Cultural appropriation and unintentionally racist tattoos in modern tattoo culture...

[sourpussoctopus]

Frankly, @Thenegativeone, it's really naive to think that cultural destruction is only ever "entirely perpetrated by the state". Cultural appropriation happens any time you disassociate the images and symbols of a culture from their original meaning and start valuing them purely aesthetically or stereotypically. So the filmmaker @Graeme mentioned is not being childish. Her people, their language and their practices had been systematically brought to the brink of extinction. And now she and others are working to revive those traditions and reinvigorate those cultural practices. Can you imagine if blonde college girls started getting twee "native tattoos" based on those designs that you've fought so hard to bring back to your community? Wouldn't you be pissed? We should listen to people when they say they have a problem with these things. (This also happens often in a myriad of ways that are not tattoo related.) It's ok to appreciate things from afar. Be interested and active in learning about different tattoo practices and their cultural meanings, be supportive of it, but don't just blindly co-opt things because it looks cool.

The Vikings thing is interesting. To me it's not culturally appropriative in the sense I described above, and I think a big part of that is that there was never really an attempt to wipe out Viking history/culture (not in the way that happened to Native Americans). With that said, I wouldn't go about getting runes or tattoos found in old mummies, for example.

[Thenegativeone]

@sourpussoctopus @Graeme

Ok, I guess my viewpoint is skewed. I'll be honest, I've not really had any exposure to cultural appropriation, it seems to be something that has come to light in the media just recently and to me it seemed a little daft to get all het up because someone wore their hair a certain way or got a certain tattoo.

I guess the fact is I wouldn't care if people started "appropriating" my culture, but possibly due to the fact England has no real cultural identity.

My apologies if I seem insensitive or if I offended anyone

[eyeballchambers]

My grandfather started a 3 piece patch m.c. in the late 60s & they had a backwards swastika worked into it &everyone thought it was racist.He was indian&it was an indian symbol.I myself got family values tattooed on me above my brow & then find out when I moved to where Im @ that theres a white prison gang with the same name.&with my love I guess I look like I can be In it.I dress and Dickies Thrasher and vans type stuff. I got approached by a guy yesterday asking me if I was in that gaNg. anyway I'm going to get off the subject but I guess what it comes down to is do whatever you want to do get whatever you want to get. I would like to change the tattoo I speak of but it would be kind of hard I'm just tired of kids coming up to me asking me the same stupid question. but all in all it's actually my favorite tattoo so whatever

[sourpussoctopus]

The fact the majority of people now think of the swastika as primarily a racist and Nazi symbol speaks volume to the impact cultural appropriation can have.

[lape]

The Vikings thing is interesting. To me it's not culturally appropriative in the sense I described above, and I think a big part of that is that there was never really an attempt to wipe out Viking history/culture (not in the way that happened to Native Americans). With that said, I wouldn't go about getting runes or tattoos found in old mummies, for example.

Racially wiped out? No, but they were culturally.

Norway (I don't know the Danish or Swedish history) wasn't peacefully converted into Christians. Some were, but the Pope ordered the middle part of Norwegian to be Christened by force and violence after missionary stuff didn't work. There is a saying in Norway that it was Christened by blood and swords... After this, the traditional Norse religion was pretty much fully vanished, and it's only thanks to a few people who took a few books to Iceland and archaeological research that we know anything about our country between 850 and 1200.

[sourpussoctopus]

@lape Oh, I didn't mean to imply that it quietly faded away. Christianity was not kind anywhere it spread. I guess maybe the difference is one of proximity in time? Like, the fact that there are native people who still feel the effects of colonialism and racial prejudice? All pagans were persecuted by the Church regardless of race, but in the Americas (and Asia, and Africa...) there was that added prejudice which still lingers. Maybe that's where the difference comes from? I could be (and likely am) entirely wrong, though.

[lape]

I think you're onto something. There are very few people (that I know anyway) that can show their viking heritage, while being a First Nations/Native is absolutely a current thing.