{"id":9782,"date":"2014-10-29T06:47:14","date_gmt":"2014-10-29T13:47:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=9782"},"modified":"2014-10-27T13:04:50","modified_gmt":"2014-10-27T20:04:50","slug":"open-space-culturally-appropriating-costumes-have-got-to-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2014\/10\/29\/open-space-culturally-appropriating-costumes-have-got-to-go\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Space<\/em>: Culturally appropriating costumes have got to go"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lions, tigers, and bears are fine, but dust off that \u201csexy harem girl\u201d costume this Halloween and we\u2019re going to have a situation. There\u2019s a problem in today\u2019s society where people still think it\u2019s appropriate to mimic the cultural traditions of others for their own personal enjoyment.<\/p>\n

Whether people want to admit it or not, another person\u2019s culture isn\u2019t a costume. I can\u2019t believe I have to say this, but dressing as a taco sporting a sombrero is inherently offensive. It simply simmers an entire heritage down into two stereotypical objects and perpetuates the problem that those in a position of privilege have the ability to claim and repurpose others\u2019 beliefs.<\/p>\n

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This Halloween, skip the cultural appropriation (photo provided).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I know that the makeup worn on the Mexican holiday Dia de los Muertos<\/em> (Day of the Dead) is stunning, but sporting it when one has no understanding of the meaningful tradition of welcoming the souls of the dead is very insensitive.<\/p>\n

Appropriating others\u2019 traditions is something the privileged have been doing since the dawn of history, and it only creates more feelings of indignation. The meaning behind these garments are lost when they become a commodity.<\/p>\n

Some say that Halloween\u2019s appeal is that it gives people the ability to be whomever or whatever they want for a day. The argument is that it\u2019s harmless fun, and getting upset about something that\u2019s not meant to be taken seriously is futile. For some, a costume is a joke, or just for fun, and they don\u2019t mean anything malicious by wearing one.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s similar to last year, when non-indigenous fans of First Nations hip-hop group A Tribe Called Red wore headdresses and war paint to their shows. Although concert-goers weren\u2019t trying to offend the band, it was disrespectful and ignorant. White people have taken enough of the First Nations\u2019 culture over the years, haven\u2019t we?<\/p>\n

My goal, however, is not to make someone feel bad if they have worn a costume that appropriates another culture. Most likely, the belief that these costumes are acceptable has been ingrained into them by the underlying racism of our society.<\/p>\n

Instead, my goal is to make people aware that they are perpetuating racism, whether or not it\u2019s intentional.<\/p>\n

These are your neighbours, your friends, and your colleagues; is it worth possibly making them feel disrespected just so you can look sexy in a buckskin miniskirt and war paint?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lions, tigers, and bears are fine, but dust off that \u201csexy harem girl\u201d costume this Halloween and we\u2019re going to have a situation. There\u2019s a problem in today\u2019s society where people still think it\u2019s appropriate to mimic the cultural traditions of others for their own personal enjoyment. Whether people want to admit it or not, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9783,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,134],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-views","category-october-29-2014"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9782"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9784,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9782\/revisions\/9784"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}