But your insistence that you don't see it as offensive is the issue. It doesn't matter that you don't see it as offensive. What matters is that there are living, breathing human beings who are suffering every day at the hand of systematic and individual oppression and racism who have said it is offensive, so out of…

I am NOT Native so I sometimes feel awkward having these conversations. But I did work hard in the Native American Studies offerings when I was in school, contributing to efforts to transcribe treaties and build an interactive dictionary software so the Miami tribe could teach more members their language. This is…

Judging by your spelling of the word "offence" I'm going to guess that you are from Europe, because if you are Canadian or Australian and have lived in a country where Native rights are still an every day, in and out issue, you should know better.

I hate to say it but, not being from North America or Australia, you don't have a perspective on Native rights and the treatment of Native peoples that jives with reality actually is.

You obviously don't come over to GroupThink all that often...we've raged about all of those things...maybe not Elvis, but certainly appropriation of black music.

Come be Godzilla and destroy our cities!

Just remind me to dose myself on Allegra first and we'll be solid. ;) I haven't been to LA in more than ten years...seems like it might be time.

And I have this whole collection of books I want to lend you! And we can talk about superhero NUNS!

Oh oh, you should also add some Charles De Lint to your list. I like starting with Someplace to be Flying, but there are a lot that are great. Most are set in the same "universe" (urban fantasy and human belief fuels gods and magic, mostly Native/Celtic in origin) and you don't need to read them in any specific…

When you get to this kind of ethnography, the terminology is changing very quickly as more and more Native people get involved in determining the course of study and how it gets expressed. The University of British Columbia hast started covering up some of the more sacred masks in their collection out of respect for…

I CALL DIBS ON TINA.

My education drew no distinct boundaries between the phrases. Totem was used more often to refer to a physical object than a representational relationship, but I don't remember in all my years of anthropological academia much consistency between which writers called them which things.

Umberto Ecco is also good for you. He feeds the soul.

The point is that Native Americans find it offensive, and your argument is that doesn't matter because other cultures (primarily in the past) have also had some of the same elements. You are misrepresenting my argument (that it's cultural appropriation of Native religious beliefs) by inserting your own bullshit into…

My big thing is that Native American people all it offensive and cultural appropriation. That's enough in my book.

AHAHA. I can point you to some good stuff online when I'm not drinking...I'm a bit fuzzy at the moment. My dad's the Swede and since Viking burials aren't strictly "legal" any more, he doesn't have a funeral fund...he has a bail his kid out of jail fund that he gave his buddy because when he dies I'm supposed to…

Does that mean I get to sit with the popular kids at lunch tomorrow?

DING DING DING.

2013! Same as 1913, but with the INTERNET.