I am sitting here this evening among the bounty of our nation and my lifestyle. I am not rich, yet the things I have on not even a middle-class income today are more than a king of the Renaissance would have. Even most poor Americans of our day have items that the rich didn’t have at the start of the previous century.
But what I am thinking about today, is the bounty we have in what our connections to the world have given us culturally. Many naysayers have talked about the evil of “cultural appropriation”. What I think about is the benefits of diversity: what we learn and acquire from each other.
Right now we are watching Avatar: The Legend of Korra via Amazon Prime. Previously we had watched Avatar: the Last Airbender via Amazon Prime. The show is just one of many that represents the cultural concepts of other cultures. Once again, the naysayers would talk about how that hurts the cultures being “acquired”. But they have it wrong.
In the Last Airbender there is this excellent scene where Aang learns about the Chakras:
One of my friends from India posted on his Facebook about how it was one of the best explanations of the Chakras. All this “cultural appropriation” is a form of cultural exchange, of cultural sharing, of communication and building of understanding.
The naysayers to cultural appropriation are the ones that want to keep us divided for their purposes. The ones who use it with the desire to learn, bring us together, and make this a greater, better world.
At The Rainbow 