[HN Gopher] Bionicle - my actual part in its origins (2015)
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Bionicle - my actual part in its origins (2015)
Author : speckx
Score : 84 points
Date : 2024-09-12 16:45 UTC (5 days ago)
(HTM) web link (alastairswinnerton.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (alastairswinnerton.com)
| Djvacto wrote:
| The online community for bionicle has done a solid job of
| archiving and even polishing the various content that was
| released over the years. There's a site that collected all of the
| flash games [0], and someone stitched together a few versions of
| the "Biological Chronicle" [1], which is every book, comic, and
| even transcriptions of two of the flash games that had an actual
| narrative, woven so the narratives all line up.
|
| [0] https://biomediaproject.com/bmp/ [1] I don't have a link
| handy to the ebook, I'm also not sure if they had permission to
| upload all of that content in one file or not
| Dalewyn wrote:
| I am going to have a field day with that site.
|
| Thank you.
| o11c wrote:
| Hm, does it not have the tabletop game (hex tiles, D&D dice) on
| that site, or am I just not finding it?
| dmonitor wrote:
| The tabletop was fanmade, right? I believe that is a
| compilation of official content.
| o11c wrote:
| Digging it out, the box says "Quest For Makuta / Bionicle /
| Adventure Game" with LEGO and RoseArt logos on it, and it
| was bought in a store ... and it's number 31390, which is
| found on ... well, one LEGO-adjacent site (bricklink) at
| least. A lot of others don't seem to have it. Apparently
| there's also a version (31391) that came in a metal tin,
| but the one I have is the cardboard box.
| somat wrote:
| "I figured that if we were going to use a language, we'd better
| use it properly, and respectfully. The Maoris didn't see it that
| way of course, and it cost Lego quite a bit of money in 'cultural
| compensation'."
|
| I mean fair enough, that is the way it happened, but I find it
| bizarre that it can be considered a "cultural attack" by... using
| the language?
|
| There is this weird phenomenon where there ends up being no safe
| way to reference a foreign culture, Every possible method becomes
| "cultural appropriation" or "racism". I understand people wanting
| to protect their culture but weird because it is self defeating.
| The only safe move is to avoid mentioning the culture at all,
| effectively forgeting about them.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| It's worth considering if the people complaining are the actual
| people so concerned or just Social Justice Warriors bitching
| for attention.
|
| If it's the former, it is obviously and absolutely necessary to
| listen to their concerns and perhaps demands and try and find a
| solution that satisfies everyone.
|
| If it's the latter, we really need to use their playbook and
| just Cancel Culture(tm) the SJWs for the betterment of
| humanity.
| madaxe_again wrote:
| You will never please everyone.
|
| I am an immigrant in a European country. Most people are like
| "wow, good for you, you've learned the language!", but I have
| also, from a couple of gen Z folks, had accusations of being a
| coloniser and cultural appropriation... for learning the
| language of the country in which I live. I was surprised enough
| that I didn't realise I was being accosted at first. As a
| crusty old millennial it never even occurred to me that
| learning someone's language could be offensive to them.
| "Portuguese is for the Portuguese, not for foreigners!" was one
| of them. Strange how there's this mix of anti-coloniser
| sentiment that actually seems to be or at least feed into anti-
| immigrant sentiment.
|
| Bluntly, I think these people are idiots, and safely ignored.
| orwin wrote:
| > Bluntly, I think these people are idiots, and safely
| ignored.
|
| I think they should be listened to, acknowledged, then
| ignored. You never know, sometimes idiots have good points.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| This assumes time is an infinite and valueless resource.
|
| Unfortunately for most people, time is a finite and
| precious resource that is already wasted far too much.
| orwin wrote:
| I agree, but if some idiot tell you mean things, you will
| hear it anyway, and it might ruin your day, even if you
| know those are best ignored. My solution is the best for
| my own mental health: i acknowledge the criticism, i use
| bit of a socratic method if they are available (not as a
| rhetorical tool, but to achieve understanding for
| myself), and then i ignore them.
| marcus_holmes wrote:
| > "Portuguese is for the Portuguese, not for foreigners!"
|
| I wonder how Brazilians react to that statement.
| jhbadger wrote:
| Not unlike how US folks react to the idea that England is
| the authority on English -- Brazil and the US are far more
| populated than the countries that originated their
| languages and so there are more books and movies targeting
| them and using their version of the language even if they
| are using it "wrong" as compared to the origin country.
| Tade0 wrote:
| > Strange how there's this mix of anti-coloniser sentiment
| that actually seems to be or at least feed into anti-
| immigrant sentiment.
|
| Even stranger considering the fact that Portugal was a
| colonial power.
|
| The language is spoken in, among others, Angola and
| Mozambique, as everyone who saw the "Pepino, de novo!" clip
| can attest.
| rollcat wrote:
| I'm usually met with a mix of shock, disbelief, and sometimes
| a little bit of joy, when I speak Greek with a Greek person
| outside of Greece - which was at first odd, considering the
| origin of the word "diaspora". Some reactions were really
| weird, one person told me it feels wrong to hear a foreigner
| speak their native language so far from home, another told me
| it's the most useless language to learn, etc - but I've never
| been met with antagonism.
|
| I don't think language and culture can be separated; Greece
| has been occupied by the Ottoman empire for ca 400 years, and
| the history of reclaiming their culture and independence is
| stained with blood (like most of them are).
|
| In retrospect, I'm glad I ended up being "friends" with a
| hospitable culture. I haven't been to Greece in over a decade
| but it always feels like I'd be welcome there.
| tigerlily wrote:
| Well there was a time when Maori were stopped by others from
| speaking and using their own language, and I guess nowadays
| they've had to bootstrap Maori language starting with full
| immersion Maori language schooling from childhood. There's a
| couple of generations of Maori between post WWII and late Gen X
| who weren't bought up in the Maori language and have had to go
| to great lengths to reclaim it, but most haven't been able to
| at all. Maori culture isn't just about the language, there's
| the meaning and context of the language, as well as cultural
| aspects of place (whenua, turangawaewae) and ancestral
| connection (whanau, whakapapa). You can't divide or separate
| these things, and the language is not a thing floating around
| in isolation from the culture.
|
| It holds true for every culture. Even the English will tell you
| english is a language and kindly don't bastardise it. That is
| to say there's a whole culture around the English language and
| its proper usage.
|
| Look at these artefacts the community was admiring just
| yesterday https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41536156 We know
| jack all about the people who created these, and most of it was
| lost. Three comments in the whole thread, we know humanity
| fucked up because we don't know what to say, and so we keep
| making the same mistake over and over and over
| postexitus wrote:
| Despite that, the whole world is using English every day in a
| quite bastardising way.
| corimaith wrote:
| I'd argue that's the real dominance of Western culture;
| anybody can be part of it, bastardize it, idealize it,
| demonize it, and so it can evolve, it transcends from just
| a singular tradition to a universal culture.
| brendoelfrendo wrote:
| Part of colonialism is replacing native cultures with your
| own. Indigenous cultures, conversely, fight for survival in
| the face of forces that seek to exploit or exterminate
| them. There's a marked difference in context between the
| post-colonial world speaking English and the Maori people
| trying to defend part of their cultural heritage.
| hnuser123456 wrote:
| It's really funny because if someone is accusing you of
| cultural appropriation, they're actually saying you're not
| acting like how they think YOU should act, the stereotype for
| how you look or your background, and they're telling you to
| feel bad about it. i.e. racism.
|
| The real distinction was whether one is PARODYING another
| culture than their own. That usually does not go well unless
| you have good comedic skills and an audience that trusts you.
| bdndndndbve wrote:
| They're a multi-billion dollar company with no connection to
| Maori culture, and they picked some Maori words for your
| product because they feel exotic and they'll "help crack the
| Far East market". The article doesn't talk about the brief
| incorporating actual Maori culture, just picking up the words
| because they sound good.
|
| Do you need a "safe way" to make a product for profit using a
| culture you don't know anything about? There's plenty of room
| for Maori people and pakeha to make content that actually
| incorporates the language and the culture. Look at the use of
| haka in sporting events, for instance.
| dotnet00 wrote:
| Back in undergrad I had to attend an event that was about these
| extreme social justice-y topics, and yeah, it was pretty self
| defeating. Was my first exposure to that kind of thing outside
| of the internet.
|
| It was kind of offensive, since a big chunk of it was telling
| me that I was supposed to be mad about "outsiders" trying to
| participate in positive or neutral aspects of my home country's
| culture without necessarily fully understanding it.
| kaikue wrote:
| The Maori's main criticism was the use of the word "Tohunga",
| which in Maori means something like "respected expert", but in
| Bionicle meant "funny little guy who is constantly getting into
| trouble".
|
| https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/31/andrewosborn
|
| > The Maoris protested that the word Tohunga - the name Lego
| gave to the cowed inhabitants of the island - was the
| Polynesian word for spiritual healer and that using it in such
| a trivial context was offensive.
|
| Lego changed that term to "Matoran", and modified a few other
| terms/spellings slightly, and the Maori were happy.
| brendoelfrendo wrote:
| As the user Kaikue pointed out in another comment, the Maori
| had a couple specific comments, which Lego addressed, and then
| everyone seems to have moved on.
|
| My stance on appropriation is more nuanced than most, I think.
| If you're not part of a culture, but you use their language,
| dress, or other cultural trappings, that's appropriation;
| whether or not that's bad is a different question. But here's
| the thing: you don't get to be the one who decides whether or
| not it's bad. A billion dollar company commercializing Maori
| language because they thought it sounded neat was probably not
| the greatest starting point, and though I'm sympathetic to
| Alastair for not having access to the resources to properly vet
| his usage of te reo Maori, I don't think Lego had such
| limitations and probably should have put a little more effort
| in.
|
| Perhaps another, more recent example: in the video game Pillars
| of Eternity 2: Deadfire, one of the main cultures that the
| player interacts with are the Huana, a Maori/Pacific Islander-
| inspired culture that is, not coincidentally, beset on multiple
| sides by colonial powers. Game director Josh Sawyer says[1]
| "...we should have also hired some Maori consultants
| specifically to look at the Huana. The Huana aren't really
| Maori (just like the Rauatai aren't really Japanese), but even
| a fictional culture that's only "inspired by" a mix of real
| world cultures can still get into uncomfortable or outright bad
| territory.
|
| A few Pacific Islanders have contacted me to tell me that they
| appreciate that Deadfire deals with PI-type cultures and
| colonial themes. I'm genuinely glad for that, but we could have
| very easily done something incredibly shitty through pure
| ignorance. It never hurts to ask ahead of time."
|
| [1]https://www.tumblr.com/jesawyer/622841880878678016/looking-b
| ...
| pennomi wrote:
| I believe LEGO (unsuccessfully) tried to trademark several
| Maori words as well, which certainly is a bit of an attack.
| RHSeeger wrote:
| Why? People trademark words from _every_ language, for
| specific contexts, all the time.
| rPlayer6554 wrote:
| What a throwback to my childhood! I loved Bionicle! My siblings
| and I had the pieces, books, games, etc. I never knew it was a
| competitor to Pokemon - but my parents tried to steer us away
| from video games to more creative toys. So that's why we were a
| huge LEGO household in general.
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