First and foremost I’d like to apologize for the lack of posting of my articles recently. With everything going on with ICMI and most of the Badger crew being in the Land Down Under things have been difficult with communications. I hope to get back to my weekly set up so we all appreciate you bearing with us during this time. Now that thats out of the way lets get back to what we do best here, disproving ridiculous narratives and concepts with hard facts and observations with the subtlety of a jackhammer.
With the various stories over the years of these instances of ‘cultural appropriation’ going around I thought it was about time this line of social justice bullshit get demolished since its now making people end their businesses. Its affecting people’s lives negatively, I can’t let that stand. Now I’m not basing this on a specific instance, though people likely know most about the burrito cart incident.
So Let’s Hammer This In!
Now what do I mean with the title of this article, saying cultural appropriation doesn’t exist? Well I mean simply that. There is no such thing as ‘cultural appropriation’ if you look at human interaction over the centuries.
The first thing that comes to mind with this is when Japan adopted Kanji from China in order to talk and trade with them. Looking at some of the origins of Kanji in China even can show where some ancient Japanese astrological mysticism known as Onmyoudo comes from. If you see a paper talisman in anime or in a video game then this very Japanese practice actually hails from China, originally. Did they ‘appropriate’ their mystical traditions and religion from China then? Of course not! They adopted what they saw worked and went with it as Japan has done for thousands of years.
Now this talks of Eastern cases of cultural mingling. If you examine a lot of older Eastern religions prior to Buddhism you’ll find a lot of similar practices. Even some Russian culture had been affected by China’s culture via the Mongols.
So how about us here in the West? Well this is where some things get fun. Look at how specifically Irish Catholicism was modified from Roman Catholicism via my own religion. Sure, there is the easy answer of lining up holidays and the like. However, I can think of something even more interesting. The adaptation of my gods into Catholic Saints. Now you could ask me “Alex, are you mad that the Catholics used your religious deities to convert your people?”
Well no I’m not.
I actually find it very entertaining, much like Alison has mentioned before when talking about the Catholic Church protecting various pagan artifacts from puritanical fools.
So that does it for the Eurasian continental mass. How about Africa? I mean a lot of the time calls of ‘cultural appropriation’ come from Afrocentric SJWs, no? Well here is where we get hilarious.
South African black citizenry adopted a lot of Dutch values and cultural concepts.
Then you have the fact that Egypt took a lot of Greek and Macedonian traits into their culture not only to sustain themselves but to become stronger after the fall of the Alexandrian Empire.
Ok, well the Latin world of South America still has some cultural purity right?
Oh please! Rio de Janeiro is proof enough otherwise. Add in all the shifting to Spanish and Portuguese as the primary linguistic tradition and South America is nothing like it was during the times of the Mayans, Aztecs and Guiana peoples. Their architectural stylings changed to more Western aesthetics, they adopted a lot of the technology brought over, and took on some of the new foods brought over from Greater Europe.
Add to that the transfer of concepts over the Silk Road and the Jesuits influencing Japan to an extent, along with (again) the Dutch, and if anything, everyone ‘appropriated’ culture in equal amounts across the globe. It is for this reason that I think the term ‘multiculturalism’ is cancer. It implies that human cultures are made in a vacuum. CROSS-culturalism would be a more accurate term, as we have already cross pollinated our cultures with others so much that we couldn’t go back on that even if we wanted to. It’s simply against the industrious nature of the human race to satiate our curiosities.
As such, like I said at the beginning, cultural appropriation is not real. Cultural adaptation and adoption, however, are very real things. Take how I do things for example, I have adapted my religious practices to work within the confines of the legal system I’ve found myself in and adopted the values to ensure I can still work within the tenet of ‘Do No Harm.’ As such I can say, interact with an atheist and nothing untoward come of it on the basis of my interpretation of religion. At the same time I can also make friends and even interact favorably with devout Catholics. This is because culture, like language, is ever-evolving for our personal needs in society at large.
This is a huge part why puritan ideologies like Social Justice are so dangerous. They encourage both rigidity and division. It is also, as we saw during #GamerGate, an extremely incestuous ideology. It deters any sort of ideological blending to create anything new. Such stagnation and staleness can only breed ever-devolving concepts much like incestuous breeding in most animals (humans included) result in genetic breakdown. We have suggested that these people come up with their own stuff multiple times. However, the results have always been hijacking pre-existing concepts. Then, in the few cases they DID make their own concepts they are so bland and without depth that no one honestly enjoys it. Add in the fact that they refuse to put up to promote such cultural endeavors and its only obvious the results. Just look at what happened to the Hugo Awards.
True creative people cannot survive in such a space and will usually escape it at full speed. Whether its an early example like Ian Miles Cheong or a glorious example like Cassie Jaye. It was hard on them escaping the ideology, but not only did they show the strength to get out, they only thrived after they did. This is not only due to the obvious fact that puritan concepts always become increasingly unpopular as they hit critical mass due to authoritarian natures, but because as, we have seen, such extreme positions are not good for one’s personal health. The more extreme one gets in their beliefs, the more noticible it is.
This is something we can see in a recent example of someone currently going through some changes as well. I’m talking about Laci Green, while I’m still not giving her a complete pass I will state that the condition of how she looks health wise today is much better than it was at the peak of her breakdown in November or in the end of her Braless content for MTV. For verification on this observation I took advantage of Miss Green’s Ask.FM page to see if she noticed this. She has probably seen this herself, I am hoping to ask her more directly and put an addendum in the comments on this subject or make a full article depending on the answers I get. This is partially shown even with the most recent videos she has made why an opening should be left for her. I’m not saying ask her to housesit for you but encourage open discussion with her, especially after seeing these short videos on Twitter. If only to disprove the presumption that the harassment is actually coming from our groups if there is any.
It’s my opinion with what evidence we have that the third party harassment that is there is not just from troll accounts but from alt accounts of radicalized feminists working on character assassinating the MRM, along with other groups that I’m still researching that feel slighted by our groups. I am not going into specifics, though, until I get more information in because the last thing I’m going to do is make or entertain a false accusation. We should be much better than that.
With this in mind I wish to make the following suggestion, that we encourage more and more opening of discussions on disagreements. This is not just for the health of society but for our own mental and physical health. We’ve seen even in our own side of things how extremism has led to some health issues. This is where I want your help to say who on our side of the coin has shown failing health due to becoming so extreme in their views. To do this I have decided to open a Discord just for my Breaking the Narrative articles. There will never be a paywall for this or anything to keep people out short of cutting out spammers and the like. I’ll be in there every week on Wednesday nights. I look forward to holding all these discussions there and Please Remember to Game Freely!
- Breaking the Narrative Episode 124: Nice Try Kotaku! This Won’t Work Though! - July 8, 2019
- Breaking the Narrative Episode 123: We Shouldn’t Go Straight to Mars! How Anime Got Space Right! - July 1, 2019
- Breaking the Narrative Episode 122: You’re Reviewing What Now? The Dissenter Web Browser! - June 10, 2019
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“Now you could ask me “Alex, are you mad that the Catholics used your religious deities to convert your people?”
Well no I’m not.”
Indeed, since those Catholics were your (our) own people too.
People have this presentist misconception that Christianity was spread in Europe the way 19th century missionaries spread it in Africa. It wasn’t – usually it was spread as a government policy by native rulers. In Ireland it spread organically after Patrick basically converted the Druid class.
Well…. I wouldn’t say ‘converted’ so much as ‘murdered’.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2012/03/saint-patrick-druids-snakes-and-popular-myths.html