Australian couple mobbed in India over Hindu deity leg tattoo

[gollygee]

My understanding is that the legs and feet are considered "unclean" and therefore that it is disrespectful to have a tattoo of a goddess on your leg.

This is a problem with cultural appropriation. People sometimes don't understand what they're appropriating well enough to do it respectfully.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-20/australian-couple-mobbed-in-india-over-hindu-deity-tattoo/6867722

They said a tattoo of the Hindu fertility goddess Yellama on his shin offended their religious sentiments, and ordered him to remove it.

"One of them came to me and confronted me about my tattoo. Soon they surrounded us and threatened to skin my leg and remove the tattoo," Mr Gordon told Indian media on Sunday.

It was reported the group quickly grew to over 25 men who blocked them from exiting the restaurant.

"A policeman arrived and said this is India and one couldn't sport such a tattoo on the leg," Mr Gordon told local media.

[hobbit709]

1. Not too bright of the tourists.

[Kali]

2. this could become an interesting thread

I can see both points of view, but it goes to show how tricky cultural appropriation can be (should I change my avatar?)

[Kalidurga]

9. Nah we have to change our names.

But, since I am not a practitioner of any religion and I love mythology I would have a hard time finding any mythological name that isn't appropriation. I like learning and taking from other cultures and I welcome people to learn from me as well. So, I think it's actually better to share culture than try to use insulating language like appropriation. Just do it respectfully like my theatre teacher.

[Kali]

10. not me

it is actually my name, and that had nothing to do with my avatar (I just kinda like her, especially since we share a name)

[Kalidurga]

11. That's cool then you can keep your avatar also

Maybe I have to worry about what I write too, I use a lot of religious symbolism in my writing despite being non religious.

[Kali]

12. meh in general if people act respectful, it is fine and most people LIKE that you are interested in

them or thier culture/religion/art/whatever

I do "feel" the irony of groups selling imagery to tourists, for example, then whining about appropriation later.

On the other hand some people have no respect whatsoever and deserve rebuke!

[Kalidurga]

13. Yeah I would never sell trinkets

that really has f all to do with culture. Owning a pair of maracas isn't making one more culturally aware. Having a Buddha statue doesn't get one closer to nirvana. So, I think they are silly things. I do have a set of pan pipes though, but that is because I like to be reminded of the time I got to listen to some very cool pan pipe players, they did "The Sound of Silence" on pan pipes. I suppose Simon and Garfunkel could have something to say about that, I think it would be "Dudes that is way awesome" I paraphrase of course. Simon and Garfunkel also dabbled a whole lot in learning about other cultures and did a lot of cross cultural music.

[Kali]

14. heh, an interesting thing that caught my eye a few years ago when I was in Germany

tons of Peruvians hawking cds at all the street festivals. Don't get me started on Sedona.

[Kalidurga]

16. Yep

I love that though. Music should be shared among all people.

[Kali]

19. oh yeah, especially hearing people play together that don't speak the same lanuguage

but bridge it with music. LOVE it!

[geek tragedy]

3. Yet another reason to not travel to India.

On the other hand, at least they didn't get firebombed because of it.

Yeah, yeah insensitive blah blah appropriation.

That doesn't provoke violence amongst civilized people

[hifiguy]

5. Agreed. Superstition is bunkum. All superstition.

Period. And violence or the threat of violence in the name of superstition verges on barbarism.

[hifiguy]

4. I'd be on the next plane back to Australia

where sanity is far more likely to prevail (IOW, no one would give a shit, as they shouldn't. The guy owns his own body, however dumb I personally may find tattoos to be.) I would also never set foot in India again.

[msongs]

6. this is a problem with religious nutters, not appropriation nt

[NV Whino]

7. Long pants would have solved the problem.

But this reminds me of the Xena episode featuring Hindu gods. Lucy and the producers filmed an apology and added it to their DVDs. Mind you, Xena played on all sorts of religious themes throughout the series. None of them deliberately offensive to my mind, but the Hindus got upset.

[Jake Stern]

8. Sick and tired of whiny ass religionists

losing their shit over some depiction of their sky daddy, sky momma or prophet that isn't 100% approved by the (Pick one) Pope/High Priest/Guru/Mullah/Chief Rabbi/Grand Poobah.

[Hortensis]

15. This guy may have been justified in not expecting to be threatened,

but why was he was so surprised to learn he was giving offense? It sounds as if he wasted much of those three years living in that southern state.

It reminds me that as an appraiser I ran into a fair number of people who treated feng shui as if it were some fun fad to pick and choose from frivolously, not as a serious quasi religious philosophy with roots that go back thousands of years. No one was ever attacked that I heard of, but they were fortunate that they did not know what sincere practitioners thought of this. This was pre- internet days. This man does not have even that excuse.

[Arugula Latte]

17. Religion again.

Ugh.

[Bucky]

18. This story comes down to religious intolerance by a mob

All cultures appropriate from each other. It's what humans do. Mobbing a guy and physically threatening him because of how he expressed himself is considerably less acceptable than the nitwit who got an "exotic" tattoo without really trying to understand how it fit into the culture he was cherry picking his cool images from.

I can accept stupid. Mean and intolerant is always wrong.