# Cultural Appropriation and Art **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 21, 2013, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568 "2013-06-21T17:08:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/61 "2013-06-23T18:38:48Z")
I thought [Dexter Holland looked pretty good with braids](http://stublogs.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/theoffspringdexter78.jpg). It’s a short list, though. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/62 "2013-06-23T18:43:42Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Even when they [look really, really bad](http://www.cinemablend.com/images/sections/1880/_1880.jpg)? Tastes must really be subjective, because those braids look fine to me. In fact, the guy looks like he could be black (albino). But maybe that’s just an illusion. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/63 "2013-06-23T18:44:58Z")
I suspect it’s just age. That’s Axl Rose around the time the old new Guns and Roses resurfaced. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/64 "2013-06-23T19:00:57Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > I suspect it’s just age. That’s Axl Rose around the time the old new Guns and Roses resurfaced. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/65 "2013-06-23T19:25:12Z")
While mowing the grass, I just thought of this. When I think of cultural appropriation, I think of taking an artifact from a historically stigmitized, invisible culture and transforming it into something palatable for the unsuspecting masses. I don’t know if this is close to the formal definition or not. But it’s how I’m looking at the Miley video. Hip hop is too big of a cultural force to be described as “stigmitized”. It’s definitely not invisible. If anything, it has just as much mainstream caché as Miley’s cultural roots, at least for the demographic she speaks to. I could see this particular charge sticking if the year was 1993 and most people had never heard of hip hop. But everything in that video is pretty much old hat for anyone who’s been paying attention to pop music trends for the past 30 years. So “poseur” fits a lot better than “cultural appropriator”, IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2013, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/66 "2013-06-26T15:22:10Z")
I hereby impose a ban on kilt wearing by people who are not ethnically Scottish. My great-grandfather didn’t risk his kilted arse in the Gallant Forty-Twa to see his culture stolen from his descendants. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/67 "2013-06-26T18:08:21Z")
> [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > Die Antwoord are white South African rappers, but they’re not appropriating black culture, it’s just part of the merged white/black street scene that they come from. They saw Lady Ga Ga’s offer (rightly I think) as an attempt to co-opt zef as a fashion statement, stripping it all of the lived experience of the Cape Town people who created it. Can I just say this is all bullshit. Die Antwooord are a parody band. Ninja (or to give him his proper name : _Watkin Tudor Jones_) did _not_ grow up on the Cape Flats, and this persona is only the latest in a long line of them (He used to wear a suit and tie and rap as “Max Normal”). Zef’s a real subculture, but Die Antwoord definitely appropriate it, they’ve never lived it. And it’s not a mixed culture - it’s the culture of poor Whites with a little Coloured thrown in, there’s no Black in it. Personally, I prefer[Jack Parow](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRzFqW4Xh2k), he’s funnier and a better rapper. And he doesn’t have that ridiculous woman with him. ---
**Author:** ![aux203](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/77aa72/32.png) [@aux203](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aux203)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2013, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568/68 "2013-06-30T19:21:45Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > OK, then picture a bunch of poor black kids going to school in ascots and riding boots and greeting each other with “Fine day, old sport! I do say it is a lovely day on the greens.” > > Like my previous examples, they’d get laughed out of town when they get to college. I find this incredibly funny because the NBA has had an influx of nerd fashion in recent years, a deliberate counterpoint to hip hop influenced fashions that dominated for so long, calling to mind instead the preppies of decades past. Wearing a patterned suit, bow tie, and suspenders as a poor black kid attending college for the first time would hardly merit comment these days, I would think. I’m not sure anyone can pull off an ascot or riding boots unless they were about to play polo these days. [Article by Morris here, worth a read I think.](http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7346656/the-rise-nba-nerd) Are NBA players appropriating white preppie culture from the 90’s? Is it okay because it’s ironic? Does anyone actually care? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cultural-appropriation-and-art/661568.md?page=3)