So I saw this post going around about white people decontextualizing poc music and art, specifically about race and I thought something was odd...like isn't art supposed to be a personal experience? Like sure the artist could make a song with a specific theme, but if it spoke to you in another way and you had no clue nor the time/effort to care what the songwriter meant with it, does it even matter? Take for example, a painting. The artist painted a scene of a young lady surrounded by laughing people. Kinda stereotypical highschool dog blood drama type stuff, but the artist painted it with the thought that this was a visual of how hard being a woman in this society is (body shaming, discrimination, whatever, it's valid). The artist may have this in mind, but the audience might not. Maybe a young trans woman sees in this painting another young trans woman struggling with the expectations of the world, her identity, and relates to that, finds meaning in it, and uses that to get them through a hard time? Or an old man sees in the painting a vision of his own daughter, a poc, wrestling with the difficulties of being in an all white high school. Maybe that same old man finds comfort that problems like this are getting some representation and maybe no one else will experience what his daughter did? Maybe 4/10 people actually pick up on what the artist was trying to convey? In the end, does it matter? Art in and of itself is meant to transmit ideas, thoughts and feelings to other people. if it conveys an idea/thought/feeling, it doesn't matter what, and it comforts someone, encourages someone, causes change, or reminds someone to improve themselves, it does not matter what the artist had in mind. The artist's issue may be very important and valid, but in the face of individual interpretation, it ranks lower. If a person decides to learn the reason behind the art that is one thing, but to require all people who consume media to learn the lore behind every song, every piece of art, for it to be meaningful to them is ridiculous, unrealistic, and unfair. Even if all they got was "vague feelings of tenderness and longing", they still got something. If they want to educate themselves on what the artist meant, they can go right on ahead np, I'll clap for them, but it's not required to enjoy something. I'm not going to narrow this down to just white people either because all people, regardless of race and white people included, are entitled to this right. Thank you for coming to my ted talk. Gn
