“yeah gee i wonder if the quirk usage of namaste and the gold statues and the impersonations of hindu gestures and the bad imitations of how desi people sing is the orientalist song”
i understand this pov, as an indian myself, as a hindu myself i don’t feel any offense from it. its not mocking, its not making a joke out of it, its a lyric in the song and the gold statues aren’t really a big deal. idk if you’re also hindu and/or indian idk if this is a more important offense to you and im sorry if it does offend you but i showed it to my whole family and they like it, its a little homage and its appreciative rather than degrading.
also i dont see any form of imitation of how desi people sing in the song, if you point out a specific part im happy to listen to it and reconsider my opinions.
and final point in my mind is that out of most kpop groups, le sserafim is a group i trust to treat cultural norms respectfully. namaste just means hello, there’s nothing to me that really feels offensive about using it. and they did an interview recently with an indian lady where they (especially yunjin) were nothing but polite and intrigued and respectful towards our culture, bangles and language (hindi). i can link it to you if you want to see for yourself. yunjin has always been careful about how she treats other cultures and they’ve always been respectful and supportive of diversity.
basically from my perspective as a hindu indian i don’t see any problems but i understand why you may, and i want to understand your perspective on it more
i will speak on my own behalf as a southeast asian who's looked into orientalism then i'll supply you my pakistani friend mir's perspective on this.
just because a song doesn't outright mock your culture or other kinds of culture doesn't mean it's not offensive. the kpop industry is notorious for being incredibly racist, transphobic, and homophobic for stealing concepts from these cultures and passing them off as their own, or something of a "quirky" concept. feature as much poc as you want, be as nice as you want to be, the profit is still going to some old guy with no fucks about other poc's culture.
in my opinion (shared with mir's) the beginning part where they sing macarena in a high-pitched tone is a lame impersonation of how desi people sing. the usage of south asian culture as an aesthetic (which is clear from its inaccuracies and facsimile of what south asian culture is) is plain orientalism
[Let's go off the bases that you believe this to be a good representation or an homage to your culture, a simple scroll in the comments of this music video show that people are treating the topic of another culture to be "weird", "quirky" and "campy" rather than seeing the culture in a more proper and well rounded form. This music video highlights how culture is a costume, it is used more like a prop than something to be appreciated and admired.
It continued to follow with its ignorance by using the song macarena, a Latino song, and then follow it with South asian cultures, which shows that there is no fixed culture here. Two very distinct and unique identities are meshed into one in the music video because they do not understand that there is a huge difference. In their eyes, its all just "weird" and "quirky"
The statues meant to represent a religion, a belief, is used as something to compare kpop idols to the equivalent of some Godhood, diminishing the inherent significance of these religious figures and simply stating that you believe you to be on a similar bases to that of a god in another religion. This music video highlights to show how the kpop industry lacks proper care for culture and rather uses whatever is "trendy" to boost their traction. It literally starts off with a knock off labubu, matcha and google Gemini, product placement after product placement that shows that this music video is just meant to be a glorified ad than any proper representation. So with that in perspective, do you believe a complete ad of a music video would care enough to properly represent south asian culture?]
also, mir wanted to share these comments under the video that supplies how normalized orientalism is within kpop spaces
jbbartram-illu
germansingergirl
kaledo-art
blakekathryn
andulkaphoto
