Just because no offense is meant doesn't mean none is given/taken. For example. One of my good friends was in the habit of occasionally using the word "gyp." The word is a slur against Sinti and Roma (aka Gypsies). When I pointed that out to her, her response was that she didn't think of the word in that way and would continue to use it because it didn't mean that to her. OK, fine, when she uses that word she's not intentionally implying that an incredibly marginalized ethnic group in Europe are all cheats/liars/crooks. But she is implying it anyway, because that's the history of the word. And a person hearing her say it has no way of knowing whether or not she's familiar with the word's history or how she intends it.
There is a difference between something like anime, which is a commercial product as well as an artistic one and one that is shipped to the West and a non-commercial religious product like the Ramayana (or the Illiad or the stories of the Dreamtime, or whatever). When you buy an anime DVD, the artists are compensated. When you act as though you are the discoverer of some great new story that is part of someone's thousand-year-old civilization, it's another story.
no subject
For example. One of my good friends was in the habit of occasionally using the word "gyp." The word is a slur against Sinti and Roma (aka Gypsies). When I pointed that out to her, her response was that she didn't think of the word in that way and would continue to use it because it didn't mean that to her. OK, fine, when she uses that word she's not intentionally implying that an incredibly marginalized ethnic group in Europe are all cheats/liars/crooks. But she is implying it anyway, because that's the history of the word. And a person hearing her say it has no way of knowing whether or not she's familiar with the word's history or how she intends it.
There is a difference between something like anime, which is a commercial product as well as an artistic one and one that is shipped to the West and a non-commercial religious product like the Ramayana (or the Illiad or the stories of the Dreamtime, or whatever). When you buy an anime DVD, the artists are compensated. When you act as though you are the discoverer of some great new story that is part of someone's thousand-year-old civilization, it's another story.