Interestingly, the very next paragraph of the link posted above says this
“The hoop earring has come a long way. While many women, celebrities included all love to wear them. They didn’t always have a good reputation. There was a time when the hoop earring was seen as a symbol of sexuality, and that only African American women or those in the sex industry would wear them.”
So?
Well the really big ones anyway. I never saw the big huge hoops growing up on my mother or her friends or my babysitters and I thought the babysitters were pretty “cool” back then.
So the question was are they considered “ghetto” or not? And the further quote from the link addresses this question. Not that African American women or sex workers are synonymous with “ghetto”. But despite all our middle-to-late-aged recollections of wearing hoops in our hippy days or knowing people who did, some people now consider hoops to be ghetto.
That’s the great thing about writing in the passive voice. You never have to specify who it is that considers all these things.
I never thought they were considered ghetto, but I grew up in the boondocks not anywhere near anything even remotely urban let alone ghetto so I’m not a good judge.
" Funniest thing I’ve read all day. I have become entirely positive that anyone anywhere anytime can offend someone about anything. "
YES !!
This… I don’t own a lot of earrings. I tend to rotate the few pairs that I have which include a pair of medium sized white gold hoops.
This stuff is just so stupid ! We are sending our college students to college to learn and become productive members of society , not part of the perpetual grudge match.
I wonder how far it would fly if members of sororities spray painted that pearl earrings are for white girls only and otherwise, it’s cultural appropriation.
This is just straight up nonsense and it just needs to stop , IMO
Whether they are ghetto or defiant or whatever is immaterial. This woman was simply wrong in crying “appropriation” and should sit down. Instead she chose to double down on the claim in her response…shouldn’t things like this be subject to discipline by the school when you throw out something inaccurate and hateful against “white girls”? This has gone on long enough. If you are too lazy to ensure your claim has validity (um, research anyone?) then I have no interest in allowing you to spray paint hatred.
I’m an almost 60 year old white woman working in Finance and I wear small gold hoop earrings everyday. I don’t care to wear large earrings or earrings that dangle (just my personal preference) and post earrings are not comfortable to me. Whatever…
I think it’s healthy to get laughed at when you say something ridiculous, and college is a perfect time to learn that lesson if you haven’t learned it already. This is really more silly than shocking.
I just noticed this -
I wonder if people would be more receptive if this was phrased as, why are white people considered cute when they wear hoop earrings, but not black or brown people?
Who says they are?? I thonk some hoops are.cute and some not, regardless of the wearer though!
Who the heck judges someone’s “cuteness” by the earrings they wear?
I had a gold name necklace when I was a teen. They were extremely popular and that was in the 60’s and 70’s!
I believe cultural appropriation is real. If a pearl wearing white sorority girl, never before wearing hoops or winged eyeliner, sees the writer on campus and copies her total look… that may be cultural appropriation. In the white girl’s eyes, maybe she’s just copying a cool look. She has lots of examples. Fashion designers appropriate cool street looks all the time. And then make big bucks. How do folks feel about that?
I don’t know why we want to punish someone for calling this behavior out, even if we don’t like her examples. Do some of you think any claim of appropriation is silly and stupid, or just this one?
At PITZER?!?!?!?! ROTFLOL.
To my eyes, the bigger issue is how the students who painted the mural have responded to having the story and their names appear in a campus paper. It’s a bigger issue to me that the students who painted the mural have received death threats.
Yes. Why aren’t we talking about that?
Several free speech threads are going on.
Shouldn’t they be able to speak without fear of punishment? Don’t we all support that?
Who is the “they” you’re referring to? The students who painted the mural? The student who wrote the news story?
I thought your earlier post indicated the mural painters were receiving death threats although those publishing their names had been criticized. Is that correct?
What are your thoughts on publishing the story with names?
I’m reading a statement by the college president condemning hate speech by outsiders in response to this story. I can’t link with my device. LA Times.
I am not against the painter’s right to her speech, I just think her message is ludicrous. I am exercising my right to freedom of speech in calling it that.
Publishing the story with names? Any reputable news outlet would. While death threats are way over the top, free speech is permitted, but there are consequences. People forget that. The government won’t stop you, but there are private consequences.
My comment on punishment refers to what I feel is hateful rhetoric toward “white girls”.