Free Speech and Creepy Liberalism

what is more embarrassing - using the term PC Culture with a straight face or worrying about your "position on the left"?

Using the term 'PC culture'.

we have to respect all cultures now, pc culture and un-pc culture, pc culture said so

Who in their narrow world is allowed to say anything about anybody?

― orientmammal, Friday, March 24, 2017 7:34 AM (two hours ago)

this isn't always communicated well, but complaints about cultural appropriation depend on larger critiques of oppressive power imbalances. no one thinks that simply taking influence from other cultures is bad in itself. cultural appropriation becomes a real problem, however, when a dominant culture simultaneously exploits, distorts and silences the cultural traditions & expressions of an oppressed minority. less dramatically, there are questions of taste that factor in, the appropriateness of this or that appropriation, given the historical context, punching up vs. punching down, etc.

Ah it doesn't really tho

Anyway - I'm essentially agnostic on this. I don't really understand what's going on, not do I feel qualified to pronounce on it. I really enjoy reading the discussions about it here, though. So thanks for that.

Also, I don't understand the (new?) resistance to the idea of punching up/down. It's an old idea - there are texts for centuries where the servant is making jokes at the expense of the master, it's evident in the idea of the court jester. Chaplin didn't choose to play a tramp rather than a captain of industry because his clothes were better suited to the former. I'm not saying anyone here questions it, but it seems to be fashionable amongst the young Right to pooh-pooh the idea of punching up/down.

Who in their narrow world is allowed to say anything about anybody?

― orientmammal, Friday, March 24, 2017 7:34 AM (two hours ago)

this isn't always communicated well, but complaints about cultural appropriation depend on larger critiques of oppressive power imbalances. no one thinks that simply taking influence from other cultures is bad in itself. cultural appropriation becomes a real problem, however, when a dominant culture simultaneously exploits, distorts and silences the cultural traditions & expressions of an oppressed minority. less dramatically, there are questions of taste that factor in, the appropriateness of this or that appropriation, given the historical context, punching up vs. punching down, etc.

― Balðy Daudrs (contenderizer), Friday, March 24, 2017 4:46 PM (fourteen minutes ago)

This is patently not true though, as the cultural appropriation authaarrataans use it in simply every single case of cultural appro, whether it's wearing a Japan kimono, India sari, dreadlocks, whereever and whatever is going. This is the quite hilarious and telling thing about it - no one in say Japan thinks they are being oppressed by anyone. Or China. They laugh at this idea. And they believe it shows that deep down these cultural appro people actually believe they are superior to everyone in the world while on the outside trying to show the opposite.It is actually a projection of their sense of superiority and self centeredness, to truly think that everyone in the world is being oppressed by you. There is no issue of "dominant culture" it's just again this leftist thing of speaking on behalf of people who don't want and didn't ask you to speak for them.

Also, a fact: American Nigerians, Ghanaians, and Asians have a higher average income than white Americans. Where's the so called "systemic" oppression 'of color' there?

This is still a racist country -- economic success of some immigrant groups doesn't undo that -- but otherwise you're on the right track. "Cultural appropriation" is a well intentioned critical concept, designed to cultivate mindfulness of inequality, but in practice it often encourages white condescension, not respect. Sometimes, 'maybe, there is a financial issue woth appropriation, like Elvis being famous instead of Chuck Berry, and that's an issue, but in a general sense a white guy having dreadlocks isn't hurting anyone.

interesting pts by orientmammal

i had to check the last factoid s/he posted

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_United_States_by_household_income

v rough *median* figures (bc they don't acct for household size) but it's the best i found after a quick google search

nigerian ams and ghanian ams nowhere near the top, but taiwanese ams are

"european" ams place 6th

Like with this painting, I agree with the part that it was a less valuable piece than something a black person would habe made on that same subject and it shouldn't have been picked for the biennalle, but there is nothing offensive about it in itself.

There is no issue of "dominant culture" it's just again this leftist thing of speaking on behalf of people who don't want and didn't ask you to speak for them.

right, that's what the painting was, and that's what the letter was critical of - did you have a point?

also lol @ cultural appropriation having no affect on natives, really? Stephen Colbert doesn't offend folks living in the PRC? Herp derp

sometimes a troll is just a troll, folks

a fact: American Nigerians, Ghanaians, and Asians have a higher average income than white Americans.

The specificity of "nigerians, ghanaians" makes this an obvious example of carefully cherry-picking one's facts, because the preponderance of facts do not support one's argument.

I agree with the part that it was a less valuable piece than something a black person would have made on that same subject

How can you possibly say this without a counterexample? News flash: black people are perfectly capable of making shitty political art.

Like with this painting, I agree with the part that it was a less valuable piece than something a black person would habe made on that same subject and it shouldn't have been picked for the biennalle, but there is nothing offensive about it in itself.

i believe that all attempts in this thread to locate the 'problem' in the painting (here, briefly, and more from aimless above) entirely constitute an attempt to reconcile the unambiguous inoffensiveness of the actual piece of art w/ the claims made against it (as opposed to an authentic response to the work). if this controversy hadn't arisen, or it had been made by a POC, surely we could find ways to praise it for its inventive +brave re-contextualization of an important photograph in american history. people are full of shit and are so quick to abrogate their own critical facilities in order to not face an obvious truth - the color of your skin does not give your opinion validity.

A seemingly poorly executed artistic statement in racism by someone who has experienced it might be worth more time than one by someone looking at this issue "from the outside."

Xp phil

Wow @ Indian Americans.

Seems like a pretty different story in Canada, based on "median income" figures here.

This made the most convincing case I've read for a problem with the painting itself, although "most convincing" != "I am convinced".

Most Indians emigrate to the US as grad students or highly skilled professionals, don't they? Canada has a different emigration pattern (they even let my fam in).

i notice lately when i sneeze it sounds like "PC bullshitttt"

I knew there was some difference, just not that it was this stark. This does go some way to helping me understand why no one seemed too bothered by Apu.

the unambiguous inoffensiveness of the actual piece of art

it was not a portrayal of a basket of fruit.

right, that's what the painting was, and that's what the letter was critical of - did you have a point?

― Not the real Tombot (El Tomboto), Friday, March 24, 2017 10:44 AM (twenty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the letter is written by a non-african american woman

The issue shouldn't be the painting; artists should not be told to self-censor as tastelessness, "missing the mark" is always a risk when one undertakes a creative project; if there is a critique to be made at all it would have to do with the institution of the whitney and which pieces they are picking and why. If their selection committee has a pattern of ignoring black artists, that's a problem. Would have nothing to do with these convoluted,narrowly prescriptive conversations about cultural appropriation though

Tend to agree w Treeship

interesting pts by orientmammal

you're both getting fp'd

In her painting, Schutz has smeared Till’s face and made it unrecognizable, again. The streaks of paint crossing the canvas read like an aggressive rejoinder to Mamie Till Mobley’s insistence that he be photographed. Mobley wanted those photographs to bear witness to the racist brutality inflicted on her son; instead Schutz has disrespected that act of dignity, by defacing them with her own creative way of seeing.

vs.

Dana Schutz, a blue-chip artist known for making popular pictures I have long regarded as George Grosz Lite, contributes three paintings, two of which are simply outstanding. The first, succinctly titled Elevator, is fittingly positioned opposite the museum lifts: it depicts its passengers involved in a mass eye-gouge, as one might find at a Richard Spencer rally. The second is called Open Casket. A powerful painterly reaction to the infamous 1955 funeral photograph of a disfigured Emmett Till, the canvas makes material the deep cuts and lacerations portrayed in the original photo by means of cardboard relief.

the latter came from the artnet review that predates the controversy. it's not a surprise that work can be radically reinterpreted depending on what you see / want to see in it, but it should be cautionary that we're certainly not dealing with anything cut-and-dried. and it's telling that if the critique is that by obscuring the subject of the work it disrespects his memory, the critiques itt that try to thread the needle condemn it on the basis of it not being meaningful /enough/, too trite. which is to say that if you need to find a reason to dislike it (because maybe you don't like the identity of the person who made it, or you really want to ally with someone who doesn't like it) you can always produce new meaning when talking about art which is always an abstract representation of reality. the first critique is extremely problematic in my eyes in that it condemns any attempt to artistically render reality as "defacing" it w/ the artist's own creative way of seeing. normally we recognize that art can reveal through abstraction truths about life but here we are supposed to believe that it is somehow obscuring the original photo (which as i think someone mentioned above it certainly is not doing - it is calling attention to the original photo).

sund4r ya, sharivari otm

also most on h1b visas are indians

there is some evidence that they are being low-balled but generally the indians i meet in the us have degrees in comp sci or engineering

Ha, I didn't know "blue chip artist" was a thing, tbh. Trying to imagine a "blue chip composer", lolling in my office.

I prefer "bitcoin artists"

In her statements about the piece, she does not show any understanding that her own expression echoes Carolyn Bryant’s expression

this is just willfully disingenuous imo and comparing this painting to Bryant's actions is as tacky and crass as whatever accusation the author is lodging against the artist

When I looked at the painting it reminded me of Francis Bacon.

Top 3 median income in USA

By ancestry[edit]
1.Indian American : $101,591[2]
2.Taiwanese American : $85,566[2]
3.Filipino American : $82,389[2]

Dominant oppressive 'white' culture? I think the people who say these things really haven't had any experience of white Americans outside the privileged affluent white America they themselves are from.

oh wow so weird that people from asian immigrant backgrounds, i.e. a background from which it is only possible to immigrate to the country if they have skills that would get them a well-paying job, have a high median income

racism can't be real

you're going to be gone in like the next 5 minutes so i hope you enjoyed your little trolling escapade, fuck boy

hmmm fp the poster making a simplistic argument about how privilege in the US cannot be easily reduced to ethnicity or the one who calls other posters "fuck boy" so hard to decide

yeah, sure, there's DEFINITELY a genuine sense of curiosity and inquisitiveness in om's argument, he's definitely not someone in total denial about racism in the U.S., and it definitely doesn't seem like he's about to tell us that whites are the truly oppressed group in America.

trolls who appear to be on the verge of posting explicit white nationalist arguments can get fucked, fuiud

otm

i don't find his argument particularly interesting but i don't think it's being made in bad faith. evaluating cross cultural pollination by how the various participants rank against each other in a race hierarchy is a dumb way of discussing art. white nationalism arguments != race in america is more complex than whites rules, minorities drool.

also i promised i'd stop getting involved in these kinds of arguments and over the last few years i've been pretty good about doing it so i'm going to bow out now.

i don't find his argument particularly interesting but i don't think it's being made in bad faith

it is being made in bad faith

you're going to be gone in like the next 5 minutes so i hope you enjoyed your little trolling escapade, fuck boy

― bomb diggy diggy diggy bomb diggy bomb (jim in vancouver),

For posting statistics of the median income of households in the U.S?

lol

Fuck mordy you're being a rube on this one

Please fp me tho, I have definitely done it to you before (think it was for apologia for, what turned out to be false, reports of Kurds ethnically cleansing Arabs in Syria)