Exactly. Cultural appropriation is bad enough. Cultural appropriation for your own gain (like world championships and Olympic medals) is even worse. But clueless and uneducated cultural appropriation is nothing less than a complete smack in the face. “We want the flavor of your interesting ethnic festivities, but we’re not going even going to bother putting in the work to actually learn anything about them. We’re just going to do our impression of what we think they’re about.”
It was cheap and tacky. If you want to borrow from something that isn’t yours, at least do it with dignity and a sense of valuing what it is you’re taking. This didn’t show a whit of that.
I understand where you guys are coming from, but I had one question…
To the complaint that they got the dance wrong, they are ice skating, right? On ice skates? I don’t know if anyone could adequately capture the authenticity of an Aboriginal dance that way.
Aboriginal Australians are not Maori though so I don’t know that comparisons between Maori culture and ice skating are relevant, or have I missed your point?
I’m not an Aboriginal Australian either but I don’t see that the dance is in any way “racist”, it makes no negative assumptions about someone based on race. At worst it may be culturally insensitive.
With this going on, I’ve wondered why a couple of US National Championship ice dance routines didn’t get the same criticism.
There was this one, from Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto, that depending on who was announcing, was variously described as a Moldavian or Moldovan folk dance. Maybe they got it right? (though I didn’t care for their execution - it looked sloppy)
Or this one from Meryl Davis and Charlie White, although maybe this one was given a pass because it was just so out-and-out Bollywood and not purporting to be a folk dance.
Watching the performance put forth by the OP, I am reminded of the comment that Jackie Robinson said when he was the guest of honor at a ballet based on a baseball game. “I am honored by the attempt, but prefer the game itself.”
Indigenous peoples seem to have a rather thin skin about things. Witness all of the Native Americans trying to get sports mascots and team names changed.
Ok ok, you’re right, it’s not all about honoring them, but at some point people just have to realize that unless your indigenous name is followed by an expletive, it’s perfectly harmless fun.
I don’t really believe it. People can claim offense until the cows come home but I find it hard to fathom that the Atlanta Braves or Washington Redskins are harming Native Americans by their name.
Let’s see how much they protest when a they change the name to the Washington Whiteys, or Atlanta WASPs
But that’s never going to happen because white is the mainstream. Apart from a few, “People equate white with lameness” quips, is there really mainstream stereotyping of or bigotry towards white people in America because of the color of their skin?
Well ok, but how does that translate into “Braves” being bad? It’s a celebrated sports team. The only damage to the Braves is if they lose all the time.
Maybe because neither Indians nor Moldavians are oppressed minorities in their own land, where adding cultural appropriation is just salt in the wound?
People who have been vilified, attacked, marginalized, excluded, and had their very existence questioned often react poorly to being reduced to a stereotype by the very folks who were oppressing them.
I can understand why the N word is bad, even if blacks themselves say it and there are no black slaves now. Regardless of the history, the word is a derogatory term whose use, by whites, bespeaks a level of hatred, ignorance, and willful cruelty along with arrogance and prejudice that is not there in almost any other english word
On the other hand, with team names like the Braves, you can have fans saying they love their Braves. Other fans may hate them, but they hate the team, not the Native Americans themselves. So I really can’t see how having a sports mascot or team name is bad for them even if they consider it distasteful.
