#peppermintedly

i mean yeah u could say that, but ur also an active member of the community here on tumblr dot com

i dunno about u but i was given basically infinite knowledge of all things when i was given a laptop with access to wifi, and what i chose 2 do with my time was sit around on various social media websites reading fanfiction and interacting with other people all over the place

before The Internet i had no clue what cultural appropriation was? or any other social justice cause really. the ones that are big in the media yeah, like stuff on the news. but, like everyone, i was ignorant of all things until i was sat down and told "it's wrong"

most people out there in the world are basically Me Before The Internet, because they're all People Before The Internet.

no one actively goes on google and searches "shitty things to do just in case i do them and regret it later" usually this stuff is learned when someone does it and is called out on it, or u do it and are called out on it

what i'm trying to say is like, yeah ur from australia and u know about this, but that's because u've been exposed to it. i'm from america and there was a point in my life where i knew nothing about this. there are times when i STILL fuck up and i fancy myself quite knowledgeable on Shit That's Not Okay To Do, and i file it away in a box in my head called Don't Be A Douche and move on with my life, a little bit less douchey.

it's unfortunate that there's so much shittiness out there, and we can do the best we can to change it but until then it's a process. yeah we could have used an apology but the fact that harry changed his icon at all is a tiny bit of progress.

it's silly to think that just because he's famous that he knows everything about the world and the many different cultures ripe for the appropriating. i'm sure he's not like u or me, who goes "wait let me check if this company is problematic" before going into a store. he probably didn't google "should i put this thing on my head" before putting it on his head bc he never would have done it had he done that?

stuff like that time he did blackface is different because that's something WIDELY KNOWN to be wrong. if he were american it probably would have been more likely that he knew putting on the headdress was wrong, but not by much. he's a member of the General Public, the group of people we're supposed 2 be educating.