Is Cultural Appropriation Immoral? (Applied Ethics)

[@TwentySeventhLetter]

I always struggle to engage in dialogue about these sorts of things because there's just no definition of terms to work from, so there's no universally agreed upon starting place. Discussions of "cultural appropriation" usually start where they end, because social science is hard to do consistently and ideas like "culture" are so complex and nuanced that hardly anything can be said about it beyond what is intuited. Often people will make an argument that by doing X, some bad thing Y will be more likely to occur because it contributes to some gradual change in culture, but rarely do I see any significant evidence that such a causal relationship exists. It's not even that it's implausible, just that I have no more reason to believe it *is* happening than that it *isn't.* In any case, I am looking forward to seeing where this series is headed.

[@kevinmcgrath6873]

I’m not familiar with your stance on any of these topics, nor have I listened to any of your other material, but your presentation of the basic arguments on either side encourages me to continue listening. I generally find myself left of right and right of left on many subjects and so, conscious balanced discussion is valuable and unfortunately rare. Even rarer is the admission of uncertainty, which wields a greater power often overlooked.

[@angelotzovanis296]

Hi Carneades! When are you going to upload a new video on Aquinas' "Five Ways" ? Nice video btw.

[@laja6108]

Sometimes immoral. In general, I believe it's a good principle to stay away from words such as "always" or "never" because context is everything. And when I say immoral, I mean "bad," in the sense that another or opposing option could be much more efficient and rational to proceed with when the present circumstances and future implications are taken into consideration.

[@giovannaliviana505]

"Cultural appropriation" is a term invented by outrage mongers, a distortion of a legitimate concept in Cultural Anthropology called cultural MISappropriation. This legitimate concept apples *_only_* to cultures whose survival is endangered, and *_only_* to substantial aspects of such cultures (rather than superficialities like food, drink, and attire). Even the sunstantial aspects, however, can be adopted without the adopter being guilty of cultural misappropriation, if such adoption be done with respect and understanding. Taking theonyms from the sacred tradition of an endangered culture and sprinkling them into an eclectic mush of Ceremonial Magick rituals, pop psychology, and New Age philosophy would be cultural misappropriation. A White, Black, Asian, etc person who cooks enchiladas rojas is doing nothing wrong.

[@dodopod]

"Taking theonyms from the sacred tradition of an endangered culture and sprinkling them into an eclectic mush of Ceremonial Magick rituals, pop psychology, and New Age philosophy would be cultural misappropriation." Would doing something like this be worse because it impinges on what the culture considers sacred? That is, as opposed to appropriating something which is important to that culture, but is considered purely secular, like maybe names for their government officials. Also, is cultural misappropriation even supposed to be wrong? The fact that cultural anthropology is a science implies no. But the name 'MISappropriation" implies yes.

[@giovannaliviana505]

dodopod Yes, a sacred tradition is a substantial part of a culture, and contributes to its underlying worldview; some would even say that a sacred tradition is culturally-specific and cannot be taken out of that context without changing it beyond recognition. This is one of the chief differences between a sacred tradition and a religion. Religions pretend to be universal, and therefore typically engage in what might be considered imperialism of a sort. And yes, cultural misappropriation would be "wrong," from several perspectives (although I would probably prefer the use of the term "discourteous" or "dishonorable"), but that is of course a value judgment (which may or may not be subjective). An imperialistic society probably wouldn't agree that such would be "wrong." That having been said, there is also a difference between eclecticism and syncretism. Eclecticism takes no thought of a consistent product, whereas syncretism aims for consistency in the finished mingling.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Interesting opinion. The goal of this series is to back that distinction up with an argument based in one of the normative theories of ethics. Why does cooking enchiladas rojas lead to more utility than cultural misappropriation? How can we see cooking enchiladas as a virtue in between two vices?

[@johnbalfour8157]

I'm still wondering how one appropriates a culture. And, if such a thing can be done, how wearing certain articles of clothing, or cooking certain food, can reflect that meaningfully. I think, at best, someone can disrespect a culture by misusing some facet of it. Whether that can be an action that deserves a moral judgment, I don't know.

[@brooke-3615]

Exactly. I think the ethical content is derived from the intent of the individual largely. If an individual purposely utilizes articles of clothing or what have you as a means of mockery, then that's an issue. I suppose individuals can do this in ignorance, too. If an individual is utilizing something to indulge in the culture of others and appreciate it, then I think that's a great method to exhibit respect. It shows you have extrinsic consciousness, imo. If it's a condition to be appreciated in a society, then this is different, too (e.g. a foreigner buying jeans to fit into western culture).

[@pabloalvez915]

As a South American person (Uruguayan), I see nothing wrong in wearing clothes, sporting hairstyles, and playing traditional music that represents other cultures, be it mine or anyone else´s as long as you do it in a respectful way, i.e., not ridiculing or profiting from it without the person´s consent (referring to authorial rights and stuff.). There’s nothing wrong with celebrating another people’s culture and appreciating the beauty of it. Do feel free to enjoy and appreciate my own culture best whenever you feel like it, I´m happy about it. It’s a good way to break down barriers between people and promote harmony and understanding.

[@cliffordhodge1449]

It is apparent that any definition of "cultural appropriation" that may exist is grossly inadequate. In moral questions, it would seem that intent plays a big part in the right/wrong/indifferent distinctions, and to find fault in any of these cases, it would seem bad intent must be assumed. Otherwise a blending of cultural elements (as with Americanization of all ethnic cooking styles - taken from groups empowered or otherwise - by US restaurateurs) or blending of musical styles (which leads to new styles, hence new cultural categories) is morally indifferent.

[@Ashurbanipal7446]

I would propose that temporality makes this problem challenging. Say two cultures independently developed dreads ( Culture A & B). Culture A developed dreads 3000 years ago and culture B created them 2000 years ago (the date doesn’t really matter); and lets also say that Culture B still uses dreads often enough but culture A stopped using them 200 years ago, however many A’ers still use them its just not super popular [but we don’t know why every A’er uses them]. Now Culture B thinks A cannot use dreads because its culture appropriation but A thinks that B is actually appropriating their culture because A invented it first. In either case, theres no way to know if B learned it from A [but it’s plausible]. However if B did learn it from A one would be hard pressed to call it cultural appropriation; but if one would find it hard to call that appropriation then on the same basis one should not say A being inspired by B appropriation. Again, in either case, you’re decision is completely arbitrary and to compound the issue many people from A and B are perspectivists anyways which makes any objective postulate based on an intrinsic value of a cultural norm as nonsensical as it is contradictory, upon that many could also take a perennialist attitude and still contradict themselves. I think that ultimately abiding by your own cultural norms makes the most sense: if it’s permissible to adopt other cultural attitudes then do so, if you believe in a common brotherhood of man then it does not matter anyways, if you do not believe that essence is not objective then it also does not matter (if a dreamcatcher is just a physical thing with only a perspective to interpret).

[@thisismyname9569]

1) The question is incoherent. The correct question is: Should we *consider* X immoral? 2) Whatever we decide, it is a *preference* , not a fact. The decision does not say anything about whether it is true or false that this instance of cultural appropriation is moral or not - that would be incoherent - only what we prefer. Usually the decision has to do with finding a balance between freedom, power, prestige, jobs, that kind of stuff. We will all tend to see it in a way which is in our own perceived interests. This means there will be more than one reasonable ( not 'correct '- that would be incoherent ) opinion. 3) A large fraction of our preferences are learned. A black person might have thought nothing about seeing a white person with dreadlocks. After attending some gender studies or critical theory classes where they were taught this is bad, they might *learn* to feel this is bad so strongly that they will confront a white person with them on a viral video becoming a hero to some and a laughing stock to others. 4) Any "theory" which considers it always moral or always immoral is not to be taken seriously. Life is complicated. 5) In some cases, people will complain about cultural appropriation to virtue signal. People in China had no problem with the qipao thing, although if the critical theory propagandists start making in roads over there - God forbid - they will discover that they were offended, they just didn't know it before. 6) There are no derogatory terms, only terms that we *consider* derogatory.

[@dodopod]

"The question is incoherent. The correct question is: Should we consider X immoral?" I think you misunderstand. The question he's asking in this series isn't "Is cultural appropriation immoral?" per se. It's actually "If, hypothetically, consequentialism/deontology/virtue ethics were true, would cultural appropriation be immoral?" It's a purely hypothetical question. It doesn't require anything to be im/moral in reality, only within the context of the theory. But out of curiosity, why do you consider the question incoherent?

[@Paradoxarn.]

I think this comment very clearly shows that moral non-realists can be just as dogmatic as moral realists. Even worse it seems to me that it is in fact containing an internal conflict: To say that morality (or what we consider to be moral) is merely a matter of preference and to then say that some ethical theories are not to be taken seriously because they are too simplistic seems hard to reconcile. Sure one might prefer more complex "theories" (the quotation marks are appropriate since real theories are a set of propositions concerning facts rather than a organized expression of preferences) but since we are merely talking about preferences, it does not really make sense to say that some "theories" shouldn't be taken seriously. It's either childish or thuggish to say that some preferences shouldn't be taken seriously because I prefer that they not be taken seriously. Personally I think that it is moral non-realism of the kind one can see above and the fact-value distinction which it is based upon which is incoherent.

[@thisismyname9569]

dodopod - By analogy, I might say a painting is ugly, but in reality that is not a property of the painting itself, rather it is my opinion or reaction to that painting. We usually express it AS IF it were a property of the painting itself but strictly speaking that is incoherent because paintings don't THEMSELVES have that property, it is a property we ascribe to the painting based on how we perceive it. Otherwise, there could be no difference of opinion on the beauty of a painting and someone saying it is beautiful would be wrong. Likewise, it is common for us to ascribe the properties 'moral' or 'immoral' to an action, such as cultural appropriation, but strictly speaking that is our reaction to the action. It is incoherent to say cultural appropriation IS immoral because immorality is not a possible property of the action itself. "Wore a sombrero to a party" would be a property of an action itself ( if someone wore a sombrero to a party ), but "is immoral" isn't, it is a judgement about the action, and different people can and do have different preferences about it without one being right and the other wrong, even though we discuss it using that language. You are right that in these videos he explores different points of view about the question. I just gave my own opinion on the matter, namely, there is no right or wrong, it is a matter of preference. Of course, the consequences of our preference are not all matters of opinion. If society condemns sombrero wearing to parties, people won't wear sombreros to parties, if it doesn't they will. There will also be many other important consequences to our preferences, but what we prefer is still, well, a preference.

[@thisismyname9569]

Paradoxarn -We can't say that all cultural appropriation is moral or immoral because we can't even define cultural appropriation (CA) well enough to do that. I am in the Northeast. If I wear a Texas style cowboy hat, is that CA? That depends on whether we decide to consider Texas a different culture from mine. For some purposes, we will consider it is, for other purposes we will consider it isn't. There is no objectively correct answer. In the US, there are many cultural differences and similarities between Native Americans and Americans of European descent. Should we consider them a different culture? Of course, the propaganda of the SJWs assumes they are different because it serves their propaganda purposes of the moment. If the discussion turns to their right to live in a certain neighborhood, they will say "but they are Americans too". Are the Washington Redskins appropriating a different culture in their symbol? That also depends on whether you consider them of a different culture. The answer is not as obvious as the propagandists want us to believe. They choose the answers they give to arrive at the conclusions they want to arrive at, not because they are true.

[@monkeymox2544]

+This IS my name you're misusing the term 'incoherent' - there's nothing incoherent about the possibility of an action being inherently immoral. I think what you mean to say is that YOU do not believe that an action can be inherently moral. I disagree, I think that we can talk about morality in an objection fashion. In fact, I do think that most people who express moral relativism are themselves being incoherent, as no-one acts as if they actually think morality is relative. The idea that not disemboweling newborn babies in honour of the great Sun God is a mere 'preference' is simply absurd. No-one with access to all the available facts actually believes that that could be a tenable moral position, or at least no-one actually acts as if it could be. As you rightly point out, the consequences of our 'preferences' as you call them are not matters of opinion, they're matters of empirical fact, which makes nonsense of the claim that the action itself is a mere preference, since we can know in principle whether the action is likely to have good or bad consequences, and make a rational moral argument on that basis.

[@plsjustnathan1]

Excited to see this series

[@Arrakiz666]

"We will look at specific things that have been called cultural appropriation". Well there is your problem right then and there. Looking at specific examples will only tell you whether these specific examples are moral or not. If you're unwilling to define cultural appropriation such that you can evaluate all of it then picking examples, talking about them and then saying "well this is what cultural appropriation is like so whenever you see something vaguely like it you can refer to the way you treated that example" is meaningless. Why even call it cultural appropriation at that point? Wouldn't it have been more useful to say "here are some specific examples of morally vague stuff, let's see how our normative theories fare"? What's even the point of conjuring the umbrella term of cultural appropriation if at the end of the day you've gotta treat each case separately? You know I agree that ethics is more useful when it deals with hoods than with umbrellas, so why not ditch the term?

[@notme222]

Well said. I'm struck that his definition seems broad and yet directional. "Redskins" is included as "cultural appropriation", despite race and culture not being the same thing. Yet other instances of the same example, such as a black actor in Hamilton, seem like they are excluded. The conclusions reached must inevitably be results to these definitions, yet the premise is presented unchallenged? It sounds like trouble.

[@Arrakiz666]

notme222 I mean I'm completely fine with defining cultural appropriation such that you could apply normative ethics theories to all of it. But defining it through examples, when you admit it doesn't quite work seems just completely pointless.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Interesting point. I am not contending to defend the thesis that there is some "natural kind" Cultural appropriation which all of these fall into. Rather I am using the term to signify to viewers which kinds of morally vague situations we are trying to look at. They seem to bear enough similarities to be put together into a video, even if no assertion is being made that they are all part of the same kind of thing, because I would argue that they are not. With that said, the overall goal is to try to use these specific examples to come up with a general rule for consequentialists with respect to cultural appropriation in general. Or in other words, we will try to at the end of each of these give a way for a proponent of each of these theories to assess a novel situation which is similar to these in some important respects and come to a conclusion about how they should act based on the normative theory which they accept. We are using the umbrellas so that if a new hood shows up, the proponent of a particular theory can use tools which were used on other similar hoods to deal with the new hood. The umbrella is just to help someone see if a hood is more like one set of hoods or another. It may be that there are not enough commonalities to come up with an umbrella rule and specific rules may need be applied to each category. That is what we are trying to figure out.

[@a.b3748]

The audio quality is really crunchy

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Darn, I was going for salty and crispy. :)

[@geraldine2527]

I was looking for the video that addresses the moral dilema with virtue ethics, I cannot find it😢

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

What moral dilemma are you looking for? I have several videos on virtue ethics: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gIG5Y36pjLKFnMU, kzbin.info/www/bejne/nWLLhKSmhK6Grsk, kzbin.info/www/bejne/enu8f6hooraCaMU

[@legerarts]

What about art taken/received in colonial times?

[@brooke-3615]

God, I love this channel. This is exactly what I was looking for!

[@matthewvillarreal9359]

My main objection to the exploitation argument is that, while it is unfair that the culture in power benefits while the disempowered culture does not benefit, the problem is not that the culture in power benefits but that the disempowered culture does not benefit. The solution is not to keep those in power from benefitting from a culture from doing so but to fight for the rights of disempowered people to be able to benefit from their culture. How might someone reply to my objection though? I’m genuinely curious

[@cliffordhodge1449]

Suppose my friend (an actual hillbilly) and I dress as hillbillies for Halloween. That is not ipso facto evil. People who don't like it claim "cultural appropriation" as a basis for condemnation because they cannot see into our souls to determine intent. I wouldn't bother dragging "cultural appropriation" into this unless it could be demonstrated that someone actually has a coherent account of what it is. When philosophy starts taking its cues from the internet homepages, it appropriates notions from popular culture to use as if they were well-considered and -analyzed philosophical positions. Cultural blending is a benefit derived from a pluralistic society. People with ill intent will always do bad things because they lack judgment and understanding.

[@MaC-jn5by]

marvelous video! thanks for posting, can't wait for the rest of videos on this subject!

[@dmelo0605]

Where can I find the rest of the series?

[@Resmioglu]

what's with the power dynamic - the original premise behind all of these types arguments like cultural appropriation. Let's first define and dissect what is "power" what is "out" and "in" power... All the woke problems come up with some basic premises no one questions but they have to be dissected before we go forward.

[@zsdCKanVOIJANSO]

Minor critique. Cultural Appropriation is a buzz word, I believe if you want to find something immoral, you should use the phrase cultural Misappropriation because if you google it, it’s the correct Term

[@alijassim7015]

Very thoughtful

[@the11382]

Definitions are important as they establish the very premise of the argument. I don't consider your definition of "culture in power" to be descriptive enough. This definition should be more manageable: Culture in power: The culture determining the primary customs between people within an area. *Halloween* People are not responsible for the actions of their ancestors. If Person A's father commited a murder, should Person A be put in jail due to the actions his father committed? You would need to establish that this person's ancestors were people who massacred Native Americans. If a man migrates to America and starts wearing a native american outfit, you would need to look up his genealogy in order to establish whether or not someone is wrong. This is not practical. *Whitewashing* That a culture has more power doesn't necessarily mean it is getting more actors. The culture of Jewish people is not in power, yet there is an overrepresentation of Jews as successful actors.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Interesting thoughts. I'm not sure that definition of culture in power is sufficient as your example of whitewashing demonstrates. In a medieval town, the culture of the peasants may be the culture which primarily determines the customs between the majority of people in the town, but the culture of the lords of the town is still the culture of power there. Though I agree that the definition needs refining, or at least we need a better understanding of what is meant by power. Just because something is not practical to determine does not make it moral. It may be very difficult to determine if Jasmine killed Jeff, but that does not mean that it is morally right. I'm not saying that makes the Halloween example immoral, I'm simply saying that the "its only wrong if you can catch them" theory of morality is exceptionally counterintuitive. I think that the original point, that we should not be held responsible for the actions of our ancestors is a much more powerful argument that the second one, though I am not sure how much purchase it will hold with all of the theories, stay tuned to find out. And just because having power does not lead to overrepresentation, it does not follow that a lack of power does not lead to underrepresentation.

[@ryleexiii1252]

Oooh this gonna be good.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

I'm glad you are excited for it!

[@Phoenix-pb4sm]

I disagree with this question being asked in the first place. If anything ask "Is Culture immoral?" Because Culture implies the spread of it by definition

[@sagebias2251]

These people arguing against cultural appropriation just enjoy complaining.

[@ryleexiii1252]

De Leontology > Deontology

[@RB3Vids]

Interesting

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

It is an interesting and controversial topic to be sure.

[@yabbadabbindude]

These examples clearly pander to a particular perspective

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

As I said in the video, if you have other examples, please offer them. These are ones which I have commonly seen discussed, but I am open to adding others for future iterations. I encourage you to watch the next video to see if you agree with my interpretations of how deontology would handle these issues.

[@hjge1012]

I'm curious, do languages besides English even have a word for this concept? Because my language doesn't(at least as far as I'm aware). So far I find the entire concept of 'cultural appropriation' patently absurd, so I'm really curious what arguments you'd have for it being immoral.

[@TwentySeventhLetter]

Thinking back to the Jim Crow era of the United States, the idea of "cultural appropriation" can be observed in the form of the "blackface" makeup dawned by early motion picture actors for the sake of (mis)representing black people and creating a conception of them in the mind of the average American as still beneath white people, still subhuman, still worthy of being enslaved. This idea of one culture ("white" America) dominating another ("black" America) works to explain how phenomena like racism can sustain themselves across so many generations, despite legal slavery being abolished in 1865. Since the master-slave relationship had been maintained sociologically despite the practice being outlawed, it merely found other ways to manifest itself, in the form of capital-S Segregation. People tend to oppose whichever instances that they deem as "cultural appropriation" because they wish to work against the collective assent to the subjugation of one group or another by means that aren't as straightforward as legal slavery. In the case of the Redskins, for example, some might think that plastering the face of a Native American on the logo of a football team (a sport played for recreation) would have the effect of making light of the very real genocide of Natives that occurred only a couple hundred years ago, thus altering general attitudes towards the surviving descendants in ways to their detriment. I do not necessarily agree with each accusation of cultural appropriation, but I think the idea is at least worthy of exploration and examination.

[@Andres64B]

HJ GE nobody outside of American sjws ever thinks about cultural appropriation.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

I am not sure about other languages. English just has a lot of words (many claim it has more words than any other language if you don't count "agglutinative" (English is huge if only based on the fact it has words like agglutinative) languages which can stick roots together to from words ad infinitum) arguably because of linguistic appropriation. And yes, this seems to be a uniquely American idea since the country is much more culturally diverse than most places.

[@bobgibson7]

People are going to get upset when you start making arguments for one of the positions. Good luck.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

I agree. We will see. Thanks! Honestly I think that depending on exactly what version of consequentialism or deontology you embrace, you may end up with a different answer. Disagreements which people claim are about culture, may in fact be based on deeper disagreements about the moral systems that they use to justify particular actions.

[@ryleexiii1252]

Imagine caring about the Avatar: The Last Airbender movie.

[@jordancychosz9127]

Apollo sadly i did

[@Playmnow]

I like you are a sckeptic talking about this.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Thanks! Hopefully I can provide a more impartial view on this.

[@anonamous6968]

. I think cultural appropriation is a way for racist people to tell people to stay in their own lane. Don't perform hip hop or we will classify you as a cultural appropriator. I mean look what they did to Bruno Mars. He is a talented musician and singer but because he's filipino and performing funk, soul, R&B, reggae and hip-hop they are calling him a cultural appropriator. That's just divisive and exclusionary period. To try to control art innovation expression is a crime. To think that it's not a part of American culture after it's been playing on the radio, tv, records, tapes, cd's and now the computer. For generations all of American culture has been influenced by what black people have created. Black people deserve recognition but where it becomes divisive, exclusionary and just plain racist is when one race tries to dictate who can perform certain genres based on their skin color.

[@bjarke7886]

normative theories > descriptive theories

[@bjarke7886]

#debunkme

[@theoryismypraxis3538]

normative theories are predicated upon descriptive theories in relation of competence-performance. it is a reciprocal relationship. to speak of one withotuspeaking of another is to speak of a rectangle by speaking only of the lenght of the side b without the lenght of the side a

[@bjarke7886]

I know, that's why i ironically wrote debunk me, because its a stupid preference to have.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Interesting idea. If you think that there is some objective reality out there to discover, you probably need a normative theory at some point, but as was noted you probably need some level of descriptive theory of ethics to build a normative theory. But the hope is that once you have some normative theory it could override outlier intuitions.

[@stopreset313]

How can something that's not even real be immoral. It's a flawed perception of hateful minds. Not an actual action or concept.

[@TwentySeventhLetter]

This is the sort of thing he tried to address at the beginning of the video; try not to focus so much on the terminology and definition of "cultural appropriation" and more about the individual situations so they may be addressed on a case-by-case basis. You might think cultural appropriation does or doesn't exist, but what do you think about the Washington Redskins' name and mascot? Does it seem wrong to use the face of a Native American to represent a sports team? Why or why not? It's a matter of diving from the conceptual level into working examples and then building your way up from those examples back to some position you can realistically employ when similar situations arise in the future (because they definitely will arise in some form down the road). I myself don't care much for the term nor how it's often used but this video series definitely seems to be a use of it that I can get behind; a skeptical and curious one for the sake of understanding, not personal attack.

[@BlueLightningSky]

Can people stop arguing whether it's real or not? It's already pre supposing that it is. So questions like this do nothing but steer the conversation in a tangent.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

What do you mean by real? Do you not think that the Redskins exist? That the NFL is a giant conspiracy? The point of tackling specific examples of what some call cultural appropriation. I don't care if you think that the term does not apply to any situation and is therefore not "real." The question that we are asking here is whether those particular things are moral. Even if you think that the category of "cultural appropriation" is empty, we can still discuss if these specific instances which seem to happen, are moral or not. I'm using the words "cultural appropriation" to refer to this set of things, others have defined and used it differently, you might define it in such a way as to mean that nothing is cultural appropriation. But for the sake of this series, when I use that term, I am talking about these specific instances which share some characteristics, but not others.

[@CarneadesOfCyrene]

Agreed Twenty Seventh Letter and BlueLightningSky.

[@michaelpisciarino5348]

It is not immoral.

[@yondertf2]

0:30 Dude.

[@Andres64B]

Michael Pisciarino It's not immoral, because it's not real.