Far Northern Attire

[Melorie]

EXACTLY THE POINT HERE! And I bet you didn't even realize it. This is exactly what is going on with a video game attire! OMG, and you are advocating against it, L.O.L.

You clearly don't get my point. The Sami people are the ones making this alive, not you wearing an outfit. THEY are the ones that hold the knowledge, nurture it, pass it on for generations, make the decisions that change that particular culture. THEY should be involved.

I know this isn't about me, and it's not even about you contrary to your private legendary opinion. I wasn't even comparing myself to this - I was pointing out a simple fact of how overboard, woke shit, overly sensitive people are being about video game attire - and no one here is affected - at all - about it. Sami Council isn't offended - they are mad because they aren't making anything from it, and that is the core issue. It's not offensive, they just don't have their name on the shirt tag.

Hypocrites.

Who said I have zero opinions on the New World, or even Thavnair and many other instances? I could spend all day here talking, but we're talking about the Sami subject. So because I didn't made a topic regarding the New World attire or whatever, I can't talk about the whole-instance regarding traditional attire? You literally can't know what is my opinion regarding everything that there's in the game, I'm not sure why you're assuming you do. Besides, every post I'm advocating that there should be new, better ways for the entertainment industry handling the act of getting inspiration from cultures around the world.

Again, it's also not a matter of being offended? After having your knowledge being used as a way for making profit for a giant company, why is it soo surprising they see the opportunity for financial compensation? It doesn't seem like a big deal to me. If anything I say the people treating this as something absurd are the sensitive ones.

Ding ding. Throwing around the whole "woke" thingy. That's all I need to know. You people are always the same, of course. Keep acting like a video game is a fairy-bubblesque world that isn't related to real world discussions, politics and blablabla. While you consume media that only exists because there's politics, there's discussion, there's culture in the real world.

[Midareyukki]

You clearly don't get my point. The Sami people are the ones making this alive, not you wearing an outfit. THEY are the ones that hold the knowledge, nurture it, pass it on for generations, make the decisions that change that particular culture. THEY should be involved.

Well, what do you think of the people identifying themselves as Sami people or with Sami descent saying they are fine with this sort of thing and denouncing the council?

Also...

Who said I have zero opinions on the New World, or even Thavnair and many other instances? I could spend all day here talking, but we're talking about the Sami subject. So because I didn't made a topic regarding the New World attire or whatever, I can't talk about the whole-instance regarding traditional attire? You literally can't know what is my opinion regarding everything that there's in the game, I'm not sure why you're assuming you do. Besides, every post I'm advocating that there should be new, better ways for the entertainment industry handling the act of getting inspiration from cultures around the world.

You can still talk about it, since the thread overall is talking about cultural appropriation and why the Sami Council issued a statement and whether other such councils can and have not.
No one said that you can't talk about this one thing because you didn't have a thread on another. And I fail to see where you got that reading. You aren't being accused of that :T

Because it is true New World, Thavnair and many other locations (Bozja, Sharlayan, Yanxia, Azim Steppe, the Ananta tribe...) have real world influences from specific cultures, some of which are ethnic minorities. Square Enix didn't get such feedback from them, or any such institution representing them. Yet Square too didn't have anyone of those cultures involved in the creative process. If we're talking about the Sami people, it's only fair we then extrapolate to every other instance of such. Minority or not. It's still a different culture outside that of American and Japanese. So the question does remain: is it a bad thing that Square Enix included those areas with such cultural overtones?

In the end, I think you're right, to an extent. Cultural Appreciation does exist, and so too does Cultural Appropriation. However, those terms are thrown around without their intended meaning. You CAN appreciate a culture without resorting to take it and do whatever you want with it, and when there's respect for the culture, it isn't inherently appropriation unless you seek to deface it, monetize it and/or strip it from its cultural context. And unfortunately, those situations aren't straightforward in some cases. And you can't always work with that culture directly... but you can still represent them with respect and with an informed mindset. With that in mind, I have another question:

As I just mentioned, a cultural item is appropriated when you strip it from its context and monetize it. I feel like the biggest hurdle of this situation is the fact that this outfit is on the Mogstation; it likely wouldn't stir up anything if it were in the game as a crafted item. However. The Sami council is claiming this to be similar to the Gakti... yet it's already been demonstrated by people in this thread that the Far Northern Attire is equally similar to other North Eurasian cultures' outfits. Like a mismash of different elements, with the end result being naturally similar to the Gakti. The latest I can remember was Burmecia when replying to Iscah on page 15. So... is this the Gakti or isn't it? And if it's not, then can we still consider them to be appropriating the Sami directly?

[Nitelancer]

Many pages ago in this thread someone from the saami people posted that the council doesn’t represent all their people and that they are just doing this for money. This person though the outfit was cool and was happy they added it to the game.

You are making assumptions about a large group of people. But how many of them actually care? How many of them would even want to be involved?

You don’t know. Also, you don’t know that this was a corporate decision specifically to exploit anyone. Did the CEO or square give the order? No. He likely doesn’t even know or care about this outfit. More likely, an artist came up with the concept and the director approved it.

“Better” ways of representation is not worth anyone’s time or energy. It would not be to the benefit of anyone expect some “official council” who are the real exploiters.

[Midareyukki]

Many pages ago in this thread someone from the saami people posted that the council doesn’t represent all their people and that they are just doing this for money. This person though the outfit was cool and was happy they added it to the game.

This post, yeah? They weren't the only ones either o: There are people identifying themselves as belonging to Sami culture on Twitter saying a similar sentiment.

We obviously don't know how many actually care. Nor whether the people who are speaking up are a loud minority that happens to disagree with the Council. But these are the voices we're mostly hearing from (I haven't heard any so far that have agreed with the Sami Council, but I also won't discredit the possibility of one existing). And so far the message is that the Sami people as individuals are okay with Square Enix. It's the Council that's got a problem.

[Burmecia]

The Sami people are the ones making this alive

And still SE didn't need them necessarily to create this item. Undead aesthetic then?
Where my resistance to this council's thinly veiled greed(*) comes from is the observable fact that the design is clearly NOT only sami. Not the cut, not the pattern, not the colour, not the embroidery. This had been pointed out.
Anyone is free to disagree, but I think that if you're gonna claim something and demand others stop using that something, you better be able to point what that something is.

"It's clearly sami!"
Why so many disagree, then, me included? What's so clearly sami, if it's not any of those details bolded above?

Is it calling it northern, is mental image of people living in far north and dressing warmly for the elements? Out of all the vague claims that would be the stupidest one.

It has taken inspiration from sources all over, that's not unique case even within ff14; sources which are not and cannot copyrighted, creating unique look. No real life people/culture owns this.


(more russian folk costuming which might have given the multibillion company an inspiration)

*

[kyyninen_kirahvi]

To be honest, I think it's useless to argue about this one way or another. The attire is clearly inspired by Finnic clothes like it but different enough not to annoy the majoirty of Sami, which is good enough for me. The thing is that there are regions out side of Sami regions who have same kind of aesthetic.

I could even argue the embroidery looks like Eastern Finnish/Karelian. I think what makes this look like a gákti is the colour blue. Any other colour and there wouldn't be a controversy.

As I've said earlier, the council is aggressive with things like this and this was expected.

I just hope they won't stop adding Finnic or Finnish things in the game.

[Mosha]

The Sami people are the ones making this alive,

This really erks me because as Burmecia pointed out other Northern European cultures wear very similar garbs that SE could have taken inspiration from. Acting like the Saami have exclusive rights to this kind of attire is actively marginalizing other ethnic groups the Saami share a heritage with.