When your friends write troubling stuff

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clee984

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I think whoever designed that book cover is to be pitied, rather than condemned. I literally can't think of any white lie (no pun intended) that I could tell someone if they showed me that as a piece of their own work.
 

Rachel Udin

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I get what you're saying, but I think the real problem with racism is that it harms human beings. Perhaps I'm missing something, but I don't exactly see how this is relevant to anything I've said or the book described in the OP, since I did in fact do these things, and we have no idea if it's even relevant to the book or how much research the OP's friend did or didn't do.

The reduction of peoples is part of the reason it becomes hurtful and harmful, in fact it's one of the biggest factors of why it becomes harmful. In any type of prejudice. It's the simple failure to realize that one person does not represent all and the imposition of the dominant power group that causes issues in the first place. It's hard to say one hates a group if you can't reduce it to harmful stereotypes.

Add the reductive quality of prejudice over time, enforce it with governmental and history and voila. You got institutionalized discrimination. That, in turn, is hurtful to the economic and social power of the group it is launched against.

You need those three ingredients in order to get it to hurt. (reduction, time, and governmental power)

Jesus was divinely conceived (according to mainstream Christian tradition.) The Bible genealogies are only for Joseph, who is not his biological father, and there are many different traditions about Mary, whom I don't think Christians consider a biological parent, either. If Jesus received no DNA from his earthly parents, why should he look like them? Maybe he did, just because it would have been inconvenient not to. Or maybe he looked completely different. (Even if he was just a normal guy, having one ancestor generations back from place FOO does not determine what you look like. Inheritance doesn't work like that.)
http://www.christiananswers.net/dictionary/mary-motherofjesus.html

Mary was a Levite. I told you. And besides, Christians didn't believe in DNA because it didn't exist until after the turn of the last century.

That's the thing about gods. They (very often) don't have human DNA. Yahweh is not a Jew. Allah is not an Arab. Vishnu is not, as far as I can tell, an Indian. And for most religions, their followers can also be of any ethnicity. The Christians I know wouldn't care if you depicted Jesus as a Jew, an Egyptian, a Japanese person, or an Aborigine... (And the ones who would care aren't Christians I'd care to know.)
Hinduism, look up incarnation. Try again.

I'll warn you, though, you're deviating. And you've admitted already you're in waters you don't understand, so I'm not quite sure why you're trying to defend it. I merely pointed out your reductive errors and pointed out that doing it that way causes problems.

Frankly, this is "noble savages" thinking in which Europe is demonized as the great big evil while everyone else is good and moral and above doing terrible things like conquering other countries. Europe is not special in this regard, and all groups, throughout history, have attempted to conquer their neighbors and adopt the useful or interesting bits of their cultures. It's an enormous jump to go from 'Europeans did (and still do) a lot of cultural appropriating' to 'therefore, a Hindu deity manifesting as an English person is racist'. It might be. It might not be. It depends on the way it's handled in the story. Maybe the deity wanted to convert the English to Hinduism, and saw this as the best way.
No... Noble Savages, refers to an idealized outsider. Someone with superior culture to be preserved.
I just poked at the fact that British rule of India was Imperialism and they tend to want to continue it on BBC, which is not much different than pointing out that Asians on Television tend to be under represented and given excuses for that such as "The culture forbids it" and "Asians are only good at math anyway." (I've heard both stupid excuses).

Have you watched a British documentary on India? The word "discover" is thrown around. "Rediscover" is more accurate. Take your choice. BBC does it a lot.

I didn't say that Indians were a "majestic" "perfect" people. There are many social issues they are trying to tackle within their country (And doing a lot better than we are from one show I saw, translated, BTW--I was jaw-droppingly amazed.). I just pointed out that people taking credit for "discovery" of a previous existing culture is a type of racism, or Did you check out why it's insulting to Native Americans to be told that Columbus "discovered" America and their cultures? (First Nations for Canadians)

Poking at Imperialism, no matter what the form, is fair game. Often accompanied by "Manifest" destiny. And let's face it Manifest destiny is just racism crossed with Imperialism given religious excuse.

And for the record, I dislike all Imperialism. I find it stupid and often filled with justifications that are prejudiced to begin with.

India, by contrast, is the world's second biggest country. It is a nuclear superpower. It is not a tiny ethnic group in danger of being overrun. Hinduism is not being destroyed by English folks writing urban fantasy about its deities. If someone says something racist, stupid, or incorrect about India/Indian culture, by all means, let's all stand up for what's right. But this is not cultural appropriation.
Reductive, yet again. How many times do I have to tell you that India is quite diverse.

You have Islam, Hinduism, Zoroastrians, Christians, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikism. (I know I missed a few... picking out the top religions. Sorry.) Not in order, BTW. Many of which gods and temples are in the US. There is a Hare Krishna temple in LA as far as I know.

Can you quit lumping it as "their gods". If you don't know, that's fine, but for both our interests and the interest of this thread, it might be better to either educate yourself on even ground (as in read up on things like the British Occupation, which you already admitted you were blind to) and last I checked there were places of worship for all religions mentioned.

Plus it sounds like you've been listening to the insipid American Media rather than stepping out of that cultural context. (Which I blame on the American Media.)
European super-dominance of the planet is, for the time being, basically over. India and China are the new super-powers.
Which is why India feels the need to teach English. And in fact the de-facto Lingua Franca is English. From 2 empires--the British and American Empires.

Global Politics also has it that the people *running* the actual corporations are Americans. (And if you notice the demographics in the 2012 job distribution they are mostly white male)

China and India *produce* goods. They do not run the show. And the dollar is still the currency that runs to stock market, especially after the sudden crash of the Euro.

I pay attention to economics. We are definitely not in any soon chance of becoming victims. We are profiting quite greatly from doing things like Nike refusing to put proper masks on workers in China because it's cheaper. (Or did you miss the whole NAFTA thing.)

America is quite a super power... exporting its language, products, movies in great quantity, while refusing to import many of the external goods of the same. (or why I was shocked at Gangnam Style being an international hit)

Asia has been, from at least the 1980's (That's as far back as I know) trying to make stars such as BoA, Namie Amuro, etc, learn English to break the American market and the American Market has steadily refused. (This is a position of power one can take when your culture is being exported and adopted due to economic power issues)

Personally, I see this whole recycled and regurgiated "Yellow Threat" as an extension of the crap that put the exclusion act in place. In the meantime those countries you mentioned? They see themselves far, far behind the US. And in *some* respects, they really are.

Even our story telling conventions are getting exported as superior to many of the native Story telling conventions.

Again, it seems you are short on knowledge and are trying to argue from a US nightly news... but spend some time in Asia, or other country that doesn't speak English and you'll be shocked at how much English you'll be surrounded by. I was asking why in France they were playing English songs, when the reverse was not true... there you go, Imperialism, though indirect in this case.

(I'm pretty sure those racist Japanese depictions of black folks are actually racist, not just accidentally racist. All things considered, the Japanese probably knew about black people long before they heard about Americans, much less American depictions of black folks.)
If you want to check it out yourself, It's called the "N Word." Worth the watch, in general.

Despite that, there is no history of racism against blacks in Japan before the importation. (Importation came after the US settling troops in Japan and Korea) There is a systemic abuse of Koreans and Ainu in Japan. The documentary, BTW, systematically shows (which was made and produced by African Americans) that it was imported by American television, kinda like American television caused anorexia in Samoa.

I tend to put more weight into people making their own documentaries, though for book use, I always cross reference.

Katana (book) and Sworddancer, though are good examples of Epic fail. Katana also illustrates the really huge fail of using reincarnation, which was definitely the topic of the OP. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11788440-katana
 

Kim Fierce

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Definitely learning a lot about the Japanese language. (I wanted to take Japanese in high school, but for some reason we were only allowed to after 3 years of taking another language and I couldn't hang.)

The only people I met who were actually from India and spoke to at length were Christian missionaries. They were born in that country, a husband and wife with two kids, and visited our church every year in the summer. I was only a kid, too, so mostly I just remember the words to a couple Christian songs they taught us, so there is no way for me to really add any input except I am reading all this with interest.
 

Amadan

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Despite that, there is no history of racism against blacks in Japan before the importation. (Importation came after the US settling troops in Japan and Korea) There is a systemic abuse of Koreans and Ainu in Japan. The documentary, BTW, systematically shows (which was made and produced by African Americans) that it was imported by American television, kinda like American television caused anorexia in Samoa.

Wait, what? If you're claiming that Americans introduced the Japanese to the concept of racism, that's so wrong it's not even funny.

I'll give you Europe/North America as currently dominating global culture, to much detriment of others, but Europe/North America as the current, let alone historical, sole purveyors of racism... umm, no.


Also, this:

You need those three ingredients in order to get it to hurt. (reduction, time, and governmental power)

is wrong. I am familiar with the equation "racism = prejudice + power" and for the sake of argument I will accept it as the definition we are using here, but even under that definition, hurtful racism does not require a pervasive, institutionalized legacy.
 

Rachel Udin

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Wait, what? If you're claiming that Americans introduced the Japanese to the concept of racism, that's so wrong it's not even funny.

I'll give you Europe/North America as currently dominating global culture, to much detriment of others, but Europe/North America as the current, let alone historical, sole purveyors of racism... umm, no.
On 1. Do you have a counter source? I gave you mine. "The "N word" film. Before the American occupation,spurred by 2 white men (Perry and MacArthur) who were the epitome of imperialism came in, there wasn't a black population in Japan at all. (Or nothing on record)

The main contact to the European world was actually Portuguese. They imported many foreign substances as pure sugar, corn, hot pepper, and so on. The other contacts by Japanese before that point were Koreans (who have a history of outsider marriages. Vietnamese, India and Mongolia...) and mostly Chinese. With Japanese denying any connection to Korea, every chance they could get, despite arcaheology contracdicting that. (Attitudes have sharply reversed these days due to free importation of media between all three East Asian countries). Imperialism rose after Perry arrived in Japan. (Mostly against China, Philippines and Korea--all three populations still exist within Japan as well). Japan, then, started to attack Korea, which was now opened by the US, China, which also was opened by the US, and the Islands...

Records about Africans in Japan wasn't until later on. Which came pretty much after WWII and television... (or so the N-word claims)

When American television was suddenly imported into Japanese television, that's about the time that portrayal of Africans was done with big lips, using the N-word for "laughs", etc. (N-word film, again). Kinda weird, because the people who were made to portray all of the stereotypes that benefited white America came to Japan, pretty much on white-made stereotypes of Japanese People...

So, yes, America imported black stereotypes to Japan. (I blank asked if there were blacks before then, and I was told very, very unlikely... and besides, foreigners were sequestered before then... Even so, I was told, most likely the blacks stayed on the Portuguese vessels...) Probably around the same time as trains, etc.

Japan, for the record, has had mixed results with reversing some of the stereotypes about blacks.... In some respects, I think they've done better than the US. (for example, the whole "Blacks are stupid" got overturned fairly quickly. [Several dramas have made them good at technology, which might be mixing the stereotypes of Americans being good at technology...] The whole "blacks as a side kick" didn't get overturned. They do still have issues with "blcks come from other places than the US".) You have no idea how much media I watched for that.

But long before that, Japan was trying to suppress and bring shame to both Ainu (who are considered a different race in Japan--though through blending, don't always look the typical "white" they once were, but are still treated as such) and Koreans, (who are technically not a different race, but still hated upon, even today) Ainu would definitely have racism against them.

Korea, also has a history of racism as well... though you wouldn't recognize it from television. You have to watch the films "If You Were Me" to get that and read between the lines of some sageuk... there is less power behind it though.

Despite this, from what I've found and researched, outside of the purposeful racism, the suppression of blacks especially as supposed to the paranoia about "gaijin" (which I should remind you that the US shares... which doesn't make it any better) doesn't seem to be any higher, nor have social or governmental power behind it than anyone else. Paranoia about "gaijin", however, is still in effect in Japan, for last reports, though I've heard it's getting a little better as we globalize.

On 2. I did not say that. (Did you miss the Anti-Ainu sentiment? Ainu are considered in Japan a different race, and historically treated as such.) In summary, the tendency towards Imperialism is often followed by prejudice in order to justify it. Also, just pointing out that not all racism is white-black relations. Or just black v. the world.

And that India *did* suffer imperialism from GB, which was disputed up there (rather weakly). And still sees some of the effects of that. (Will you dispute that?)

And that the majority of the effects of global politics have come out of European rule in at least the last 200 years. (British and American, American with a White Middle Class and up dominant, as seen through the political leaders of the country.) Some of that has also led to prejudicial framing out of European ideals. (through religious and cultural justifications.) That does not exclude other country's history of racism. Just that because of global politics, Europeans have been kinda dominant in that field.... (Boxer rebellion, opening of Japan's ports, The districting of Africa haphazardly (not a country...), the Philippines, North and South America, the forcing open of Korea..., WWI for "Middle East Management" excuse (which I find lame... since it was most likely the treaties that caused it), "Manifest Destiny") Kinda been done a bit more. You can argue for China before the Boxer rebellion, but due to the factioning within Chinese history and the constant conquering of each other and the splitting, it was not as unified as the European front (Mainly, should I note, the Dutch, British, Portuguese and Spanish Smatterings of Italian in there too).

Also, this:
is wrong. I am familiar with the equation "racism = prejudice + power" and for the sake of argument I will accept it as the definition we are using here, but even under that definition, hurtful racism does not require a pervasive, institutionalized legacy.
Language gains power with tradition (repeated practice over time). So I disagree, because in order for a word to gain power, it needs a population to both agree it is hurtful and to agree on that definition, which takes time. Power also takes time to gain. Also that prejudice gains power exponentially over time.

The N-word, I believe would not have the same power as when it started if not for the history of slavery, demeaning, and agreed on hurt in order to reduce a person to a label.

Made up insults don't have the same weight as ones that have a history behind them. Add power behind those insults and I would say it gains weight. Prejudiced slurs, as noted by Steven Pinker, (From a Steven Fry documentary) are currently rated more insulting than the traditional 4-letter words. There was never any real governmental power behind the traditional 4-letter ones... but the prejudiced ones did.

Discrimination also gains power over time as well. Something that held up one day versus 10 years with language to match it... has a different meaning.

If you are going to argue that prejudice doesn't need history, at least history *does* exacerbate it.

And I would say racism is a type of prejudice. (Square is a type of parallelogram logic.)

Prejudice=reduction of people to labels+power+time

Or maybe in your argument Prejudice=(reduction of people to labels+power) <^time> <-- I know, nerdy.

Fair?
 
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Amadan

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On 1. Do you have a counter source? I gave you mine. "The "N word" film. Before the American occupation,spurred by 2 white men (Perry and MacArthur) who were the epitome of imperialism came in, there wasn't a black population in Japan at all. (Or nothing on record)

Are you arguing that the Japanese were never racist against black people before Americans came, or that they were never racist against anyone? Because obviously, the Japanese had almost no exposure to people of African descent before the American occupation, but they had a long history, dating back to before the first European set foot in Japan, of viewing themselves with a sense of racial superiority rivaled by few societies in history.

And even if you're blaming Americans only for importing racism against blacks, you know what? Racist attitudes are a choice. I am not saying American racism did not (and does not) have a corrosive influence, but to blame it all on our media and thus completely absolve the Japanese and Koreans who adopted it is wrong on many levels. It reduces their entire culture to passive children who simply absorb what they're told. It implies they have no responsibility to question and resist harmful ideas. (Do you give white people who grow up in really racist regions a pass for being racist because "that's how they grew up"?) It also implies that they were a blank slate on the subject of black people or anyone else not like them until Americans came along. No - there may have been very few Japanese who'd ever met a black person before the end of World War II, but certainly they had their own media and their own cultural mythology about the rest of the world (including Africa) which was none too complimentary.

With Japanese denying any connection to Korea, every chance they could get, despite arcaheology contracdicting that. (Attitudes have sharply reversed these days due to free importation of media between all three East Asian countries). Imperialism rose after Perry arrived in Japan. (Mostly against China, Philippines and Korea--all three populations still exist within Japan as well). Japan, then, started to attack Korea, which was now opened by the US, China, which also was opened by the US, and the Islands...

You're condensing and simplifying a lot of history there, but if you're implying that the Japanese became imperialistic because of Perry's arrival, you're only half-right. It wasn't because America "taught" them how to be imperialists (they were extremely imperialist and warlike within their own borders for centuries). It was because they suddenly realized they were a small country surrounded by greater powers, and they wanted to play with the big boys. That was motivated entirely by their own cultural imperialism - rather than taking any number of other approaches that small, weak countries historically took, they said "We need to grab us some colonies of our own before the Europeans get it all."

From a pragmatic point of view, one might argue that Japan made a pretty rational decision, even if it didn't turn out well for them in the end, but it was certainly imperialism, and all their own volition.

Korea, also has a history of racism as well... though you wouldn't recognize it from television.

Unless you count the near total absence of non-Koreans, except for the occasional white TV personality who becomes a novelty by being able to speak fluent Korean.

What's that word? Oh yes, erasure. I've seen Korean TV. You'd think from watching Korean TV that they do not, for example, have large numbers of immigrant laborers coming from other countries and being treated the way immigrant labor from poorer countries are usually treated. Or an increasing number of Chinese and Russian brides being imported even to remote farming villages.

And that India *did* suffer imperialism from GB, which was disputed up there (rather weakly). And still sees some of the effects of that. (Will you dispute that?)

I did not see little_e disputing that India suffered imperialism from Britain. I saw her arguing that India today is a rising world power.

Language gains power with tradition (repeated practice over time). So I disagree, because in order for a word to gain power, it needs a population to both agree it is hurtful and to agree on that definition, which takes time. Power also takes time to gain. Also that prejudice gains power exponentially over time.

I do not think that word means what you think it means.

You're free to disagree, but if you are oppressed in a small community that has no government power behind it, it's still going to hurt you.

And I would say racism is a type of prejudice. (Square is a type of parallelogram logic.)

Obviously.
 

kuwisdelu

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I'm not sure about importing racism, but it's definitely possible to import cultural and racial stereotypes.
 

lolchemist

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Eww... I'm not Indian but I am from a similarly brown culture and it would literally physically disgust me to find out that an author did something like this, just taking a character from my mythology and inserting it into the body of a white person for no valid reason. I would literally be pulling my hair out having to read about her *insert fancy description here* hair and her *so much better than boring old brown* eyes and her fancy pale sparkling marble skin. Unless it's relevant to the plot, why put the reader through this???
 
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