Cultural appropriation – Jill Domschot

As I’ve said before, I don’t do social media, unless this counts. I listen to podcasts and accordion tutorials on YouTube, but I have very low desire to engage with others in the comments. Therefore, I’m sheltered from much of the toxicity in the world right now. But I know it exists — it’s out there damaging others’ lives instead of mine.

Imagine my lack of surprise that while I was joking about cultural appropriation here on my blog, a long-time writing friend was cancelled for it. I suppose I can say what her penname was, as it doesn’t really matter at this point. She was writing under the name Jessica Tescher when she invoked the wrath of the black romance hashtag folks on TikTok. She had the gall, you see, to write about a black couple in her sweet romance southern-themed books.

Naturally, she thought that she should write from the diversity that exists in the South. But this is not okay because she’s white. Whites can only write whites. She was hit so hard by trolls that she trended on TikTok for a day and now, to rescue her sanity or career or both, she’s shut down all her social media. Of course, white writers can’t win in this rigged game. The narcissists on TikTok have to get attention and harm others at the same time. Narcissists do that. They play victim at the expense of other people. If Jessica were to have written her series with no black romances, I’m sure she would be accused of whitewashing. I’ve heard that accusation, too. It’s a balancing act I don’t care to participate in of having a diverse backdrop to a white-prioritized book. The diverse characters have to be given voices…just not too loud and descriptive, so as not to pretend that an outsider can know someone else’s perspective. They must still remain visible in the background, however, and yet not be stereotypes. I don’t know why anyone would bother trying to please narcissists; it’s an impossible task that will get you nowhere.

When you can’t win, anyway, you might as well just write what you want. Write from a perspective that all people are humans who feel the way humans feel and love the way humans love. Write from the understanding that not every member of an ethnic or racial group has the same experience. And also understand that racism is real because people are hateful and tribal and will ostracize others if they perceive it will give them social credit. Most people have been ostracized and rejected if they’ve lived in the world long enough, even if it doesn’t rise to the level of oppression. Therefore, write from that understanding. Write about how hard it is to fit into a majority culture.

I’m not sure if TikTok is aware of this, but when observational people like writers try to understand the world, they are opening their minds and hearts to people different from themselves. This is something we should want. We should want more empathy in the world, not less. Empathy begins with you. And me too, but now I’m simply addressing those people on TikTok who haven’t expressed any empathy towards an author who was trying to develop an audience. She certainly didn’t have that yet; she was no JK Rowling that you just stuck it to. No, you harmed someone who had a very small voice. You punched down, in other words.

What if her book was really that bad, though and deserved the hate? I doubt it. I haven’t read the book she’s being cancelled over, but I’ve read her other work (published under a different name). But let’s just assert for the sake of argument that she screwed up royally with this book. Should you have brought a mob to destroy her, or given her honest criticism? Stop! I already know the answer.

I’ve long given up hope on people being reasonable. Most people just aren’t as a rule. It was a frustrating realization I had to come at about age forty. I’m not even sure why I’m writing this post, since I know people are unreasonable. I guess hope still lives inside my soul.

I’m currently writing this post on my lunch hour; that’s how upset my friend being destroyed has made me. Normally, I use my lunch hour in better pursuits, such as staring at the wall and thinking of that moment later when I can clock off, drive home, and play my accordion for an hour. Yes, I’ve changed my schedule such that I play seven hours a week. I manage this by playing as soon as I get home instead of cuddling my doggies and slowly changing my clothes for my evening walk. The dogs can listen to my music, and the evening walk will still happen eventually. One must have priorities. Because playing gives me great joy lately, I’m living day to day off the excitement of it. I’ve solved my chronic insomnia by replacing sleep with excitement! Try it out! See how it works for you!

I can’t wait to go home and watch the sun disappear through my enormous front window while I squeeze and extend my bellows. From my window, I can actually see the whole world! Or at least my tiny portion of it. There’s so much to discover out there that doesn’t involve worrying about cultural appropriation. Please pray for my friend, as the future must look dark for her at this moment. If she hadn’t already shut everything down, I would instead exhort you to buy her book and give it an honest review. Too bad she caved under the intense pressure — would I have, too? I don’t know. I don’t particularly like being visible. It brings up bad memories of childhood bullying.

The part in quotes is a line from Corrido de Juanito, which, as you know, I’ve been learning on the accordion. Because I listen to the song on repeat, I have it permanently stuck in my head and consequently sing it all the time, especially the line above. The funny thing is the line ends up sounding like a commercial when sung on repeat, por ejemplo, “The best part of waking up is being Mexican to the top!” I’m sure you can hear the Folgers song in there, no need to spell it out.

Most of the time, I live in my musical fantasy world, my favorite songs filling my head and keeping me going after my three hours of sleep per night. But then I will have moments when reality wakes me out of my sleep-deprived reverie, and I ask myself who exactly I think I am. I’m certainly not Mexicana hasta al tope. Because of that, some old college friends might call my norteño obsession and accordion playing cultural appropriation. Is it, though? Is it really?

The accordion is German in origin; the name comes from the German akkordeon. Mexicans appropriated the instrument from another culture, in other words — from the German immigrants who settled in Texas and Northern Mexico. This is what happens when cultures rub shoulders. They influence each other. It is unavoidable, or should be. When cultures share music, dancing, and food with each other, they tend to get along a lot better than if they stay suspicious and aloof from each other. There is much cultural snobbery and myopia when people get their hackles up over hoarding aspects of their culture.

I will never forget the article I read years ago, in which a Chinese-American woman claimed the bone-broth fad was appropriation of Chinese culture. It didn’t seem to occur to her that cultures all over the world might have been cooking bone broths for millennia. This doesn’t even fall under the category of sharing; it rather signifies our forebears’ mutual necessity to utilize all parts of the animals they slaughtered. The Chinese were not alone in this.

If I were to only play the music of my culture, I would play the fiddle or one of those tiny accordions popular with hillbillies and the Irish. My family was part of Irish dance culture for years, and I distinctly recall hearing the accordion playing the same jigs and reels fifty times over. I mean, it’s not a matter of recall. All those jigs and reels are indelibly printed on my psyche along with big wigs and bling. But alas, the Irish don’t count Americans of Irish ancestry as being Irish, and there goes my culture. Like so many Americans, I simply have a mezcla of cultural parts and pieces, which includes Mexican pieces because I’ve lived around them my entire life.

Is there such a thing as cultural appropriation in America? I’m going to say yes. I was thinking about this at dawn, having been awake for hours. My body was achy and sore and I thought I might like to do some yoga. I don’t do yoga, though. Oh, sure, I used to. I appreciated its efficiency in strengthening and stretching the body at the same time. I also argued with other Christians who claimed it was wrong to participate in another religion’s worship. They argued against it because yoga, after all, means yoked, as in yoked to spirits and gods Christians don’t worship. I’ve always found it a little bizarre when Christian churches offer yoga hours in their fellowship halls, but doing it as exercise in one’s living room, sans spiritual components, I thought was quite all right.

The way Americans practice yoga is areligious to be sure, but it’s hugely disrespectful of another culture’s religious practice. I’m not sure what hyper conservative Hindus, who still believe in modesty, think of Americans who do Yoga Booty while wearing pants so clingy you can see every bump and jiggle on the legs and backside, wearing the pants to show off the effectiveness of the exercise. The way we practice yoga might very well be what people mean when they cry, Cultural appropriation! It’s rude and offensive. That and maybe chintzy plastic Native American dolls and fake moccasins. Marketing off a culture we very nearly wiped out to extinction no doubt leaves a bad taste in the mouth of the extant native tribes.

Speaking of weird activities Christian churches get up to, along with showing off their jiggly booties…no, I don’t think they make moccasins or plastic dolls or even bone broth. At one time, it was standard charity in England for bones to be used multiple times, once at the wealthy person’s house, who supped on the richest broth, of course, until finally the picked-clean bones were ransferred to the poorest of the poor to make broth with. But church food pantries these days are more inclined to collect canned vegetables and beans than spare animal parts. No, the weird activity I was going to mention is doing counseling sessions using the Enneagram personality typing system. In response, Reformed-style Christians are horrified, despite the dubious occultic roots behind Enneagram.

There are no known accusations of cultural appropriation regarding Enneagram; I just find it amusing that Christians have latched onto it AND that more Reformed types are making a fuss of it. I wouldn’t care one way or the other if Christians didn’t have a peculiar problem with lacking self-awareness. They make lofty claims that we shouldn’t be looking to any other source but the Bible for help, but what they really mean is “I don’t want to know anything about what I’m really like inside.” In other words, they don’t want to be faced with their own egos. Obviously, the ones using the Enneagram are busy identifying with their egos, looking straight into them, but that is not to say that there aren’t many Christians who refuse to look.

I took the Enneagram once, at my husband’s insistence, as he found it gave him an accurate description of his personality. Modern Enneagram type descriptions are incredibly detailed, unlike the truly occultic horoscopes. This might be why some people have an aversion to Enneagram. It’s not always pleasant to read that you fit an archetype that isn’t 100% positive. Was the type I tested as an accurate description of me? Sure, it was…at the time. And I really didn’t like it; hence, it motivated me to not be “my type” as much as possible.

Being self aware is a good starting point for making good choices in this life; I suppose one could be self aware and still make wrong choices. For example, a truly invested thief could be a proud criminal. Or maybe in more ordinary circumstances, a person might learn to identify with their negative traits and never seek growth. Well, I admit I still have personality traits I’m working on. I often shut the world out so I can pursue my personal goals, which my Enneagram description predicts. That pattern of behavior is so ingrained I believe it would be difficult to change. Like my pursuit of the accordion, for example… No, no, I have examined my interior and decided playing norteño on the accordion is a good choice. A wonderfully positive choice. It had better be. That norteño style accordion I bought was really expensive. Plus, I love singing in Spanish. Here it comes again. I. Can’t. Stop. Singing… Mexicano hasta al tope. It’s somehow gratifying to sing a song about someone with an intact culture, even though part of the song’s sadness is the subsequent loss of culture in the US, loss brought on by Juanito’s children no longer speaking Spanish.