Talk:Cultural cringe

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Contents 1 Australia Day 2 United States? 3 Aussie Rules? 4 This entire article is crap 5 Sources & attributions 6 Aust section - error 7 Neutrality disputed

[edit] Australia Day

The day is also less-than-enthusiastically celebrated due to its marking of the invasion of Aboriginal Australia huh? The vast majority of Australians don't care (for better or for worse).

[edit] United States?

Come on, this phenomenon definitely exists in the US, especially among the highly educated/traveled who have to carry the stigma of George Bush, Walmart, and Bud Light everywhere they go.

[edit] Aussie Rules?

What a joke. Some people just don't like the stupid sport because they were brought up in a different Australian culture. Any apathy for Aussie rules lies in the fact that aussie rules is not part of the culture in those areas where it isn't accepted. Thus it doesn't qualify as cultural cringe. Austrlia is a big country. Cultures vary. NSWelshman 01:45, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I respect your opinion, coming from Queensland and being brought up on the game of rugby league and rugby union. However I don't think that the article disputes this. What it does say is that there are many people who have have not been brought up with it who justify their rejection of it based on the concepts of cultural cringe, and in this context, the statements of the article have merit. --Biatch 01:01, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This entire article is crap

or at least the Australian section, I'm not qualified to comment on the rest.

NSWelshman is right. Some of us don't particularly like Aussie Rules because we grew up playing a different sport. It would be like saying there is a cultural cringe in the U.S. because not everyone likes Ice Hockey.

I assume the owner of convict creations.com added in the link to their own site, but that doesn't make the information legitimate: we treat all public holidays as days off. Also, if you think about what Australia Day represents, it's really no wonder we don't make too big a thing of it.

I can't really comment on the rest because in true Wiki-style, it consists of disjointed facts and incomprehensible arguments.

198.142.39.40 08:06, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

This is your personal opinion. Wikipedia is not the place to dismiss things as crap simply because they are your personal opinion. The same arguments are often found on other pages related to these subjects, but they have not been substantiated and there are plenty of articles out there that point to the cultural cringe phenomenon. Find something that argues the contrary and then you can put forward your case. By the way, Ice hockey is a Canadian sport as far as I am aware and the US, as one of the world's great superpowers and an independent free settlement (as opposed to a colonial convict outpost), would hardly be subject to any cultural cringe. --Biatch 00:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Germaine Greer loves Australia?? Pull the other one, it's got bells on.--EDH 10:23, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes certainly the Aust section is a big mess. Various editors do not even seem to understand the concept: that Aust culture is no good, though it becomes acceptable once international audiences show their approval. eg this sentence: Many Australians who are prominent overseas are subject to cultural cringe. The fame of personalities such as the late Steve Irwin,[10] Dame Edna,[11] Rolf Harris, Kylie Minogue or Paul Hogan internationally has never achieved quite the same level of affection at home in Australia.[12] For many, this is due to their overly Australian stereotyped characters or self-deprecating humour. Now this does not make sense because these people all achieved significant UK and/or US success, so in terms of cultural cringe, this international success should then mean that suddenly they become successful and approved of in Aust as well. According to the theory of cultural cringe, Australians will only show approval of a cultural item after international audiences have validated it by showing their approval. The fact that the likes of Irwin never achieved quite the same degree of cult fame in Aust as he did in the US, serves only as a counter example of cultural cringe. It proves that cultural cringe does not always operate. Like, we don't like Neighbours as much as UK audiences do, while things like Blue Heelers, that never really caught on overseas, enjoyed enormous popularity with Australian TV audiences. I'll try to fix up some of this but it needs a lot of work! Asa01 05:50, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't think so Asa01 . I think you fail to understand that the topic. It is not "the concept: that Aust culture is no good, though it becomes acceptable once international audiences show their approval". If you read the opening paragraph and citations from literature, where does this say that the concept is this ? What it is saying that ideas and people that have originated from Australia are not given the same respect as those from other countries, in particular the mother country England. --Biatch 01:15, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi user Biatch, got your message. Victorian Rules or Aussie Rules or whatever it wants to call itself is not really seen as a native Australian game in New South Wales and does not exist to a huge extent outside the top-down. I do not disparage AFL because it is a part of Australian culture, I disparage because it is not part of my Australian culture up north and that whole reference is dodgy. You could make just as much reference to the rugby-thugby attitude that exists in Mebourne as cultural cringe. --Rugby 666 04:25, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sources & attributions

The Examples section is very poor. A lot of it is spent trying to decide whether certain aspects of Australian culture are 'cultural cringe' or not. It is not Wikipedia's place to decide such things (WP:OR). Since cultural cringe is so hard to define and identify, the only way we can conform to WP standards is by insisting on sources for other notable commentators who have proclaimed such-and-such to be an example of cultural cringe. There is also a lot of 'perhaps this is cultural cringe, but maybe not' which is unsourced, uninformative and pure opinion. I've going to chop the worst of it out immediately. Ashmoo 01:31, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree, cut all the personal opinions, but don't just replace it with another lot of personal opinions. If it is too hard to define, don't try to do it on Wikipedia, leave it to the chattering classes to talk about it. Phaedrus86 00:40, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Aust section - error

Article claims following: In Australia, the government has to legislate to keep a quota of Australian content. This particularly effects reality television.

I believe this is wrong: yes the Govt does legislate to keep a quota of Australian content, but the shows must be scripted drama [1] . Unscripted reality or magazine type programs do not count towards the quota. Asa01 03:51, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Neutrality disputed

I placed an NPOV template on the article page because I think readers should be warned that a large proportion of this article, particularly the Australian section, consists of biased personal opinion. If people want to publish personal opinions on Wikipedia, then that is their right, but until such time as the article becomes neutral and based on facts or citations of credible authorities, then I think the warning should stay so readers know what they are getting. Phaedrus86 01:07, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The australian section is seriously dodgy. Though there are references, (eg, a news article stating that Steve Irwin wasn't that popular in Australia) I wonder just how many of these references actually state that their subject's lack of popularity it due to cultural cringe. Like, the Irwin article corroborates that he wasn't that popular in Aust. It does not corroborate that this is because of cultural cringe. To be useful in this article, the reference must also state that it is due to cultural cringe. Asa01 02:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I'll third that. All statements in the article need sources that attribute a specific attitude to cultural cringe. Having a source that includes an Australian criticizing another Australian isn't enough. Ashmoo 03:42, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I hadn't even *heard* of Steve Irwin prior to 2002, and I worked in the media industry. I don't think it was cultural cringe at all - rather, he got on US TV first, then went international and then was able to fund a program for Australia. Orderinchaos78 02:58, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

A couple of comments about the Australian section:

• I think claims about Australian rules football are incorrect: IMO, people who prefer football (soccer) because of its international reach don't do so because it wasn't invented here - after all people still follow cricket with intensity - they do it because with Australian rules, once you have won the domestic league grand final, that's the end of the road, there is nothing else to achieve; with football (soccer), there are confederation and world club competitions, potential of national team selection and the confederation and world cup competitions after that.
• The claims about Steve Irwin not being popular because he was Australian - it was because the thing that made him entertaining, the fact that he played an Australian stereotype, just isn't funny when you actually live in Australia and have done your whole life. (This is just my opinion as well.)

-- Chuq 11:39, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with both points. Many of the examples given state that something or someone is disliked, but do not provide the link to the concept; they don't satisfactorily explain why it is an example of cultural cringe. In many cases this is because there simply isn't a link. I think the article needs to build on the promising recent contributions in the introduction to further define the concept, then we can add examples that link to the definition. Phaedrus86 00:09, 16 December 2006 (UTC)