Genevieve+M’s+Final+AmEx+Speech+2017

A patent is issued to an invention. This is when a government has the authority to grant a complete monopoly over one’s idea and now that person has complete and utter autonomy within their use of this intellectual property. Pause…. Our first amendment is freedom of expression. This amendment is a restriction on our government’s authority, so it may not undermine our right to express ourselves by nearly any means we see fit. Pause…. “Cultural appropriation”... many cringe as your socio-neurological alarm bells ring “Danger Will Robinson.” This is largely due to the fact that many have taken the word “adoption” and replaced it with the word “appropriation”, these words are not interchangeable and there are obvious, and vast different between the two. Pause…. You guys are probably fairly confused as to what my topic is by now… so let me pull patents, the first amendment, and cultural appropriation together. To appropriate anything infers that there was a theft of sorts, where one party has taken something from another without their consent. Hence, cultural appropriation infers that there was a theft of another’s culture, as if there was some sort of social patent within the culture of a group of people who deemed a social nuance to be theirs and theirs alone... So can you patent a hair style? Can you patent a language? Can you patent a way in which people act? NO. Why you say? Because that would be the government granting one party a monopoly over another’s first amendment rights! Hence a social patent would be unthinkable to any level headed person or group of people. Unless, of course, you are a fascist, authoritarian, tyrant, totalitarian, racist, isolationist, or any other buzzword worthy of someone who is flamboyantly ignorant. I am continually baffled at the mere idea of considering culture as property, and even more so that cultural appropriation has become a social movement particularly active in the academic world. I don't know how institutions created for the sole purpose of intellectual flourishment have restricted the exploration of one of human nature's most powerful learning tools in an effort to avoid offending anyone. What ever happened to relentless pursuit of enlightenment? Why can't we disregard offense in an effort to pursue the truth? Why don’t we put effort into enabling true inclusivity of ideas, rather than reaching quotas to portray this plastic idea of diversity?.... Back to cultural appropriation versus adoption. The jazz movement was appropriated by other jazz artists. Jazz started in the African American community, and was hijacked by white musicians who claimed to be the originators of jazz. This is appropriation. To lie, deceive, and hijack someone else’s work, whether it have a cultural influence or not; this is a theft. This does not mean that a white person playing jazz is aiding in cultural appropriation, but rather, embracing a new musical genre created by another culture. This is adoption. Not claiming the throne as the originator of the jazz movement but instead immersing oneself in another’s culture, melding it to your own and producing something unique. This is true inclusivity, and true diversity. That is where humans are most creative, industrious and productive. Human ingenuity is created from immersing oneself in ideas different from our own and culture is just another diversification of thought. So why would we bar ourselves from such a powerful driving force in the evolution of human ingenuity? This is a detriment to society as a whole to stray from cultural adoption, and those who try to expand and twist the definition of cultural appropriation are perpetrators of the fight against multiculturalism and they, inturn, help to push forward a racist agenda riddled in segregation. When I am old and fat, I would like to see an America engrossed in multiculturalism. An America that embraces the melding of cultures rather than masquerading segregation as diversity. This is the America I would like to grow old in.