#Good example of cultural christianity and why even if you arent really ~christian~ you still inevitably internalize christian values
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that time of the year where people melt down over the fact that no matter how secular your christmas is it is still based in a christian holiday and it is not seperable from that no matter how much you try because you cannot make something purely stand alone when it's so attached to its origin.
like the fact that people try and force christmas on others because "its not really that religious, so its the only good cosy holiday" is literally a parallel to people forcing christianity on others because "its not really that different from your faith, so its the only good cosy faith".
#the idea that someone is “missing out” and “not understanding the meaning because they refuse to experience it”#is itself deeply anchored to christian concepts of “missing out on redemption” and#“not understanding the meaning of jesus because you refuse to experience the word of god / holy spirit”#Good example of cultural christianity and why even if you arent really ~christian~ you still inevitably internalize christian values
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I got in a relationship last November.He have four kids.We be together all the time and he swears he loves me and wants to be with me for forever.I pick his kids up from school and all.He even calls my family is in laws and we're good together.This isn't my first serious relationship. I've have had a couple and been married too.I just have my moments when I wonder if we're moving too fast?What do you think from what I've told you?We started saying I love you within two months and I like I said,he calls my family his in laws and I do the same.He talk marriage a lot.His kids are in high school.The youngest is in 9th grade.Sometimes I wonder if once age graduate ,will things go left field?I wonder because I have a child too who's younger than all of his and you know sometimes things change after children get older and go off to college.I cook for him,wash his clothes etc.People say we're moving fast and bring up how I've been married before and do this with every man which is true but I don't understand why my previous relationships would matter with this one.I also watch a lot of tv and see how people who get with somebody who have older children,when they leave the nest things change.His youngest is 14 and my child is 6.I just wonder if he'll really stick around til my child is 18 and goes off to college.
Wow, Friend. Im a huge believer in following your intuition so if you have a hunch youre moving too fast, you likely are.
The reason people are warning you and citing your previous relationships is because the best predecator of the future is your demonstrated pattern of behavior. and they know previously this is almost exactly like what youve done and it hasnt ended successfully.
HOWEVER, this is your life. I dont want you to think your goals of lifelong marriage and healthy coparenting arent attainable bc thats simply not true. I believe you need to silence the noise of other peoples' lives and opinions and tap further into whats motivating youe fears so you can frame your mind (and thus your actions) for success.
I believe when you get clear w your partner about what you expect and aspire to (culture) for yourself it helps them play their part in making it so. Theres a lot yall just start doin without discussing and its extremely comfortable...for now. It sounds like you have a vision of how your future will go and youre not sure if he's committed to that future vision and that uncertainty is causing fear.
Heres what you should do:
Write down how your marriage and family and homelife have went from the perspective of yourself at 50 years old and 80 years old. I highly suggest marriage counseling - what would be a good timeline to speak with a licensed professional? What do holidays look like when all the kids are gone? What did they look like when they were here? What is your marriage/family culture (the daily family/home/marriage beliefs, traditions, values and customs)?
Beliefs: For example Im Christian but my ex wasnt. We agreed to let our future children choose and continue to practice our religions in our home. Our relationship had huge issues bc he didnt understand Christians have sacred altar spaces just like Ifa do. It helped me confidently leave a relationship knowing his continued violation of my sacred spaces was unacceptable (he stole my tithe money twice).
What do you believe and guide yourself by when you feel powerless/hopeless? What beliefs will you pass down? What beliefs do you want to be encouraged in/supported by your partner? Whats their role in it?
Traditions: Its traditional in my family to attend church EVERY Sunday, Tues and Wednesday for yeaaaarrrs. To have baked chicken at least twice a week. For Mom to cook. But its tradition in my bf family to go to church Sundays but had sports Mon-Sat. I didnt have that til highschool. His dad cooks a few nights a week when he wasnt traveling for work and when he did they had a nanny.
But we can agree before their in hs we want their extracirricular and spiritual lives in balance. We want our labor at home to be balanced for me as a Mother. Both are important to us and therefore our future family.
What are your families traditions each week/year? Who has to make it happen? Whats everyones role in it? What are your traditions as a couple every week/year? When will each of you bond individually with your children?
Values: Black ppl believe in pinchin a penny but some of us go too far 😂 I go years without shopping for clothes or sometimes providing basics for myself. (There were years of my life I was so broke I didnt even buy underwear lmfao). Certain values are great, some we'd like to leave behind!
At the end of the day whats more valuable than money to you? What do you want to invest time/money in as a couple? What do you still want time/money to invest in yourself as a woman?
Customs: Things we do without announcing or planning - its just our way. Ive dated men that have arrived while I was at a work event. And had to network, speak to roomfulls of people at a time and theyre bored, ready to leave feel like theyre wasting their time etc. My current asks me, "Did you bring your business cards? You better go talk to that lady!" Super supportive and always in my corner actively cheering me on.
These unspoken mini-traditions we have in certain instances. Postures/roles we take without announcement. Customary practices like chivalry. That may not have a calendared time but we definitely expect to reoccur.
How will you treat/support one another when youre not making a lot of money? Who's responsible for what? What about when youre both/either working a lot - what are our roles in supoorting one another? How do we model for our children about conflict resolution? How do we best celebrate one anothers accomplishments and differences? What does a typical week day look like for everyone in the family? What about the weekends?
Beliefs, values, customs and traditions make up our individual culture. Getting on 1 page about what that looks like - what that can look like, and getting clear on it for yourself, then fielding it with your partners ideas so its really a livable life plan? Thatll melt the fear.
But you need to root yourself FIRST. and decide whats negotiable and not negotiable so you can be happy, sure and committed.
#anon#anonymous question#anonymous questions#blended families#dating advice#cohabitating#taenonymous#Aspiring Wife Anon
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Hello! This isnt meant to offend or disrespect, but if so much of witchcraft comes from european cultures (at least as far as my newbie brain knows), why is everyone ok with using that magic but its not ok to use native american and other cultures magic? Why is it just ok to use the europen one, even for people who arent european? Thank you! I hope you understand
Okay so, since I don’t have a laptop and can’t organize this answer appropriately, this may come off as ramble-y, but I hope you’ll read and ask (smaller questions) if you don’t understand something.
Small disclaimer that I do not have all the knowledge and can only give you an answer based on what I’ve learned in books and from my time on Tumblr and talking to people from different magical backgrounds.
1 - I’m going to assume that most of what you are seeing on Tumblr is American and New-Age type witchcraft. What I mean is that you will see terms like visualization, meditation, charging and energy work. These are pretty universal practices you can find (sometimes named differently) in most magical cultures and practices.
2 - Closed cultural practices are generally closed because they are something you are born into, you need to be of certain heritage, or because the culture suffers at the hands of white supremacy in various forms and they want to preserve it within themselves. Basically, if someone says “you can’t have this” there really doesn’t need to be a reason, you just need to respect that and not pester them for all the answers.
3 - There are some practices that are not necessarily requiring of heritage, but initiation and/or mentorship to be considered a valid practitioner. This includes I believe Druidry, which is European, and Traditional Wicca and various forms of it - also derived from England (?). I can never keep these straight, but Voodoo/Hoodoo does come somewhat from America and Puerto Rico(?) and is also closed to an extent. So, the assumption that all European practices are open for the taking is incorrect. Wicca that you see on Tumblr is generally Neo-Wicca, which does not require initiation into a group and does not always have all the original information (hence initiation).
4 - Most European practices that didn’t require initiation were probably passed down through generations and considered very folk-like, which means it was based on geography more than culture. Once Christians swept through Europe, these practices were left behind or continued in secrecy. Some practices even introduced Biblical influences and Jesus as a source of power. In that sense it was very adaptable and not dependent on “tradition.” Even traditional paths are highly influenced by what works, not what is expected. We have historical reference books for this (ex. Gemma Gary) and because the information is open to the public, it is generally open to you. You will not find many books on specific Native practices unless they have been shared by that particular tribe. I recommend that anytime to read something you source the author’s credentials as well. How did they acquire the information? What permissions did they have? And so on.
5 - Wicca and most popular European practices we have regular access to (books or teachers) have never turned people away because of heritage (or if they have they are probably racist) so in that sense there’s no reason why people can’t learn about them freely. There are groups that suggest needing “witch blood” or whatever but that’s highly …not a real, scientific thing you can prove and just silly. PLUS minority cultures negatively affected by white supremacy here in America cannot be racist against those of us from European backgrounds because we have not been oppressed in the same way.
Tl;dr
There are European practices that are not open for everyone, so that’s just not a good point to argue. Minority cultures have all rights to keep us whites out but you can always respectfully ask - because asking is better than taking just because you feel left out.
Always do your research and never stop learning. This has not been an attack on you in any way - I just hope that this explains the subject a little bit for you. Essentially, most practices or modern adaptations are open and I’m assuming that you may be referring to religions as well? For example Egyptian and Greek pantheons are open because they wanted to share their culture - and they are not related to Wicca or English traditions at all. So.
Some things are closed. Some things require mentorship. Some cultures have died off and are being reintroduced and shared, but still ask that they aren’t white-washed for the sake of “spirituality.” You can always find what you need in places that are open to you.
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An incomplete list of Hollywood’s favorite excuses for whitewashing and why they’re nonsense
Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell
Image: paramount
Between Iron Fist, Ghost in the Shell and that first Death Note trailer, it’s been a banner month for racially insensitive casting.
But while the problem may be getting extra attention right now, it’s not new and it doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon, either. In fact, with each passing controversy, the excuses have just started to sound more and more familiar.
SEE ALSO: Netflix’s ‘Death Note’ teaser trailer opens the book on horror and destruction
Hollywood’s racial bias comes in many forms. Sometimes it’s “whitewashing” casting a white actor to play a character who was originally conceived of as non-white, like the Major in Ghost in the Shell or Light in Death Note. (John Oliver has an excellent primer on the industry’s long history of whitewashing here.)
Other times, it might be favoring a white lead character in a narrative that borrows problematically from non-white cultures like positioning Iron Fist‘s Danny Rand and Doctor Strange‘s Stephen Strange as the ultimate practitioners of mystical martial arts that they learned in made-up Asian countries.
Perhaps most insidiously, it can also mean simply overlooking POC talent, and defaulting to white characters and white actors time and time again, even when there’s no narrative reason to do so. We adore Tim Burton and the Coens as much as the next person, for example, but it’s hard to deny that their films tend to be pretty homogenous.
(And we’re just talking about casting here, though the data shows that there’s racial inequality in basically all areas, at basically all levels of the industry. More on that here.)
Image: giphy
If there’s a bright side to these seemingly endless controversies, it’s that they’re making headlines moviegoers seem less and less willing to let this kind of prejudice slide. Even as journalists and audiences have become more critical, though, too many stars and filmmakers seem to be stuck pushing the same old defenses.
So in the interest of saving everyone some time, we’ve compiled some of Hollywood’s favorite excuses for favoring white people in casting and some thoughts on why each one falls apart.
Actually, this is a really diverse cast.
Eddie Redmayne and Katherine Waterston in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Image: Warner Bros.
Recently used by: J.K. Rowling, who insisted, “Everyone in Fantastic Beasts is not white.”
Also used by: Steven Paul (Ghost in the Shell), Joe Wright (Pan), Ridley Scott (Exodus: Gods and Kings), Finn Jones (Iron Fist).
Why it’s nonsense: This excuse might hold up if it were actually true in any meaningful sense if, in fact, the real problem was that detractors were just woefully misinformed about the makeup of the cast and/or the significance of their roles.
But very often, the “diverse” cast members turn out to be supporting players or even extras, while white stars get the meaty leading roles. Yes, it’s nice that America’s wizarding community has a black female leader in Fantastic Beasts, or that Tiger Lily’s tribe is a racially diverse bunch in Pan. It’s just too bad they get fuck-all to do compared to the white leads.
Even in Iron Fist, which is a bit more evenhanded than some of these other examples, there’s no question of whose story gets top priority and it’s not Claire Temple’s or Colleen Wing’s.
This argument, then, turns out to be disingenuous. It makes no distinction between a high-profile hero and a half-baked love interest, a one-off guest star, or a non-speaking extra.
This is a universal story.
Russell Crowe in Noah
Image: paramount
Recently used by: Producer Ari Handel, explaining why Darren Aronofsky’s Noah was about a bunch of white people. “From the beginning, we were concerned about casting, the issue of race,” he stressed, before going ahead to put his foot in his mouth:
What we realized is that this story is functioning at the level of myth, and as a mythical story, the race of the individuals doesnt matter. Theyre supposed to be stand-ins for all people. Either you end up with a Bennetton ad or the crew of the Starship Enterprise. You either try to put everything in there, which just calls attention to it, or you just say, Lets make that not a factor, because were trying to deal with everyman.
Also used by: Lilly Wachowski (Cloud Atlas).
Why it’s nonsense: Leaving aside that it’d actually be really nice to see a cast diverse enough to make up a Benetton ad, why should “everyman” default to white? (We can’t know the ins and outs of casting for Noah, but Handel makes no indication that they ever seriously considered the possibility of, say, an all-Middle Eastern cast.) The assumption here seems to be that only people of color have race, while white serves as a totally neutral default.
Cloud Atlas and Noah might think they’re beyond race somehow, because they’re concerned with lofty ideas but they’re still movies made by and for people who live in this world, with all of our weird racial hangups and troubling cultural contexts.
We wanted to avoid stereotypes.
Tilda Swinton in Doctor Strange.
Image: marvel/disney
Recently used by: Doctor Strange director Scott Derrickson, who in trying to avoid one controversy face-planted straight into another. It was a challenge from the beginning that I knew I was facing with both Wong and the Ancient One being pretty bad racial stereotypes1960s versions of what Western white people thought Asians were like,” he said. “We werent going to have the Ancient One as the Fu Manchu magical Asian on the hill being the mentor to the white hero. I knew that we had a long way to go to get away from that stereotype and clich.
Also used by: Johnny Depp (The Lone Ranger).
Why it’s nonsense: Avoiding stereotypes is a good goal to start with, but casting a white person to play the part of a person of color doesn’t fix that problem. It just creates a different one. The better approach in scenarios like these would be to subvert the stereotype, maybe by using the character to comment on it or simply by fleshing them out so much that they’re not a flat, two-dimensional archetype any more. Or, better yet, start by asking yourself it’s even worth resurrecting such an outdated and possibly racist property in the first place.
But we hired a woman.
Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell
Image: paramount
Recently used by: Ghost in the Shell star Scarlett Johansson, who used Hollywood’s woman problem to deflect a question about Hollywood’s race problem. “I certainly would never presume to play another race of a person. Diversity is important in Hollywood, and I would never want to feel like I was playing a character that was offensive.”
However, she continued, “having a franchise with a female protagonist driving it is such a rare opportunity. Certainly, I feel the enormous pressure of that the weight of such a big property on my shoulders.”
Also used by: Tilda Swinton and Kevin Feige (Doctor Strange).
Why it’s nonsense: We’re all for seeing more and better female roles, but gender and race aren’t somehow equivalent or interchangeable. Bringing in a white lady doesn’t magically make up for erasing a person of color. Plus, this line of argument conveniently forgets that women of color exist. Ghost in the Shell wouldn’t have been any less female-led if its star had been an Asian or Asian-American woman.
We hired the best person for the job.
Characters voiced by Charlize Theron, Art Parkinson and Matthew McConaughey in Kubo and the Two Strings
Image: Moviestore/REX/Shutterstock
Recently used by: Director Travis Knight, addressing why his Japan-set fantasy Kubo and the Two Strings has a mostly-white voice cast. Ultimately, what matters most for us is the ability for an actor to convey the nuance and the emotional truth of the role using the only tool that they have at their disposal, which is their voice, he said. “There are very few actors in the world that can do that. There are a lot of great actors that cant do that.
Also used by: Tina Fey (Whiskey Tango Foxtrot), Scott Buck (Iron Fist), Rupert Sanders (Ghost in the Shell).
Why it’s nonsense: “Hiring the best person for the job” sounds all good and fair in theory. But “best” is a subjective measure, and the specific criteria are set by the filmmakers. If they believe the “best” person for a non-white role is a white person, it means the filmmakers decided that racially sensitive casting wasn’t something they felt they needed to address.
(Keep in mind, too, that “best” can encompass all sorts of qualities that have little to do with the actual quality of an actor’s work, like how famous they are or what their public image is. It’s not as if the casting process exists in some artistically pure plane before race is factored in.)
Furthermore, there are plenty of films that seem to fare just fine with racially appropriate casts. Kubo itself was shown up a few weeks later by Moana, which went out of its way to find stars of Polynesian descent and was rewarded with praise in addition to all its of excellent reviews and truckloads of money.
Non-white stars arent bankable.
Joel Edgerton, Sigourney Weaver, John Turturro and Christian Bale in Exodus: Gods and Kings
Image: Fox/Scott Free
Recently used by: Ridley Scott, who blamed the business for making his Egypt look so white in Exodus: Gods and Kings. “I cant mount a film of this budget, where I have to rely on tax rebates in Spain, and say that my lead actor is Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such,” he said. “Im just not going to get it financed. So the question doesnt even come up.”
Also used by: Dana Brunetti (21).
Why it’s nonsense: This argument sounds kiiinda pragmatic until you start to break it down. Sure, Exodus star Christian Bale is world famous. But is Joel Edgerton’s international fanbase really that big? Is 21 star Jim Sturgess’? And why are the options here “white A-lister” or “nameless nobody”? Non-white stars exist some of them even starred in Scott’s next movie, The Martian.
This rationale also conveniently forgets that Hollywood doesn’t just employ stars it creates them. Indeed, Sturgess himself was just a scrappy up-and-comer when he landed 21, which would turn out to be one of his first big breakthroughs. Brunetti could’ve used this opportunity to boost an Asian-American actor; he just chose not to.
And yes, while conventional wisdom might state that only white-led movies do well overseas, the conventional wisdom in this case is wrong.
Why would we need non-white people in this?
Ella Purnell, Asa Butterfield, Eva Green and more in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children
Image: fox
Recently used by: Tim Burton, justifying the lily-whiteness of Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children. “[T]hings either call for things, or they dont. I remember back when I was a child watching The Brady Bunch and they started to get all politically correct. Like, OK, lets have an Asian child and a black,” he said.
“I used to get more offended by that than just … I grew up watching blaxploitation movies, right? And I said, thats great. I didnt go like, O.K., there should be more white people in these movies.”
Also used by: Joel and Ethan Coen (Hail, Caesar!).
Why it’s nonsense: Once again, this argument only makes sense if you assume that white stories and white characters are the default, whereas non-white stories and non-white characters have to be specifically “called for.”
This, by the way, is how you end up with stereotypes: by presuming that, say, a Latino character should only exist if there’s something “Latino” about the story.
And never mind that the blaxploitation genre, which Burton cites in his own defense, was created specifically because black people weren’t being represented in “mainstream” (i.e., white) movies.
This character is supposed to be (or look) white.
Matt Damon in The Great Wall
Image: Universal
Recently used by: Matt Damon (The Great Wall). I didn’t take a role away from a Chinese actor … it wasn’t altered because of me in any way,” Damon said, adding that he hopes criticism of the film will die down once people see that its a monster movie and its a historical fantasy.
Also used by: Cameron Crowe (Aloha), Ben Palmer (Urban Myths)
Why it’s nonsense: Of course you can have white characters in a story full of non-white people. Of course some non-white people can pass for white. But that doesn’t mean it makes sense to cast a white person as the star of a story about a person or a culture of a different background.
The reason it’s frustrating to see Damon in The Great Wall or Emma Stone in Aloha or Joseph Fiennes in Urban Myths is that it’s hard enough for an actor of color to snag a meaty role without getting shut out of stories that borrow from their culture or revolve around people of their heritage.
In short, as Hollywood continues to drag its feet on casting actors of color, their arguments are only wearing thinner. The only real fix is for this industry to become more inclusive.
That might mean reinventing an old property by bringing in a Native-American lead. Or launching the next big movie star from the pool of overlooked Latino actors. It might even mean gasp! hiring an actual Asian person to play an Asian person.
What it definitely doesn’t mean is returning to the same old excuses for keeping out people of color. We’ve heard it all already, Hollywood. It’s time to write a new story.
WATCH: Viola Davis is the first black woman to win an Emmy, Tony, and now, an Oscar for acting
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from An incomplete list of Hollywood’s favorite excuses for whitewashing and why they’re nonsense
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