Wadded Panties As Usual At The New Republic. (This Time It's Sombrero-Sickness)
Eekers! The horror!
The subhead of the piece in TNR by Josephine Livingstone:
At a recent party for the libertarian magazine "Reason," guests were given a paper doll of Lionel Shriver to dress up in outfits from different cultures.
She starts out with full cluelessness:
If the right believes that cultural appropriation is not offensive, why are they making paper dolls that ridicule other cultures?
Reason is not "on the right" but libertarian. P.S. There are lots of lefty libertarians.
Livingstunned continues:
The sombrero is a reference to Shriver's comments at the Brisbane Writers Festival in 2016. During her speech, Shriver described "the bramble of thorny issues that cluster around 'identity politics.'"A group of students at Bowdoin College who wore sombreros at a tequila-themed birthday party, she lamented, were subsequently accused of cultural appropriation by the student government. Shriver believed that the outrage over this incident would have serious implications for fiction writers, who would feel they could not create a variety of characters.
As Reason's editor in chief Katherine Mangu-Ward put it, "Shriver raised the specter of being 'obliged to designate my every character an aging 5-foot-2 smartass, and having to set every novel in North Carolina,' which would surely make for dull reading." Shriver then took out a sombrero and placed on her head in front of the audience, claiming that writers needed to "preserve the right to wear many hats."
Shriver makes a critique of cultural appropriation that is shared by many on the right. Cultural appropriation, she argued in her Brisbane speech, is actually a mark of appreciation for other cultures: "Exchanging ideas and practices," she proposed, "is self-evidently one of the most productive, fascinating aspects of modern urban life." In a similar vein, New York Times opinion writer Bari Weiss recently insisted that "culture should be shared, not hoarded."
Here's more:
At Brisbane, Shriver argued that the concept of cultural appropriation was crushing free expression; it was a freedom of speech issue, she said. Yet it wasn't Shriver's words that made her speech attract so much attention. Shriver turned the wearing-of-hats metaphor (the author must become many people, do many types of thought) into a literal hat.I personally responded to this nonverbal gesture more strongly than to her words: the donning of a sombrero, an item commonly used to summarize and deride Mexican culture by, say, drunk white college students on Cinco de Mayo.
So, if we dress up as French, we are deriding French culture? Or is it just cultures that New Republic writers feel we should pity that we're not allowed to pull from?
Annoyed by the piety, someone on Twitter today linked this example of how daring the magazine used to be.
Remember magazines? They were on paper. People would leave them around the house.
Crid at September 21, 2017 11:05 PM
Back before they went all lefty neo-Puritan.
I still love paper magazines.
Amy Alkon at September 22, 2017 6:30 AM
It's funny because Livingstone doesn't realize that Reason did that specifically to troll people like her. And obviously it worked.
And: Maybe it's just too early in the morning for me, but I found Livingstone's prose to be so obtuse that even after several re-reads, I'm still not sure who of the people she names is on which side of the debate.
Cousin Dave at September 22, 2017 6:34 AM
It is the SJWs who assume that college boys (always those evil boys) putting on a sombrero is deriding Mexicans, when in fact they are celebrating Mexican food and drink. Kids play pretend as a way of helping them learn about other groups. Dress-up is NOT always about deriding but the Left sees every mention of another culture to be derision. Perhaps it is when THEY do it!!
There are no halloween costumes left that are allowed according to these scolds except you could go as an appliance or a leaf maybe, or something that is educational --go as climate change maybe?
And what about St. Patrick's day? All manner of people get drunk, reinforcing the old stereotype of the Irish as drunks. This is ok? The Irish are ok with it.
cc at September 22, 2017 11:43 AM
And what about St. Patrick's day? All manner of people get drunk, reinforcing the old stereotype of the Irish as drunks. This is ok? The Irish are ok with it.
That's because they have white privilege. And they're a bunch of dirty gingers. So it is perfectly acceptable bit of appropriation and bigotry.
I R A Darth Aggie at September 22, 2017 2:33 PM
Why is "cultural appropriation" a sign of idiocy and ignorance?
There is nothing you can do that hasn't been handed down to you by another culture.
The term tells me the utterer is completely clueless about where (s)he came from.
As they are about "indigenous people's day" in Portland and elsewhere. Columbus led Europe to the invasion of the Americas, so instead, we'll celebrate a completely fictional Utopia where native Americans never engaged in warfare, slavery, ritual sacrifice or other atrocities completely common to humanity.
Radwaste at September 22, 2017 4:25 PM
As they are about "indigenous people's day" in Portland and elsewhere. Columbus led Europe to the invasion of the Americas, so instead, we'll celebrate a completely fictional Utopia where native Americans never engaged in warfare, slavery, ritual sacrifice or other atrocities completely common to humanity.
I love those celebrations, you get to explain to people how racist they are for spouting the 'Noble Savage' crap and then use every lefty argument against them when they try to deny it
lujlp at September 22, 2017 7:31 PM
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