Cultural Appropriation by Any Other Name Still Smells...

Hello all, I hope your weeks have been more fantastic than the thought of playing on a life size Monopoly board (come on, admit it, it would be fun).

Well, this past week I happened to post a video on my Facebook page addressing the issue of cultural appropriation, particularly focused around "theme" parties that tend to stereotype entire races and cultures in a detrimental light (i.e. themes like "Ghetto Fabulous," "Asian Parties" etc). 

For context, and because it is an excellent piece, here is the video:

While most of the response I received from posting this originally was fairly positive. There was one comment that I received, in person no less, from a Caucasian acquaintance who is nearly as pale as I am that made me want to go high five someone... in the face... with a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird.

The comment basically boiled down to (and I am paraphrasing), "I don't see why people of those cultures would be so offended. I mean, it's just a reason to party and it isn't like we're trying to be offensive."

Sadly, I have heard this exact sentiment echoed by many white people I have spoken to about a lot of different forms of cultural appropriation.

"Come on, what's the big deal?" asks the white frat-boy dressed at Halloween as a Muslim wearing a turban with bombs strapped to their chest.

"I don't think this is offensive," says the white girl who is dressed in a "Thug Life" t-shirt, with a fake grill who is addressing everyone at a party using the n-word.

The point that these comments miss is this: Not being of that culture means that you DO NOT have the right to decide what is offensive and what isn't. (I bolded and underlined that, is there some other way I can make the "do not" more noticeable?)

It's as simple as that, just because you don't find something offensive, doesn't give you a pass to use other peoples' cultures, history or race as you please.

My family, on both sides, is Scottish. How Scottish am I? I know Flower of Scotland by heart, am helping organize the Highland Games and I can quite happily tell you where to go and what to ride on to get there in Gaelic.

You know what I find annoying? The phrase, "Oh, but Ireland and Scotland are basically the same thing right?"

Absolutely, if you ignore two completely diverse cultures, histories and just mash ancient traditions together like the ingredients in a haggis, then the two are exactly the same.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Irish, but calling our heritages the same is just not correct.

If I am annoyed by just that phrase, I can only imagine what it is like to have your entire culture hijacked and mocked publicly just because someone else thinks it is "fun" to do so.

Remember, the outfit you're wearing as a "joke" is something that someone else wears on a daily basis as part of their everyday life. You take off the costume and you return to your daily life, but that person gets to deal with the nasty stereotypes or stigma perpetuated by your disregard for their culture.

So how about next time you think, "Is what I'm doing perpetuating harmful stereotypes? If I wore this in a insert culture neighborhood would I find a lot of people who were very offended?"

If the answer to either of those questions is yes, then please rethink your plan.

As always I can be found on Facebook or Twitter (@AllisonHawn) and my books can be found here.

No Food For You

Hello all! I hope your weeks have been more fantastic than the thought of 'Swan Lake' performed by baby pigs.

While this is mostly a humor blog, I do sometimes feel the need to address ridiculousness that I see out in the world. Today is one of those days.

For months I have seen posts on Twitter, Facebook and even in the news about how those who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funding (more commonly referred to as food stamps) should have to pass a drug test to qualify.

At first blush to many I'm sure that that sounds like a fantastic idea. Sadly, that first blush would only last about .05 seconds before the negative effects of that kind of legislation would bring would begin to show themselves. So today your friendly neighborhood social worker is going to explain to you why drug testing for food stamps is not a grand idea!

Just to give you all a little background, I have worked with impoverished populations for my entire adult career, have helped the government perform studies on homelessness (I even wrote some of the parameters for state and federal programs) and am considered enough of an expert in my field that I have been asked to teach students (yes, your children) about poverty in the United States by both public and Christian schools. I've taught classrooms full of first graders and given lectures to university students.

I say all that so that I can say this; drug testing for benefits will cost the government an insane amount of money and won't actually punish the people who some (wrongly) feel need punishment. Here is why:

1. It's already been proven not to be effective at saving money. In fact Florida tried it. No really check it out. Out of the 4,068 people tested, only 2.6% tested positive for drugs (most of the positive results were for marijuana, not hard illicit drugs). The state spent over $118,000 dollars on the drug testing alone only to waste a majority of that money on people who, surprise, were not using their SNAP funding to buy drugs.

2. The government systems to run SNAP are already overloaded. In Washington state alone there is such a backlog on six-month checkups for food stamp recipients that now an automated system has been put in place with a lottery system to audit whether the check-ups have even been performed. This means that about one in twenty participants will be audited a year. Why? Because Washington State lacks the money to hire enough people to review each and every single case. 

DSHS is the largest government organization in Washington. So tell me, how much manpower are they going to have to hire to cover their current deficit plus this new drug testing program? In Spokane we don't have enough money to fix our pot holes in the road, you want money to check for every pot head? Good luck with that.

3. Drug addiction is a complicated matter. You don't cure someone from drug addiction by saying "No food for you!" You only make already desperate people more desperate. Want a higher crime rate? Deprive drug addicts of basic necessities and see what happens. You want fewer people to use drugs, how about we stop closing down treatment facilities that supposedly 'cost too much.'

4. A mass majority of food stamps and welfare recipients are not drug addicted fiends. You want to know the biggest demographics of SNAP users? It just so happens that the highest percentages are Caucasian, working families with children or with an elderly relative in the home. 

So implementing a system for a tiny minority that is using some form of drug that is going to cost extreme amounts of money is short sighted and ridiculous. Not to mention the amazing inconvenience we would, as a nation, be putting people through just to get one of their basic necessities met. It already can take six hours to do a six-month recertification, and we want to add a pee test to that?

5. Taking away food stamps, even from people who test positive for drugs, has the potential to take away food from a child. That's right, sometimes people who use drugs have kids, and those kids' only source of food is welfare. Yes, it sucks. Yes it's not right, but there it is. The majority of those who benefit from programs like SNAP and TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) are children. 

So before we blindly hurrah behind the "I don't want my money going to addicts" rhetoric, let's think about the consequences and who we would actually be hurting. Answer: Mostly working families with kids and ourselves for wasting our own tax dollars.

As always I can be found on Facebook and Twitter and check out my books on Amazon. 

What Lee Left Us

Hello all. I hope everyone has had at least marginally successful weeks (or at least been able to give failure a couple slaps in the face).

Well, in a break from my normal more jovial posts, this week I wish to honor a life lived truly in the service of others. Spokane, and the world at large, lost a man this past week who was dedicated to social justice, an ardent advocate for homeless rights and a truly wonderful soul: Lee Nelson.

Lee worked for many years as a homeless outreach worker, traveling under bridges, in train yards, through make-shift tent cities and wherever the homeless could be found to help connect them to vital supplies and services. I got the opportunity to work with him during my time as a homeless and at-risk youth outreach worker and then in the following years on various homeless advocacy projects.

Whether his name goes down in the history books or not is irrelevant, because he touched the lives of so many. Even the meanest, most hardened, train-hopping homeless man had respect and words of kindness for Lee.

This past week we had the Homeless Connect event here in Spokane (the pictures included in this post are from the event). In one day over 40 service providers came together for a one-stop-shop for homeless services, greatly diminishing one of the major barriers to receiving help: distance. This year the event, which helped 250 to 300 homeless in five hours time, was held in honor of Lee.

Lee saw my strange career from the beginning, he met me one month after I had graduated from college with a bachelor's degree in my hot little hands. So in honor of a man that I looked up to as a mentor and someone I saw as a friend, I want to impart some of the wisdom to you all that he imparted to me.

1. Treat everyone as fairly as you can.

Lee didn't care what your skin color was, what your sexual orientation was, how long your rap sheet took to print out, when you last shot up or what gang tattoo was on the back of your hand. He was going to treat you with the same amount of respect as the person sitting on the bench next to you. This meant that if he offered socks to one person, then even if the person sitting next to that person was a loud-mouthed jerk, he would offer them socks too.

Food Bank at the Spokane Homeless Connect

2. Call people out on their bullshit, but don't ever make them feel like bullshit.

I cannot count the number of times when I would be at the same homeless meal site when Lee was there and would watch as someone would be coming down from meth, or detoxing from an alcohol binge or suffering the side-effects that come from not taking their medication.

Over 40 Service Providers Gathered to Help the Homeless

 He would calmly sit there and talk to them, whether he'd known them for years or known them for minutes in the same jovial tone, "So you used again? Well, how's it feeling? Not great? You ready for treatment yet? No? Well, when you are, just let me know, we'll get someone down here to do an assessment. Here's some hand warmers your fingers look frozen man." 

It was never, "Go to treatment," or "I can't believe you used again!"

With Lee it was always, "You ready for treatment? No? Well, tell me when you want to stop feeling like crap and we'll make it happen."

That was it, no guilt trip, just a hard look at the facts. Your actions are hurting you, here's an out. You want it, it's yours. You don't, that's your choice.

3. Nothing changes without people willing to get their boots on the ground and their clothes a little dirty.

Providing Hope One Pair of Socks at a Time

Working street outreach meant that us workers had to go into some pretty decrepit places. I can remember one bridge in particular where we all knew to stay on the path provided, because everywhere outside of the path was fair game for toilet use.

While none of us found it pleasant, we didn't complain about it much either. After all, we didn't have to live there, we were just there temporarily to give out aid.

In social work you end up going to a lot of meetings (which is the true test of whether you'll make it in social work or not, can you stay awake and not kill anyone during endless meetings?).

In one such meeting there was a politician-administrator type who was pontificating about his plan to end homelessness (which was a load of absolute tripe). About halfway through his little speech, Lee put up a hand. The guy speaking ignored him. After a minute Lee calmly and quietly said, "Excuse me."

The speaker gave him an annoyed glance from behind his two-hundred dollar glasses and said, "What?"

Lee just shrugged and evenly asked, "You ever been homeless?"

"Well, no."

"How long you worked with homeless people?"

"Well I volunteer in a soup kitchen once a year..."

"So, you don't work with homeless people and you were never homeless."

"Umm..."

Lee let out a laugh, "So what makes you think you know how to end homelessness? This is the same crap-plan we've been hearing for decades, and guess what, it doesn't work. You're in a room full of homelessness experts, why don't you sit down and listen to some ideas instead?"

Lee knew the value of going out and having the experience to make actual attainable progress with people and the homeless population at large, even if that meant ruining a few pairs of shoes. There was no other way to understand the population and no other way to find ways to actually help them.

It saddens me that the world has lost another great advocate and person of purpose. However, I do know that the lives he touched across the country will be forever changed by his sense of humor, compassion and immense patience.


As always I can be found Facebook, Twitter (@AllisonHawn) and Goodreads!