Is retaining Culture better than allowing people to suffer?

I don't think so, though realistically it would cause racial tensions.

Unfortunately.

I am now known as Flyboy.

I did mention somewhere that to me an ideal world would be one in which each country can adopt any laws except those that restrict migration in any way, noone is ascribed citizenship by default and people consciously choose, once they reach adulthood, citizens of which country they wish to be. That way, people are only subjected to laws they consciously agreed with.

But that is currently impossible.

If we disagree, that much, at least, we have in common

We have that happening now. Refugee statues from Southeast Asia and Africa are sent in to the American government all the time. Mexicans are fleeing the repercussions of the drug violence here.

But there are some Americans who see this influx of migration, legal and illegal, as a threat to American culture.

"Oh wait. She doesn't have a... Forget what I said, don't catch the preggo. Just wear her hat." - Question Marc

...that would probably end very poorly, Beholderess.

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A fine question...but who gives them such protection? Put simply, whose responsibility is it to "liberate" people, and who decides?

What we have here is the same problem one runs into with any social issue; the two questions of "where do we draw the line?" and "who gets to hold the pen?" Every socio-political/economic debate can really be boiled down to this.

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

Thread Hop: destruction of cultural heritage=>good, so yes. While ending peoples suffering isn't a particularly high priority, "it'll destroy their culture" is positive, not a negative.

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lol @ Deboss

As has been said before, the issue here is not cultural preservation but cultural self-determination. All cultures change. The important thing is that the cultural community in question gets to decide how this change occurs rather than having it dictated to them from the outside.

BTW

Um wat? Hello India? Hello Brazil, where I'd wager more modernization has introduced the predominantly Catholic population to other belief systems and atheism?

Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.

Neither do I think they are inherently western or European! But the thread title explicitly asks about such cases. I mean whether you use archaic European belts, sampangs or whatever in most cases will not lead to anybody suffering. But there are hurtful customs, unjust social hierarchies, etc., and "culture" just cannot be an excuse for them. Beholderess hit the nail on the head - it can't be that we accept that people have less rights just because of where they are born.

In fact, I don't think "culture" can be an excuse for anything! After all,w hat is culture is not restraints put on individual behaviour to make it more uniform? Now, since those restraints are internalized, most people keep to them, but those who don't should be able to do so, and screw "culture". Individualism>Culture.

Hence -

But the truth is we don't have as much distinctive culture anymore as before Enlightenment or before the Industrial Revolution, and for above mentioned that's a good thing.

So, really, I guess, it's not about imposing western or European culture. It's about dissolving culture.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic

OK, this kind of got off of where I was trying to send it. My fault, really, I wasn't very clear.

What I'm really trying to talk about are the societies that are still hunter-gatherers in Africa or the Amazon Rain forest or whatever. I've heard many people say that because they're still in their "natural state" they should not be assimilated into real culture, even though that would mean they could consistently eat and live past the age of 40.

Thoughts?

Still Sheepin'

We have our own hunter gatherers society. The Government is trying to assimilate them with the main society. The Government is also providing eduction for their children, because it's really unfair if their children didn't receive what everybody's children receive.

If a chicken crosses the road and nobody else is around to see it, does the road move beneath the chicken instead?

Depends:

Do we consider free religion, free press, free speech, and freedom of assembly Western ideas?

If you don't like a single Frank Ocean song, you have no soul.

The thread isn't supposed to be about West v. Everything else, it's Modernity v. Backwater. More about whether we should give mechanized agriculture and penicillin to indigenous hunter-gatherers or not.

Still Sheepin'

But those are Western ideas.

And the hunter-gatherers are so few now that they hardly matter.

edited 7th Dec '11 6:45:42 PM by Erock

If you don't like a single Frank Ocean song, you have no soul.

Yes, but no longer exclusively. And it's irrelevant whether they matter, we're only discussing if they should be modernized.

Still Sheepin'

Not they're not, Erock.

Europe just happened to be the first to industrialize, and thus was the first to develop such values. We call them "Western" values because they then aggressively expanded and dropped them off artificially in other areas without the necessary technological development to back them up, thus creating a backlash towards them.

It's all a gigantic fuck-up you can rather easily tie to imperialism...

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This makes me think about societies which practice such traditions as ritual mutilation.

No. Go away.

Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.

Really, maybe the people making suggestions that they be kept in their natural state should have to live their life for some years, maybe they'd change their view then. It's all very nice to find such cultures quaint and interesting - as long as you aren't part of the "quaintness".

Culture is not worth human suffering, full stop.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic

Establish contact, bring them to mainstream. Provide education.

edited 7th Dec '11 7:26:50 PM by Blurring

If a chicken crosses the road and nobody else is around to see it, does the road move beneath the chicken instead?

Send linguistic and anthropology scholars, keep all missionaries away.

If they want to learn more, open the door slowly and with respect to their culture.

If they don't, back the hell out and tell them where they can reach you if they change their mind.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

But who's "they"? Cultures are no hivemind. The door must stay open for each and every individual from those tribes.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic

>Implying that hunter/gatherer societies are not real cultures

Bad boy/girl. Off to the corner with you.

What if they don't need your education or your mainstream?

This, first and foremost.

Of course, there are people such as the Sentinelese that we cannot contact, because they are very hostile to outsiders, and with good reason, some of their own have been abused by outsiders in the past.

edited 7th Dec '11 7:40:57 PM by annebeeche

Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.

@43 You can pretty much safely ignore Deboss in any conversation like this.

To the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.

Octo No they don't. It's up to how that tribe works. But every society has some sort of spokesperson, authority of some kind.

Basically it's like if an alien culture came to the American President and/or Congress and presented their culture. My government as my authority has the right to speak on behalf of me and say no or yes.

Even basic hunter and gatherers have elders or leaders. Ask the leaders. If the leaders say no, you back off and respect their wishes.

edited 7th Dec '11 7:41:51 PM by Gabrael

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur