meaningless.

So, go ahead and do your 'authentic' yoga and be smug in the knowledge that other people are 'doing it wrong'.

(That is, if your white guilt will allow you to do yoga).

Which people? You seem to object vehemently to the author wanting yoga to be something different than what it is in the class she attended.

Um, no. I object to her wanting all yoga classes in Australia to be 'authentic' because otherwise the widdle baby would feel 'marginalised' and 'othered'.

Because if this woman were attending an 'authentic' yoga class, she'd still feel bothered that other non-brown people are doing something that they call 'yoga' differently in their own time and own space, and her widdle baby fee-fees are hurt because she's a whiny entitled brat.

You are incredibly naive.

And you're incredibly condescending. Next.

Neither do you.

I know my own fucking mind better than you know my mind, Toni.

It was never in question. Not by me and not by the author. Unlike you, I believe the author is just as entitled to express her opinions and her thoughts. I think she did a better job backing hers up than you did yours, but that is my right as well.

Excuse me, where do you get the idea I think she's not entitled to express her thoughts?

Please note: she is not calling people who practice yoga as it is done in classes in Australia wrong or stupid nor is she saying that people aren't allowed to do what they like. She is simply expressing how disconcerting it is to walk into a class that is so vastly different than the yoga she grew up with. She went into the class hoping to connect with part of her culture. She found something else entirely.

Well walking into an Australian yoga class expecting to find her version of 'authentic' yoga means not only is she a whiny brat, she's an idiot, too.

What side is that? That she's entitled to her own perceptions? I am always on the side of a person being entitled to his or her own perceptions.

Whoever said people weren't entitled to their own perceptions

Oh, just for fun: Did you know that there is a chain (of course it is a chain. This is America dammit) of restaurants that are supposedly Australian-themed?

I didn't know.

 

[Metaphor]

We've been through this, laughing dog. I don't go into threads you've started and call your concerns and priorities ridiculous.

If you don't want people to comment on your concerns and priorities, then don't post them. Otherwise, that will happen. And when the concerns are ridiculous, people will tend to point that out.

Very well. You and Athena can come into each of my threads, ask if this is the hill I want to die on, contribute nothing, and then leave.

I'm sure we'll all be the richer for the experience.

 

[Toni]

You are obsessed with the idea of 'authenticity', even when something has never proclaimed itself to be 'authentic', even though the idea of 'authenticity' is practically meaningless.

To paraphrase your own words:
I know my own fucking mind better than you know my mind, Metaphor. It is rude and arrogant that you continually tell me what I think or feel. You don't like it when you think does it to you so lay off it your own self.

Which people? You seem to object vehemently to the author wanting yoga to be something different than what it is in the class she attended.

Um, no. I object to her wanting all yoga classes in Australia to be 'authentic' because otherwise the widdle baby would feel 'marginalised' and 'othered'.

Really? Where did she say that she wanted "all yoga classes in Australia to be 'authentic'?"

Because if this woman were attending an 'authentic' yoga class, she'd still feel bothered that other non-brown people are doing something that they call 'yoga' differently in their own time and own space, and her widdle baby fee-fees are hurt because she's a whiny entitled brat.

Followed by

And you're incredibly condescending. Next.

Irony meters are at the breaking point.

 

[Toni]

Isn't she allowed to express how she perceives this? Doesn't she have a perspective that might be informative?

And she's allowed to make that judgement. And to express her opinion it...

I very clearly and specifically stated that she is "allowed" to express her opinion. My point was and remains your characterization of her article as "context". It wasn't just "context". It was mostly her judgement and opinion. Are you acknowledging that now?

Of course it is her opinion, based upon context. Isn't she allowed that? Why isn't that ok?

OK Toni, I like you and don't want to fight with you, so when you decide to address MY posts with me, rather than lashing out because of what you think Metaphor is saying, let me know.

Either that or point out where I have said anything remotely indicating that the OP author is not "allowed" to express her opinion or that it isn't "ok" to do so.

Nor do I wish to fight with you.

Apologies if something is misunderstood or misconstrued.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Oh, just for fun: Did you know that there is a chain (of course it is a chain. This is America dammit) of restaurants that are supposedly Australian-themed?

I didn't know.

G'day mate! It's called Outback steakhouse. Crikey, in Australia, I guess you just call it "Steakhouse." I think most of the Australian food is okay. I have never tried the walkabout soup and besides the grease the bloomin' onions are okay. I can't eat more than 10 strips of onion though. You Australians must have a tolerance for grease beyond ours. Shrimp on the barbie is good, too--you Aussies will barbecue anything won't you? Also, the steaks are good. I used to like the Queensland pasta with shrimp but I didn't see it on the menu last time. Why did you people stop eating it?

 

[RavenSky]

I didn't know.

G'day mate! It's called Outback steakhouse. Crikey, in Australia, I guess you just call it "Steakhouse." I think most of the Australian food is okay. I have never tried the walkabout soup and besides the grease the bloomin' onions are okay. I can't eat more than 10 strips of onion though. You Australians must have a tolerance for grease beyond ours. Shrimp on the barbie is good, too--you Aussies will barbecue anything won't you? Also, the steaks are good. I used to like the Queensland pasta with shrimp but I didn't see it on the menu last time. Why did you people stop eating it?

fuck fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck... thanks a lot Don! Another one of those examples of learning new stuff in weird ways... except this time I've learned that Outback Steakhouse's parent company is a conservative-leaning "corporations are people, too, my friend" with a PAC  ...called the Bloomin' Brands, Inc. Political Action Committee.[9] Bloomin' Brands, Inc. Political Action Committee is a PAC during the 2016 election. As of the most recent financial filing from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the committee raised a total of $347,483 and spent a total of $253,075. During the 2014 election, as of the most recent financial filing from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the committee raised a total of $976,793 and spent a total of $767,249. Some of their political spending included $5,000 to the NRA, $30,000 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, $45,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee, and $15,000 to the Republican Party of Wisconsin.

Wisconsin and the NRA? Seriously? My favorite goddamn steak and salad in the world, and I have to learn this

Oh, and they are not owned by Australians.

They are also not Italian, but they own Carrabba's Italian Grill, too.

And I stand corrected, Toni. Now I know one (defunct) Chinese restaurant not owned by a Chinese family: Paul Lee's Chinese Kitchen.

The NRA? Fuck.

So anyway, is this cultural appropriation or is it marketing?

 

[laughing dog]

If you don't want people to comment on your concerns and priorities, then don't post them. Otherwise, that will happen. And when the concerns are ridiculous, people will tend to point that out.

Very well. You and Athena can come into each of my threads, ask if this is the hill I want to die on, contribute nothing, and then leave.

I'm sure we'll all be the richer for the experience.

In comparison to this OP, a dog fart would make us all richer for the experience. And smell better too.

 

[JonA]

I was wrong to compare this issue to linguistic purism. Since this whole thing is about the use of a word, it is linguistic purism.

Complaining about other people using a word from a language you speak because 'they're not using it right' is no better than little old white ladies bitching about 'those dreadful blacks wrecking our English'.

Both are entitled to their opinion.

Neither opinion is entitled to any respect.

 

[JonA]

What We're All Thinking...

Very well. You and Athena can come into each of my threads, ask if this is the hill I want to die on, contribute nothing, and then leave.

I'm sure we'll all be the richer for the experience.

In comparison to this OP, a dog fart would make us all richer for the experience. And smell better too.

Fuck off.

Really.

To all the people who think it's their God-given duty to hop into people's threads and deride them for the interests they happen to hold: fuck the fuck off. Get over your rotten, self-entitled, smug-ass selves and fuck off.

99.9% of the shit on this forum is ridiculous to someone somewhere. If every thread were to devolve into a brawl over the merits of the topic, there'd be no interesting discussion anywhere.

So fuck off.

 

[Archimedes]

I'm genuinely confused by the repeated question in this thread that asks "And she isn't entitled to have her say on the matter?" or variations thereof.

Am I reading the same thread as everyone else? I've read the entire thread and no-one has suggested that the person who wrote the article in the OP isn't entitled to her opinion and to have it published.

 

[Metaphor]

I know my own fucking mind better than you know my mind, Metaphor. It is rude and arrogant that you continually tell me what I think or feel. You don't like it when you think does it to you so lay off it your own self.

You're the one who brings up the word 'authenticity', unprompted, every single time we have these discussions.

Really? Where did she say that she wanted "all yoga classes in Australia to be 'authentic'?"

What is she after then? Is it just a long whine about how she feels alienated and othered but white people have done nothing wrong and don't need to change anything?

Irony meters are at the breaking point.

No; what's fucking ironic, Toni, is that you condescendingly imagine that I think whatever the 'white media' tells me to think, without having any evidence at all about how I have come to think the things I do, and you implicitly exclude yourself from being a slave to the 'white media' and then you have the fucking cajones to say I'm being condescending.

 

[Metaphor]

Very well. You and Athena can come into each of my threads, ask if this is the hill I want to die on, contribute nothing, and then leave.

I'm sure we'll all be the richer for the experience.

In comparison to this OP, a dog fart would make us all richer for the experience. And smell better too.

Thank you for your considered and thoughtful critique.

 

[Metaphor]

I didn't know.

G'day mate! It's called Outback steakhouse. Crikey, in Australia, I guess you just call it "Steakhouse." I think most of the Australian food is okay. I have never tried the walkabout soup and besides the grease the bloomin' onions are okay. I can't eat more than 10 strips of onion though. You Australians must have a tolerance for grease beyond ours. Shrimp on the barbie is good, too--you Aussies will barbecue anything won't you? Also, the steaks are good. I used to like the Queensland pasta with shrimp but I didn't see it on the menu last time. Why did you people stop eating it?

Queensland pasta is made from gum trees and the excessive deforestation to meed demand was endangering the habitat of the drop bears.

 

[Toni]

You're the one who brings up the word 'authenticity', unprompted, every single time we have these discussions.

And that perception on your part makes it ok to continually tell me what I do or do not think while getting all bent out of shape if you think I'm doing that to you?

You make less sense than usual.

What is she after then? Is it just a long whine about how she feels alienated and othered but white people have done nothing wrong and don't need to change anything?

So she didn't say she wanted all yoga classes in Australia to be authentic. That's what I thought.

No; what's fucking ironic, Toni, is that you condescendingly imagine that I think whatever the 'white media' tells me to think, without having any evidence at all about how I have come to think the things I do, and you implicitly exclude yourself from being a slave to the 'white media' and then you have the fucking cajones to say I'm being condescending.

You lambast a woman (and it is always a woman) for expressing her opinion, back up yours with absolutely nothing ? Meanwhile you post piece after piece from mass media. But you are not influenced by mass media. Got it.

 

[Metaphor]

And that perception on your part makes it ok to continually tell me what I do or do not think while getting all bent out of shape if you think I'm doing that to you?

You do do it to me. You told me, point blank, that I think whatever the 'white media' tells me to think.

So she didn't say she wanted all yoga classes in Australia to be authentic. That's what I thought.

She said the following:

If the yoga class itself wasn't white-centric enough, she really had to place the appropriative cherry on top.

Whether marketed as an exercise class or a way to connect with your spiritual self, the commodification of yoga in a way that is entirely dismissive or ignorant of its roots or connections to an existing religion is appropriation at its worst.The history of colonisation in India means that the practice of yoga in countries with colonial ties, like Australia, can never truly be a friendly exchange.

Given most classes are taught by white women, and most ads you see for yoga classes or yoga wear feature white women, white women have become the embodiment of yoga in Australia. As a Hindu woman, this places me as the "other" in a culture that is mine.


It also furthers the economic exploitation of the colonised by the colonisers - landing the profits from a practice that has been appropriated from the colonised in the pockets of the colonisers.

I had to break it up here because the fucking gall, the hide, the cheek, the nerve, the temerity, the audacity, the chutzpah, the cajones, the effrontery of this woman calling Australia 'the colonisers' when Australia was the colonised is so obnoxious it deserves particular excoriation.

It's about questioning whether your practice of yoga is claiming space away from people of colour to whom yoga is more than a part of their daily routine – it's a part of their cultural and religious identity.

It's about considering whether you can practise yoga without spiritually harvesting a culture and religion that is not yours

And it's about considering whether your casually saying a few namastes at the end of your yoga class feeds into the commodification of Hindu spirituality that then makes it OK for people to Instagram memes such as 'Namaste away from me', to publish a yoga book as a white woman called 'Namaslay', and to make people of South Asian and Hindu identity feel exoticised and misunderstood.

You lambast a woman (and it is always a woman) for expressing her opinion, back up yours with absolutely nothing ? Meanwhile you post piece after piece from mass media. But you are not influenced by mass media. Got it.

You've gone off the deep end, Toni. "Reading the media" does not mean "white media" "dictates" what I think. Do you believe and agree with everything you read? How unfortunate for you. I'd try a class on critical thinking and how not be a sheep.

 

[Toni]

You do do it to me. You told me, point blank, that I think whatever the 'white media' tells me to think.

Yes. I did it once, to illustrate the point of how arrogant and unpleasant it is.

If you don't like it, maybe stop treating other posters in a way you find so objectionable when someone does it to you.

P. S. White people in Australia are the colonizers.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

G'day mate! It's called Outback steakhouse. Crikey, in Australia, I guess you just call it "Steakhouse." I think most of the Australian food is okay. I have never tried the walkabout soup and besides the grease the bloomin' onions are okay. I can't eat more than 10 strips of onion though. You Australians must have a tolerance for grease beyond ours. Shrimp on the barbie is good, too--you Aussies will barbecue anything won't you? Also, the steaks are good. I used to like the Queensland pasta with shrimp but I didn't see it on the menu last time. Why did you people stop eating it?

Queensland pasta is made from gum trees and the excessive deforestation to meed demand was endangering the habitat of the drop bears.

That's just like the people of Queensland to get all uppity and try to change everything but I noticed it's actually not gone from the menu anyway. See Queensland people don't have a monopoly on what everyone else can do or call Queensland pasta. Queensland doesn't own the word "Queensland."

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

G'day mate! It's called Outback steakhouse. Crikey, in Australia, I guess you just call it "Steakhouse." I think most of the Australian food is okay. I have never tried the walkabout soup and besides the grease the bloomin' onions are okay. I can't eat more than 10 strips of onion though. You Australians must have a tolerance for grease beyond ours. Shrimp on the barbie is good, too--you Aussies will barbecue anything won't you? Also, the steaks are good. I used to like the Queensland pasta with shrimp but I didn't see it on the menu last time. Why did you people stop eating it?

fuck fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck... thanks a lot Don! Another one of those examples of learning new stuff in weird ways... except this time I've learned that Outback Steakhouse's parent company is a conservative-leaning "corporations are people, too, my friend" with a PAC  ...called the Bloomin' Brands, Inc. Political Action Committee.[9] Bloomin' Brands, Inc. Political Action Committee is a PAC during the 2016 election. As of the most recent financial filing from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the committee raised a total of $347,483 and spent a total of $253,075. During the 2014 election, as of the most recent financial filing from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the committee raised a total of $976,793 and spent a total of $767,249. Some of their political spending included $5,000 to the NRA, $30,000 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, $45,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee, and $15,000 to the Republican Party of Wisconsin.

Wisconsin and the NRA? Seriously? My favorite goddamn steak and salad in the world, and I have to learn this

Oh, and they are not owned by Australians.

They are also not Italian, but they own Carrabba's Italian Grill, too.

And I stand corrected, Toni. Now I know one (defunct) Chinese restaurant not owned by a Chinese family: Paul Lee's Chinese Kitchen.

The NRA? Fuck.

So anyway, is this cultural appropriation or is it marketing?

I'd say that it's definitely marketing and it barely qualifies as cultural appropriation, if at all. Australians pretty much remain in a position of power to speak and influence American culture so that their identities are not made a mockery. Observe how easily Metaphor just used sarcasm back. No one was kicking him while he was already down. However, were the Australians an oppressed minority or second class citizens in the US struggling to make ends meet, then the insensitivity I tried to put on display would be stronger by orders of magnitude. Likewise the detrimental effects to opportunities to said oppressed people would be much more since they would not be empowered to compete within the greater context of the dominant culture. [Mind you I don't necessarily believe in all this but it's not really being tested as an idea. Instead the worst examples possible are on display.] Sensitivity to this issue does require some empathy and the little issues we've seen so far are not so much about removing opportunities but about feelings.

Next NSFW topic:

Show

Americans need to stop appropriating circumcision from Jewish culture -- No need to borrow from Jewish aesthetics and normalize them. A circumcised penis doesn't look better.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Monty Python Voice on/

We are the knights who say namaste!

Monty Python Voice off/