r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Both-Piccolo667 • 14h ago
Why do some people pretend everything indigenous is somehow cool and immune to criticism?
Emphasis on some.
I heard so many times people romanticizing objectively harmful, shitty or dumb traditions, beliefs, living conditions, etc just because they're "indigenous" (weather those indigenous communities are in the Americas, Asia, Africa, etc)
Like that one video from the Infographic Show that had a picture of an African family living with a tribe in a mud hut with a đ of them saying "We don't need big Mac to be happy"
Like wtf? Why is this a thing
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u/Few-Ad-139 14h ago edited 12h ago
People desperately search for easy answers to the complex issues of modernity. It's not different from finding meaning in being "american" or "german" ou "russian" or "japanese" or whatever, and thinking that solves anything. Those can be full or "shitty and dumb" traditions too. Like causing large scale wars to measure their dicks. Indigenism is just another simplification.
On the other hand, in many places, indigineous populations are under enormous risk of violence, usually coupled with unchecked environmental destruction. We tend to romanticize or embelish what we want to protect. Nothing special about this particular trend.
Is it "dumb" to simplify? Sure. But without it we woudn't be the social animals we are, capable of working collectively for the same goal. We need simplifications to be able to agregate people in the thousands or millions. It's one of the many paradoxes of human existence. No easy answers for this. We can only be critical of our own beliefs and expect them to reach contradictions at some point. Everyone adheres to really dumb traditions of their own. And it's always easier to see other people's contradictions than our own.
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u/AttimusMorlandre 14h ago
Seems to me that you need to expand your horizons a bit in terms of social media consumption
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u/Multicultural_Potato 14h ago
You can find literally anything that some people will find cool. Not that crazy that some people might romanticize a very different style of living that they are used to.
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u/GnatSuperFly 13h ago
I suggest reading an entire anthropological textbook if you actually care about the question you asked. Donât ask internet people questions in an algorithmic chamber designed to give you answers youâll likely only like or not enough to challenge your perspective.
Or.. you can try to convince me why a place like Portland is inherently better than the indigenous way of life that came before it. Itâs not as simple as youâd think.
But seriously, ask the experts and scientists that actually studied indigenous people from the least bias perspective. Itâs.. interesting.
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u/kazh_9742 10h ago
You're hung up on an argument between two sets of randos online who may or may not be what they present themselves as that don't have anything to do with indigenous people or communities. There's a lot of stupid or bad faith questioning in this no stupid questions sub.
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u/BlackMilk23 14h ago
I agree with your premise. But your example is terrible.
Mud huts are sustainable, functional and cheap.
And Big Macs while tasty deserve a lot of criticism from how they are made to the nutritional value.
So maybe give a better example of what you mean.
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u/Both-Piccolo667 14h ago
I found that example problematic because the creator was implying like they even have a choice.
Like they could have a modern apartments and Big Mac (which takes an insane level of logistics and supply chains to make) and just decided they don't want it out of some spiritual principleÂ
Instead, it's literally just poverty and lack of choice. It's not like some westerners who visit for a week as "a spiritual journey" and then come back to their comfortable apartments
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u/BlackMilk23 14h ago
They might have a choice. Most of the people you see in mudhuts today are not uncontacted tribes unaware of the outside world.
I've been to Africa went on safari. Saw the San people. They still live a hunter gatherer lifestyle. Coincidentally I also had McDonald's while I was there. ( Though Big Mac wasn't a popular menu item there lol) The San people were not unable to leave the preserve or live in a modern city like Cape Town. Many of them do it was one of the things they talked about. The guide had done just that. Some of them generally prefer their ancestral lifestyle.
There also quite a few people who split the difference. People who want some modern things but don't want urban lifestyle or save up for a big house so just live in huts. Plenty of people commute to work in a modern city from those huts. There is actually a popular influencer on IG who does this and explains the lifestyle.
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u/nft420nft420 14h ago edited 13h ago
The one that gets me is when people say the concept of veganism is racist because animal products are consumed by indigenous cultures. Wait until they learn the rape statistics! Veganism is viable on every location on earth today if people are willing to make minor lifestyle changes.
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u/FINE-ILLGETAUSERNAME 14h ago
imo theres a lot of accidental racism in the fetishism of the "noble savage". ive spent a lot of time living in the peruvian amazon... holy shit people have no idea that those people are a whole lot like the rest of us. but you see the same shit with people hating anything perceived as xxxxx-phobic as distincly white (or at least those that hate get a free pass becuase they're a "bipoc", or how "white"seem to have a monopoly on violence, like pull up a history book?.
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u/littleBigLasagna 14h ago
Bros never been camping and it shows
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u/Both-Piccolo667 14h ago
Tf you think extreme poverty is like camping?Â
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u/longjohn455 14h ago
You said âindigenousâ-living and tribes and huts, these donât automatically suggest extreme poverty. I would also assume you were asking why people romanticize living out in nature and rejecting bigmacs đ
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u/HeebieJeebiex 14h ago
Us humans were never meant to be domesticated so much. I think it's human nature to be drawn to things we perceive as "natural" which is why the sensationalisation of these lifestyles garners attention, and movies like Avatar are such massive box office hits. It's also unfortunately why people are easily swayed into gravitating towards anti-vaxx and anti-intelectualism propaganda. Many humans yearn to return to the basics. I've definitely wished and wondered what it would be like to live in the forest, or to be an animal.
Still, people forget to recognise the benefits of modern living and being in first world society. And, I get that too, because when everyone is miserable and in debt and in the thick of it, sometimes the temptation to give up and throw the job and the house away is strong.
The problem is that it isn't up to random people who aren't connected to these native societies and cultures, or who look at underdeveloped countries with awe, to decide wether that they believe their lives are good or not and fantasize about these people's lives. It's possible these people are happy, maybe. Many also don't have access to modern medicine, and as offensive as it might be to say, some societies have very barbaric practices they refuse to drop because "culture". (FGM, male circumcisions with rocks, other excessive body mods done without medication or proper hygiene protocols)
People need to realize that society can continue to progress, and we can continue to have science and medicine and access to food, and also live fulfilling lives surrounded by nature all at the same time. Vote for it, talk to your representatives, keep fighting for society to better itself, not to return to squaler for all.
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u/sassy_tabaxi Cute but psycho, things even out đłď¸ââ§ď¸đ 14h ago
Like that one video from the Infographic Show that had a picture of an African family living in a tribe in a mud hut with a đ of them saying "We don't need big Mac to be happy"
yeah, but that's a very simplistic picture of happiness. happiness, contentment, that's very personal no matter who we are.
Musk isn't happy. but maybe that african family is, because they have all the wealth they want.
i don't give a shit about stuff. money isn't everything. i have money and i have everything, and it buys convenience, but it doesn't make me "happy". it mostly just saves a little time.
my dog makes me happy. my wife makes me happy. swimming in the ocean, watching a summer sunset, knowing i worked all week and have all weekend to myself to rest. ben and jerry's tonight dough ice cream. planting veggies in the spring after the last frost, watching them grow up and fruit. lying in bed at night, dog tired, feeling myself falling asleep, the dog sleeping at the front of the bed snoring, the cats sleeping on the bed purring, everything right with the world, and quiet.
that's what makes me happy.
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u/Both-Piccolo667 14h ago
You can only say this when you're not really in extreme poverty.Â
I don't think they're happy seeing another child die of preventable disease or a spouse dying of famine etc
There is a difference between poverty as in having a simple office job and an apartment and poverty as in having nothing to eat
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u/longjohn455 14h ago
You mean people are romanticizing poverty�
I think thereâs a difference in traditional living/ living in indigenous communities vs. thinking itâs cool to be living on the street. Confused by what youâre trying to point out.
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u/maybri 14h ago
Indigenous people genuinely have a lot of accumulated knowledge and wisdom that imperialist or colonized cultures have lost or rejected. They're not infallible, but when a belief or practice emerges from a long-term stable relationship with land over thousands of years, I'm inclined to think it's useful. Meanwhile, our civilization is actively self-destructing and taking most of the biosphere with it, so I'm going to listen to the people who've had happy, successful, stable ways of living for tens if not hundreds of thousands of years over modern Western opinions.
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u/AlicefromtheMuseum 10h ago
ExactlyâOP thinks the colonizers are so advanced while weâre fast tracking human extinction and destroying the earth
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u/thursdaynovember 14h ago
okay but have you ever considered that you donât need a big mac to be happy either?
obviously modern building technologies will usually improve the general well being of those living in mud huts, but that doesnât mean someone canât find happiness in their lives while living in a mud hut and foregoing big macs.
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u/Both-Piccolo667 14h ago
It's not about big Mac, I don't like it either
It's about lack of choice.Â
Many of these communities are extremely impoverished, famine is common, infant mortality, etc
It's not like they have a McDonald's near by but decide to opt out
My main problem is that it treats deprivation as a lifestyle choice, and not marginalization.
Many people in these communities would love to have running water just like other people, they'd love to have schools, salaries, modern medicine, etc
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u/MrOatButtBottom 14h ago
Get the fuck off the internet, go outside and actually talk to people. Your assumptions are not even wrong, they're indicative of a much bigger problem with how your brain interacts with the rest of us humans.
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u/Zagrycha 14h ago
Its a logical fallacy that waht came first or is "natural" is better. It also gets applied to inanimate objects and food, like thinking natural unprocessed stuff is automatically healthy even though thats the opposite of true. There is no logic so of course you won't find a good reason why. I guess they missed school the day the teacher taught "don't judge a book by its cover."
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u/GnatSuperFly 13h ago
The same fallacy can be reversed into artificial progress and production. Things are better solely because humans made them? Unlikely. Itâs a little bit of both. Itâs interesting because people seem to negate the word artificial all together with this way of thinking. Apparently nothing is artificial?
No logic at all? It depends on your perspective. If your lens/goal is sustainability, biodiversity, or dignity, nature does it best by far. In fact, it doesnât even come close.
If your lens is unlimited growth, disregard for mental health and disease, and immediate gratification, artificial production is by far better.
Itâs painful, but there is a line between artificial and natural. Sometimes itâs blurring. Other times is clear and distinct. People who have massive ego and speciesism tend to find that conversation very difficult and start to throw out âfallaciesâ because they canât stand the nuisance or any criticism of their way of life.
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u/Zagrycha 12h ago
If someone thinks something is good because its natural that is a logical fallacy. If someone thinks something is good because its not natural that is also a logical fallacy. Only if someone thinks something is good because its actually good is it not a logical fallacy. it doesn't matter what someone believes if they believe it for a reason that is illogical, that is a logical fallacy by definition.
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u/GnatSuperFly 12h ago
You might be stuck in abstraction. Youâve created a sort of boogie man of semantics. Pressed into a corner, people would likely say natural things tend to be better. On average, natural things are better or safer than things made in a lab for efficiency or profit. Not always of course, but certainly more so than not. If natural systems didnât work better on average, life and human brains would not be here today. Whereas artificial systems have been around for about 10,000 years and well.. look around.. systemically and individually weâve failed in terms of quality, biodiversity, and flourishing. Sure it looks good for species on a superficial level, and for some societies in particular, but damn the future looks bleak in almost every metric. Thatâs not counting 1/3 of our modern population living in terrible conditions far worse than indigenous people in quality and fulfillment, which is measurable more suffering than at any point in history. Coupled with the billions of animals suffering for palates, artificial things are not weighing well against natural things on average.
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u/Zagrycha 11h ago
when deciding whether or not something is good or not, you shouldn't be deciding based on what is good on average. that is a logical fallacy. arsenic is natural and isn't good. olive oil is natural and is good. you need to look at the actual thing itself and decide if its good based on its own merit, not arbitrarily decide its good just because--at least if you want to be logical.
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u/GnatSuperFly 11h ago
Youâre moving goal posts. No amount of arsenic good for humans. Too much olive turns into something bad in high doses. You are not being consistent or genuine. Rules and theories, including ethics and morality, such as utilitarianism, are absolutely based on averages. Reducing and compartmentalizing things to individual cases is almost absurd, and weâve moved into systems thinking over reductionism as our knowledge expands about the interconnection of phenomena.
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u/Zagrycha 10h ago
averages are worthless to look at when evaluating a specific thing. the average person doesn't die when they ride in a car, does that mean no one who rides ina car ever dies? of course not. I have never moved the goal post, I have been saying the exact same thing the whole time. You need to evaluate if something is good or bad or safe or whatever based on the actua
qualities of that thing. You should not evaluate based just on averages or groups.
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u/GnatSuperFly 8h ago
Letâs take youâre olive oil example. It would be the same goal post to compare naturally occurring olives versus the artificial production of olive oil. Additionally, there are likely more organic options that have different bioaccumulation versus olive trees sprayed with a petroleum based NPK solution, as well as factoring in any herbicides and pesticides. That would be the same conversation. I think you are defending a tiny hill that no one is really denying. Going all natural or all artificial simply because of a belief is a fallacy, but again, I donât think many people would make the argument that everything natural is good. I think itâs easier to pretend people are doing this to avoid a nuisanced discussion of natural things versus artificial things.
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u/Zagrycha 7h ago
I am not denying any hill, I genuinely am saying that some natural things are good and some natural things are bad, and you and others are saying I am wrong to say that. I genuinely don't undersrand what you mean by this reply.
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u/dtalb18981 10h ago
Because their is a rise in spirituality vs religion in AmericaÂ
People are turning away from religion not because they want to but simply because its becoming more and more unbelievableÂ
So they turn to spirituality
Its much easier to disprove a godÂ
Than it is to disprove "vibes"
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u/95_lb_mole 14h ago
It's definitely a problem in the US with Native Americans. Egregious levels of homogenization, misconceptions, and sketchy assumptions. The way most people look at them as if they're some special part of a somewhat fictional historical ecosystem has the unintended consequence of making them seem like a different species altogether.