Anyway, my point wasn’t to start an argument about colonialism (hey there, Europe!) but that it’s possible.
The main reason it kinda icks me out to read this is because I know fellow white Americans who…oh, hell, I’ll just say it: I kinda ruined my late father-in-law’s love of bluegrass by pointing out that the banjo was African.
Please see many previous BB threads on privilege, prejudice, and whether or not straight white cis-male Christians are being discriminated against.
If your mother packed Indian food for you every single school day for years, wouldn’t you be ecstatic if a friend traded you for a PB&J or cheeseburger? Wouldn’t you say something like: this is yummy, and I love it even more because it isn’t Indian food?
So… as an American am I not allowed to like Eurovision? I’m confused. Whatever… I just remembered I don’t give a fuck and this is why I pretty much never tell anyone what I like or don’t like!
No-fly list for you, buddy. Using treacherous euro-technology…
You are absolutely allowed and encouraged to like it. It is just not about you.
Most of the things I like are not about me. If I was into me I would never need entertainment!
What does colonialism have to do with this? That is a completely different league and I did not make any statement concerning colonialism.
And about your comparison, I don’t think it is a good one. It is a completely different situation and also the opposite. I’m just going to state this flat out: It is not that I do not like US products and culture, it is that it is nice to have some things that are purely European.
To take your comparison you’ve made in this topic, the correct comparisons would be:
A Sami person living in an African country liking Sami folk music because it is part of his/her culture and has not the least bit to do with the African culture that he/she enjoys but encounters throughout his/her daily live and which still does not completely correctly cover his/her cultural identity.
Ah. My mistake; I meant imperialism (hi there, Europe!)
However, your example of a Sami person living in Africa and clinging to Sami culture…er, I think you evoked colonialism there.
It is roughly analagous, and it’s also not wrong. It’s simply language at work.
When people talk about “Washington” or “Moscow” passing a new law or signing a new treaty, we all know what they mean, just the same as when people talk about “The Pentagon” or “The Kremlin”. When the Vatican puts out a statement, we have no trouble saying that today “Rome” said such and such. When people grumble about “The Man” putting them down, we all know that they aren’t referring to an actual person.
Pars pro toto are inaccurate in a literal sense, but they’re not being used in a literal sense - they’re symbolic. They’re shorthand. They’re stand-ins. They’re representative of something. They have no obligation to literal reality, because they operate on the level of linguistic reality - of conceptual reality.
So when someone casually refers to The Netherlands as Holland, it’s not a goddamn attack on the collective pride of the Dutch. Getting bent out of shape over a pars pro toto out of some misplaced Nationalistic fervor is simply absurd - getting bent out of shape on the behalf of someone else who quite certainly doesn’t care is even more so.
Please explain, how does the peaceful cultural intermingling of a dominant culture
(due to politics, science, migration and trade) into other cultures is in any way analogous to the violent and bloody suppression of indigenous cultures by a military power, who thinks they have a superior culture?
Please explain, why do you ignore the part were it is being said that the Sami person enjoys the culture where he/she is residing? (and is thus not as such “clinging to Sami culture”) Why do you think this has anything to do with the violent oppression and exploitation inherent to colonialism?
There’s no way for me to reconcile it with my concept of good music, either.
Oh, sure. I hope those less familiar with the contest don’t assume that that’s what it’s about. While the national submissions and the winners tend to sell pretty well, the ESC is still mostly its own world and only tenuously connected to real world pop music.
In some ways it is a lot like the Olympics. How many people genuinely give a shit about pole vaulting or track cycling? However that doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy the spectacle on its own terms, appreciating the history, the intenational shared experience, the human drama and the excellence even in something you consider pretty pointless in your more sober moments.
For that I’m grateful.
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
