Parenting is a very hard job. But what makes it even harder is when people interfere with their opinions and try to make you look like a bad guy when you’re just trying to make your child feel better.
A woman found herself in a situation where her coworker called her racist because she let her white autistic daughter identify with the Asian Disney princess. And so, she went to Reddit to ask who was the jerk in the situation.
More info: Reddit
A parent’s job is to make their child feel as good in the world as possible. But what to do when your effort gets on some people’s nerves?
Image credits: MOVIE PREDICTOR (not the actual photo)
A woman was called out for letting her daughter go around telling everyone that she’s just like Mulan
Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Karolina Grabowska (not the actual photo)
Image credits: u/Sensitive-Ant-5907
She answered that she’s not going to police her daughter’s already challenging ability to communicate
The 8-year-old autistic girl’s favorite Disney princess has been Mulan ever since she was little. Mulan is a Disney animated musical action-adventure movie. It is based on the Chinese legend of Hua Mulan.
The plot takes place in imperial China. In it, Fa Mulan, daughter of an aged warrior, impersonates a man to take her father’s place during a general military draft to counter invasion.
And even though the OP’s daughter doesn’t live anywhere near imperial China, she still found quite a lot in common with the princess. Mulan “never knew what she was doing either” and since the girl always struggled with fitting in, she found that she’s not the only one. Mulan’s struggle provided her a sense of self-identification.
However, the complexity of Mulan’s character is not so clear to everyone. Some just see her as a representation of the Asian race, not much else. One day the OP took her daughter on a playdate with one of her coworkers and her child. When the subject of Disney princesses came up, the girl brought up how she was similar to Mulan. Her mother’s coworker gave her a funny look. And after the kids went off to play, she asked the mother why she let her white daughter say such offensive things.
The mother explained the context behind her daughter’s words, but the coworker still said she shouldn’t let her daughter say these things, because others might find it offensive. But the mother answered that she won’t be policing her young autistic daughter’s words because that could negatively affect her. She already struggles with communicating her feelings enough.
Image credits: Daria Obymaha (not the actual photo)
The autistic girl from the story is not the only one who thinks she and Mulan are alike. In fact, some theories are circling the internet, which state that Mulan might be autistic-coded.
Autistic-coded characters are those who are never explicitly said to be autistic in the source material, but people presume they are. Usually, it is presumed due to people seeing some traits in characters that can be found in real autistic people. Usually, such traits as difficulty in socializing, unusual thought processes, and sensory differences, to name a few, are interpreted as being autistic traits.
Some mention that defining these traits as autistic is quite a generalization and it should be noted that a person having any of these traits does not definitely mean they’re autistic.
Coming back to Mulan, some people listed traits that, according to them, prove that the princess might be autistic-coded. The list includes such traits as being socially awkward and clumsy, fidgeting with her hair, seeing herself as a misfit, and so on.
So, if we take Mulan as an autistic-coded character, the girl from the Reddit story identifying with her makes even more sense. And so, the mother’s coworker trying to make this situation bad by bringing race into it was just a jerk move.
People online were of the same opinion. A lot of them pointed out that the trouble was not a white girl identifying with a princess of a different skin color, but the coworker’s white savior complex. She shouldn’t go around telling people who they can and cannot identify with. Mulan resonates with plenty of people no matter their skin color.
Folks online decided that resonating with Mulan is not a race-specific experience and the coworker should back off
I am half Hawaiian. My family is originally from Ni'ihau--one of the most Hawaiian islands of Hawaii. My VERY white son inherited my mother's (Irish-Italian) and his father's (Italian) looks. The number of times people have tried to call him out for "appropriating" his own culture is ridiculous. This racism thing has gotten out of hand.
Yep. The worst was when white folks tried to say Morgan Bullock appropriated Irish culture because she is a most excellent Irish dancer. Irish dance schools exist all over the world because the Irish do not give two f***s if you use their culture to dance without moving your arms!
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Honestly never understood this aspect.. As a Indian, i would be really happy if someone loves my culture and wants to be part of it. My only issue would be if they doing it right. That's it...
I love different cultures, I have a soft spot for Indian clothing. There was a time a white woman could wear these and nobody would have second thought. Can't happen now, although I'd love to do it respectfully and occasion appropriate correctly just once, the jewels, sequents and colours are beautiful and why can't everybody like beautiful things?
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Gatekeeping ethnic groups, that's a new low in those fake white knight people
No, not really. It's pretty standard. Not new at all.
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I am a 62 year old white woman. My entire life, since childhood, I have admired, learned from, and tried to emulate so many good people. MLK, Gandhi, and even some fictional characters—-including Mulan, coincidentally—-who embody the kind of intrinsic qualities I want to have. Skin color and culture never mattered. What is inside is what always mattered to me. Is that racist? No, because you’re not basing it on race. Is it cultural appropriation? No, because intrinsic qualities are universal, so have no basis in culture. We humans are so much more alike than different, and admiring, emulating, and feeling like a kindred spirit with someone of a different race and culture because of who they are underneath all the surface noise means you actually SEE them on a much deeper level than most people who can never get past the surface can ever understand. OP and her daughter are perfectly fine and lovely people, the coworker isn’t, and probably never could be.
the daughter is stating out similarities based on personality. whats wrong with that?
Ok but why? Why is this a problem? I have always identified with Mulan. We share a lot of struggles. It was big for me to see a Disney princess like Mulan and Jasmine and Pocahontas and Belle that wasn’t frilly and feminine because I never identified with that. The little girl is seeing the person, not the skin color. The adult woman is being racist. In all honesty(I am white so correct me if I’m wrong), but as long as you respect the culture, it’s not appropriation it’s appreciation
The child's identification with Mulan has nothing to do with culture and everything to do with her personality. There are a few places where you can say you're appreciating and they still won't like it, like with most North American Indigenous groups. But genocide and being caricatures in film for a century probably has a lot to do with it.
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How could it possibly be racist to identify with the personality of a person from a different race? This seems like the exact opposite of racism. Mulan was always my favorite too, even though it came out when I was in high school. She's tough, resilient, expected to be something she's not to appease her family, and not afraid to get dirty with the boys. My white a*s always identified with her, and Cinderella, but who wants to be that?
Mulan and Cinderella were the best princesses. Both had talking animal sidekicks.
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Ironically, in trying to protect others, the colleague discriminates against someone with a disability.
White knights don't think about the emotional harm they might cause. The opportunity call out is just too irresistible. What they just did to Buffy Sainte-Marie... every so-called piece of 'evidence' has other possible explanations. It was all yt people doing the investigating. Nobody spoke to the nation to whom she says she belongs (who very loudly claim her as their own). They'll inflict massive emotional violence on an 81 year old woman just to be able to be "right" about something. Makes me sick.
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What Would Jesus Do? Well unless you're a Middle Eastern Jew, you're not allowed to Do What He Would Do.
I'm Ashkenazi - how much water can I change into wine before a Mizrahi Jew calls me on it? Would it mitigate the offense if I changed it into Château Mouton Rothschild? 😁
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It could just be that it's early in the morning for me, but I'm not understanding the problem the woman has. The lesson that is often taught is love everyone equally. This girl identifies with someone and doesn't see an ethnic difference. Isn't that what we should want? It is right up there with the picture/story of the white girl who befriended a black girl and said they were twins because they had the same birthday.
I saw a picture awhile back of two little boys, one black, one white. They wanted the same haircut so their teacher wouldn't be able to tell them apart. :)
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Isn't part of the goal of Disney princesses to have young kids see themselves reflected in all of them?
Yes. And as an autistic woman in her 40s, I identify with Mulan.
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I'm not Mexican, but love Mexican food. I'm not Chinese, but I love Chinese food. I'm not Italian, but I like Italian food. Should I stop eating them?
We Mexicans love you and encourage you to eat more Mexican food
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At 21 I was attending an école supèrieure in France. Played the flute, so joined an amateur orchestra. We were invited to participate in a musical event in Germany where local families hosted us while we participated. Since one of the electives I had chosen was to study Japanese language (in French!) I was assigned to a family where the husband was German and his wife Japanese. She took great pride and delight sharing her culture with me by encouraging my faltering attempts to communicate in Japanese and ceremonially dressed me in a formal kimono to take pictures. She also took me through formal tea ceremonies every day. I have no doubt some people would be outraged that I participated. They don’t comprehend the gratitude I felt nor the joy my hostess felt when I honoured her culture. As someone who identifies as agnostic, it was a near religious experience. I still have the pictures and the memories.
I was once accused of cultural appropriation for wearing a headscarf, because the way I stylled it apparently resembled headwear of african ladies. I am white. Person who accused me was also white.
White people are champions at white knighting. Any Africans I know have always been pleased if I choose to wear their traditional clothing or try their food (I could live on puff-puff). Maybe some African cultures don't feel that way, but until an African person tells me I'm appropriating something because I like dashikis, I'm gonna wear them. There are some cultures who don't like to be imitated, but they make that well-known. Most North American Indigenous people don't appreciate if we imitate them (which is fair, because genocide and residential schools and they've been caricatures on film for a century), but a lot of other places are happy to share. In Japan, it's seen as brave to put on the traditional clothes and participate in a traditional meal, because you will make mistakes, but you're at least giving it a try and you're willing to be seen a fool in order to respect the culture.
Load More Replies... I'm Mexican, and it makes me sick when foreigners want to police how we should feel when others honour our traditions like day of the dead or dress like Catrinas, or identify with any other aspect of our culture. Let us decide what we can be "offended" about, and for the record, we don't take offence on little girls.
Isn't it racist to criticise a person for taking a character of a different race as a role model?
It's also ableist to criticize an autistic child for finding someone she relates to.
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The desire to find racism, and virtue signal over it, is very strong in some white middle-class people.
Its because she doesn't really understand the problem, so she's just assuming that any kind of crossover is appropriation
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Oh please. Other than the fact that Disney characters are ready ethnically ambiguous, even neuro typical kids don’t get “cultural appropriation” in regards to emulating their cartoon heroes. A kid who we assume is actually diagnosed with autism gets a total pass for not understanding why this is *maybe* an issue. People are so insufferable now with their race to offense and outrage. Save it for the real giants and stop tilting at windmills.
I'm 55, and I don't understand why it's "maybe" an issue. I think the only issue is the coworker is a closet racist.
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My daughter was obsessed with Moana when it came out. We would play I would be Maui and she would be Moana, she loved the character, she is such a white kid, really fair, she never saw Moana for he colour, just the cool character she is. My daughter is 5 and never brings up skin colour on a character, she pretends to be who she thinks is cool. Watching her jump around the living room as Black Panther is fun to see. Kids will only see colour and difference if parents tell them about it.
NTA, I have a freind from Kenya who reminds me of me. I relate to this kid, minus the autism.
I was obsessed with Pocahontas when it came out. I identified with her just second to Belle (my #1 because of her love of reading) but for some reason I just felt Pocahontas in my soul. I even spent an entire weekend stopping/playing/pausing the VHS so I could rewrite the entire movie as a school play. Unfortunately, I did not know about copyright and all those details and didn't understand when my teacher said we couldn't perform it lol. Never really considered the race at all I just adored her.
It's always an entitled white people who always have something to say about cultural appropriation. Outwardly I don't look it but my background is Hispanic and I got so much c**p for my dia de muertos decorations by my neighbors, until I went off on them in Spanish.
I'm so tired of white people being offended over sh*t that has nothing to do with them. Not her culture, not her complaint to make. It's always white people getting offended over this kind of stuff. Stop looking for reasons to be offended and mind your business. It's completely fine to relate to anyone for any reason. fwiw, I'm white if it matters.
It doesn't have to do solely with just being white, I'm a white Mexican (because we come in all colours) and I see non Mexicans trying to gatekeep our culture even from us. I once had a guy from the US trying to lecture me about my own country and telling me how wrong I was because he only liked the "traditional old culture" and now more modern expressions of art. It was not a matter of race or colour, it was a matter of entitlement and ignorance.
Load More Replies... Not seen the movie, but is the race/culture of the character in any way relevant? I wouldn't have even known that she's supposed to be of some particular ethnic origin, just that the animator has coloured her skin somewhat.
Mulan being Chinese is definitely relevant. Shes a revered Chinese folk hero, and her time and place are the catalyst for the conflicts of the movie. But she is admirable as an individual and relatable as a hero to any child.
Load More Replies... Nobody can white knight like white people. There are some well-known things that are indeed appropriation and racism. Black American women often ask that White ppl not use the word "breeder" because of the history of their enslaved foremothers. North American Indigenous generally don't want White ppl imitating their clothing or ceremonies, which is fair considering the whole genocide residential school century of caricature in film thing. But many cultures are happy to share costume, food, etc. It takes about five minutes of Googling to figure out who doesn't want to be imitated and who is cool with it. All that being said, the child in question is identifying with Mulan's personality, not her race. It's not like she's pulling her eyes into slants and speaking pidgeon. It would be emotionally harmful to this already isolated girl to be told she cannot identify with her. But what do they care about inflicting emotional violence upon someone if they get a chance to call out?
Modern society has become absolutely disgusting. I'm about to turn 40 in a couple of weeks, for the entirety of my childhood everyone was trying to impress the importance of not seeing color. See WHO they are, not what they are....because that's the only way you can treat anyone, in any circumstance. How you treat others, your actions, the content and quality of your character, that's all that matters. It's still ALL THAT MATTERS, yet the virtue signaling outrage culture is trying to force the world to pretend that the only important parts of a person are the ones they have zero control over. Don't try to find common ground with someone that doesn't look like you, you couldn't possibly understand, don't pay any attention to what they say, how they say it or the validity of their logic, all that matters is they're ______ so you have to support them, which means agree with them, even when it's simply someone getting offended on behalf of a group they do not belong to. It's moronic.
iseefractals, I agree with everything you're saying. I just want to say that race matters in the sense that many folks experience abuse because of the colour of their skin. My Black friend tells me stories about being spit on in the street because she grew up in Klan country. So it's important to care about what people do endure due to racism. Where I grew up, they treat Indigenous folks as subhuman. It's disgusting, and I see how my friends are traumatized, and sometimes I must offer comfort and listen to them talk about an experience I'll never live. Character matters in a person. You are absolutely right. But when it comes to our nonWhite friends, racism has in part shaped who they are, so accepting it exists helps us be a better friend. I have seen people call my Black friend the n-word, and I make them regret it. We have to stand up to the real racism. Random white-knighting like the woman in the post takes attention away from real racism, which might be why they do it.
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White woman here, and also not a parent. The way I see it, kids don't see "race" like adults do. Racism is taught, and the second lady is the one who is being offensive. Shame on her but good on the mom for defending her kid!
As a Chinese person, I'm totally fine with a white girl idolising Mulan. If I was able to idolise Belle when I was eight, then there shouldn't be a problem with her relating to Mulan. As long as you're not being offensive, I'm cool with other people interacting with my culture.
Kids seem to celebrate finding themselves similar to others, until the adults around them beat it out of them. :(
This appropriation thing is getting more and more out of hand! I'm not american, and english isn't my first language, but even I understand that appropriation means taking something and calling it your own! How can people say that someone liking aspects of a different culture, be it food, music, etc., can mean appropriation?! So each of those people only listen to their culture's music and eat their culture's food?! That's just nonsense! If I want to cook myself an italian dinner, that's not appropriation! That's just me, cooking and it's a sign of appreciation for another culture's cuisine...... It just baffles me how people can be so oblivious and easily offended....
Another White person making racism all about them. That is so very common among a certain segment of wealthy White people, with women being more likely, but far from exclusively. It's a bunch of people who want to feel good about themselves and feel that they are the True Moral Persons, but are actually cowardly, miserly, and Too Delicate for physical discomfort. So donations, protest, working with others, or confrontation with anybody who can hurt them is out of the question. So they express extreme outrage on the internet, against children, and against people who look unlikely to retaliate.
Instead of discussing racism you should be looking at prejudice in general. You have just shown in one comment that you are prejudiced against white people, wealthy white women in particular. I’m a white woman, I do ok financially, I don’t have any particular urge to be moral and I have definitely been known to express outrage on the internet. I’m doing it now. The post we are discussing is not a wealthy white woman expressing extreme outrage on the internet. The woman’s wealth isn’t mentioned and she expressed her opinion to her friend who wrote this post. She’s a complete idiot and she’s definitely a white woman but you are no better than she is. Racism is discrimination against someone because of their race. That’s what you just did. Sexism is discrimination against someone because of their gender. You did that too. Oh look. Someone retaliated.
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This is in no way, shape or form exclusive to the US. I go to college in Germany and it's pretty much the same here.
Load More Replies... I am half Hawaiian. My family is originally from Ni'ihau--one of the most Hawaiian islands of Hawaii. My VERY white son inherited my mother's (Irish-Italian) and his father's (Italian) looks. The number of times people have tried to call him out for "appropriating" his own culture is ridiculous. This racism thing has gotten out of hand.
Yep. The worst was when white folks tried to say Morgan Bullock appropriated Irish culture because she is a most excellent Irish dancer. Irish dance schools exist all over the world because the Irish do not give two f***s if you use their culture to dance without moving your arms!
Load More Replies... Honestly never understood this aspect.. As a Indian, i would be really happy if someone loves my culture and wants to be part of it. My only issue would be if they doing it right. That's it...
I love different cultures, I have a soft spot for Indian clothing. There was a time a white woman could wear these and nobody would have second thought. Can't happen now, although I'd love to do it respectfully and occasion appropriate correctly just once, the jewels, sequents and colours are beautiful and why can't everybody like beautiful things?
Load More Replies... Gatekeeping ethnic groups, that's a new low in those fake white knight people
No, not really. It's pretty standard. Not new at all.
Load More Replies... I am a 62 year old white woman. My entire life, since childhood, I have admired, learned from, and tried to emulate so many good people. MLK, Gandhi, and even some fictional characters—-including Mulan, coincidentally—-who embody the kind of intrinsic qualities I want to have. Skin color and culture never mattered. What is inside is what always mattered to me. Is that racist? No, because you’re not basing it on race. Is it cultural appropriation? No, because intrinsic qualities are universal, so have no basis in culture. We humans are so much more alike than different, and admiring, emulating, and feeling like a kindred spirit with someone of a different race and culture because of who they are underneath all the surface noise means you actually SEE them on a much deeper level than most people who can never get past the surface can ever understand. OP and her daughter are perfectly fine and lovely people, the coworker isn’t, and probably never could be.
the daughter is stating out similarities based on personality. whats wrong with that?
Ok but why? Why is this a problem? I have always identified with Mulan. We share a lot of struggles. It was big for me to see a Disney princess like Mulan and Jasmine and Pocahontas and Belle that wasn’t frilly and feminine because I never identified with that. The little girl is seeing the person, not the skin color. The adult woman is being racist. In all honesty(I am white so correct me if I’m wrong), but as long as you respect the culture, it’s not appropriation it’s appreciation
The child's identification with Mulan has nothing to do with culture and everything to do with her personality. There are a few places where you can say you're appreciating and they still won't like it, like with most North American Indigenous groups. But genocide and being caricatures in film for a century probably has a lot to do with it.
Load More Replies... How could it possibly be racist to identify with the personality of a person from a different race? This seems like the exact opposite of racism. Mulan was always my favorite too, even though it came out when I was in high school. She's tough, resilient, expected to be something she's not to appease her family, and not afraid to get dirty with the boys. My white a*s always identified with her, and Cinderella, but who wants to be that?
Mulan and Cinderella were the best princesses. Both had talking animal sidekicks.
Load More Replies... Ironically, in trying to protect others, the colleague discriminates against someone with a disability.
White knights don't think about the emotional harm they might cause. The opportunity call out is just too irresistible. What they just did to Buffy Sainte-Marie... every so-called piece of 'evidence' has other possible explanations. It was all yt people doing the investigating. Nobody spoke to the nation to whom she says she belongs (who very loudly claim her as their own). They'll inflict massive emotional violence on an 81 year old woman just to be able to be "right" about something. Makes me sick.
Load More Replies... What Would Jesus Do? Well unless you're a Middle Eastern Jew, you're not allowed to Do What He Would Do.
I'm Ashkenazi - how much water can I change into wine before a Mizrahi Jew calls me on it? Would it mitigate the offense if I changed it into Château Mouton Rothschild? 😁
Load More Replies... It could just be that it's early in the morning for me, but I'm not understanding the problem the woman has. The lesson that is often taught is love everyone equally. This girl identifies with someone and doesn't see an ethnic difference. Isn't that what we should want? It is right up there with the picture/story of the white girl who befriended a black girl and said they were twins because they had the same birthday.
I saw a picture awhile back of two little boys, one black, one white. They wanted the same haircut so their teacher wouldn't be able to tell them apart. :)
Load More Replies... Isn't part of the goal of Disney princesses to have young kids see themselves reflected in all of them?
Yes. And as an autistic woman in her 40s, I identify with Mulan.
Load More Replies... I'm not Mexican, but love Mexican food. I'm not Chinese, but I love Chinese food. I'm not Italian, but I like Italian food. Should I stop eating them?
We Mexicans love you and encourage you to eat more Mexican food
Load More Replies... At 21 I was attending an école supèrieure in France. Played the flute, so joined an amateur orchestra. We were invited to participate in a musical event in Germany where local families hosted us while we participated. Since one of the electives I had chosen was to study Japanese language (in French!) I was assigned to a family where the husband was German and his wife Japanese. She took great pride and delight sharing her culture with me by encouraging my faltering attempts to communicate in Japanese and ceremonially dressed me in a formal kimono to take pictures. She also took me through formal tea ceremonies every day. I have no doubt some people would be outraged that I participated. They don’t comprehend the gratitude I felt nor the joy my hostess felt when I honoured her culture. As someone who identifies as agnostic, it was a near religious experience. I still have the pictures and the memories.
I was once accused of cultural appropriation for wearing a headscarf, because the way I stylled it apparently resembled headwear of african ladies. I am white. Person who accused me was also white.
White people are champions at white knighting. Any Africans I know have always been pleased if I choose to wear their traditional clothing or try their food (I could live on puff-puff). Maybe some African cultures don't feel that way, but until an African person tells me I'm appropriating something because I like dashikis, I'm gonna wear them. There are some cultures who don't like to be imitated, but they make that well-known. Most North American Indigenous people don't appreciate if we imitate them (which is fair, because genocide and residential schools and they've been caricatures on film for a century), but a lot of other places are happy to share. In Japan, it's seen as brave to put on the traditional clothes and participate in a traditional meal, because you will make mistakes, but you're at least giving it a try and you're willing to be seen a fool in order to respect the culture.
Load More Replies... I'm Mexican, and it makes me sick when foreigners want to police how we should feel when others honour our traditions like day of the dead or dress like Catrinas, or identify with any other aspect of our culture. Let us decide what we can be "offended" about, and for the record, we don't take offence on little girls.
Isn't it racist to criticise a person for taking a character of a different race as a role model?
It's also ableist to criticize an autistic child for finding someone she relates to.
Load More Replies... The desire to find racism, and virtue signal over it, is very strong in some white middle-class people.
Its because she doesn't really understand the problem, so she's just assuming that any kind of crossover is appropriation
Load More Replies... Oh please. Other than the fact that Disney characters are ready ethnically ambiguous, even neuro typical kids don’t get “cultural appropriation” in regards to emulating their cartoon heroes. A kid who we assume is actually diagnosed with autism gets a total pass for not understanding why this is *maybe* an issue. People are so insufferable now with their race to offense and outrage. Save it for the real giants and stop tilting at windmills.
I'm 55, and I don't understand why it's "maybe" an issue. I think the only issue is the coworker is a closet racist.
Load More Replies... My daughter was obsessed with Moana when it came out. We would play I would be Maui and she would be Moana, she loved the character, she is such a white kid, really fair, she never saw Moana for he colour, just the cool character she is. My daughter is 5 and never brings up skin colour on a character, she pretends to be who she thinks is cool. Watching her jump around the living room as Black Panther is fun to see. Kids will only see colour and difference if parents tell them about it.
NTA, I have a freind from Kenya who reminds me of me. I relate to this kid, minus the autism.
I was obsessed with Pocahontas when it came out. I identified with her just second to Belle (my #1 because of her love of reading) but for some reason I just felt Pocahontas in my soul. I even spent an entire weekend stopping/playing/pausing the VHS so I could rewrite the entire movie as a school play. Unfortunately, I did not know about copyright and all those details and didn't understand when my teacher said we couldn't perform it lol. Never really considered the race at all I just adored her.
It's always an entitled white people who always have something to say about cultural appropriation. Outwardly I don't look it but my background is Hispanic and I got so much c**p for my dia de muertos decorations by my neighbors, until I went off on them in Spanish.
I'm so tired of white people being offended over sh*t that has nothing to do with them. Not her culture, not her complaint to make. It's always white people getting offended over this kind of stuff. Stop looking for reasons to be offended and mind your business. It's completely fine to relate to anyone for any reason. fwiw, I'm white if it matters.
It doesn't have to do solely with just being white, I'm a white Mexican (because we come in all colours) and I see non Mexicans trying to gatekeep our culture even from us. I once had a guy from the US trying to lecture me about my own country and telling me how wrong I was because he only liked the "traditional old culture" and now more modern expressions of art. It was not a matter of race or colour, it was a matter of entitlement and ignorance.
Load More Replies... Not seen the movie, but is the race/culture of the character in any way relevant? I wouldn't have even known that she's supposed to be of some particular ethnic origin, just that the animator has coloured her skin somewhat.
Mulan being Chinese is definitely relevant. Shes a revered Chinese folk hero, and her time and place are the catalyst for the conflicts of the movie. But she is admirable as an individual and relatable as a hero to any child.
Load More Replies... Nobody can white knight like white people. There are some well-known things that are indeed appropriation and racism. Black American women often ask that White ppl not use the word "breeder" because of the history of their enslaved foremothers. North American Indigenous generally don't want White ppl imitating their clothing or ceremonies, which is fair considering the whole genocide residential school century of caricature in film thing. But many cultures are happy to share costume, food, etc. It takes about five minutes of Googling to figure out who doesn't want to be imitated and who is cool with it. All that being said, the child in question is identifying with Mulan's personality, not her race. It's not like she's pulling her eyes into slants and speaking pidgeon. It would be emotionally harmful to this already isolated girl to be told she cannot identify with her. But what do they care about inflicting emotional violence upon someone if they get a chance to call out?
Modern society has become absolutely disgusting. I'm about to turn 40 in a couple of weeks, for the entirety of my childhood everyone was trying to impress the importance of not seeing color. See WHO they are, not what they are....because that's the only way you can treat anyone, in any circumstance. How you treat others, your actions, the content and quality of your character, that's all that matters. It's still ALL THAT MATTERS, yet the virtue signaling outrage culture is trying to force the world to pretend that the only important parts of a person are the ones they have zero control over. Don't try to find common ground with someone that doesn't look like you, you couldn't possibly understand, don't pay any attention to what they say, how they say it or the validity of their logic, all that matters is they're ______ so you have to support them, which means agree with them, even when it's simply someone getting offended on behalf of a group they do not belong to. It's moronic.
iseefractals, I agree with everything you're saying. I just want to say that race matters in the sense that many folks experience abuse because of the colour of their skin. My Black friend tells me stories about being spit on in the street because she grew up in Klan country. So it's important to care about what people do endure due to racism. Where I grew up, they treat Indigenous folks as subhuman. It's disgusting, and I see how my friends are traumatized, and sometimes I must offer comfort and listen to them talk about an experience I'll never live. Character matters in a person. You are absolutely right. But when it comes to our nonWhite friends, racism has in part shaped who they are, so accepting it exists helps us be a better friend. I have seen people call my Black friend the n-word, and I make them regret it. We have to stand up to the real racism. Random white-knighting like the woman in the post takes attention away from real racism, which might be why they do it.
Load More Replies... White woman here, and also not a parent. The way I see it, kids don't see "race" like adults do. Racism is taught, and the second lady is the one who is being offensive. Shame on her but good on the mom for defending her kid!
As a Chinese person, I'm totally fine with a white girl idolising Mulan. If I was able to idolise Belle when I was eight, then there shouldn't be a problem with her relating to Mulan. As long as you're not being offensive, I'm cool with other people interacting with my culture.
Kids seem to celebrate finding themselves similar to others, until the adults around them beat it out of them. :(
This appropriation thing is getting more and more out of hand! I'm not american, and english isn't my first language, but even I understand that appropriation means taking something and calling it your own! How can people say that someone liking aspects of a different culture, be it food, music, etc., can mean appropriation?! So each of those people only listen to their culture's music and eat their culture's food?! That's just nonsense! If I want to cook myself an italian dinner, that's not appropriation! That's just me, cooking and it's a sign of appreciation for another culture's cuisine...... It just baffles me how people can be so oblivious and easily offended....
Another White person making racism all about them. That is so very common among a certain segment of wealthy White people, with women being more likely, but far from exclusively. It's a bunch of people who want to feel good about themselves and feel that they are the True Moral Persons, but are actually cowardly, miserly, and Too Delicate for physical discomfort. So donations, protest, working with others, or confrontation with anybody who can hurt them is out of the question. So they express extreme outrage on the internet, against children, and against people who look unlikely to retaliate.
Instead of discussing racism you should be looking at prejudice in general. You have just shown in one comment that you are prejudiced against white people, wealthy white women in particular. I’m a white woman, I do ok financially, I don’t have any particular urge to be moral and I have definitely been known to express outrage on the internet. I’m doing it now. The post we are discussing is not a wealthy white woman expressing extreme outrage on the internet. The woman’s wealth isn’t mentioned and she expressed her opinion to her friend who wrote this post. She’s a complete idiot and she’s definitely a white woman but you are no better than she is. Racism is discrimination against someone because of their race. That’s what you just did. Sexism is discrimination against someone because of their gender. You did that too. Oh look. Someone retaliated.
Load More Replies... This is in no way, shape or form exclusive to the US. I go to college in Germany and it's pretty much the same here.
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