So many chinamen to kill

Last night I got a kindly rejection email from the Slow Fashion Market organisers for their upcoming Sydney market at Petersham Town Hall on Sept 14th. I have also been declined for their Melbourne and Canberra events earlier this year. The same form letter always arrives referring to "unprecedented amounts of applications, far in excess of the stall spots we have" and I get the thumbs down. Perhaps one day there will less applications than spots and I'll get in?

Strangely enough, though I've been turned down for 100% of all applications I've made in 11 years for markets in Sydney, Newcastle, Melbourne and Canberra I just get madder and madder rather than blase. All these are curated artisan markets boasting of their committment to sustainability and ethical making but I'm always baffled when making the applications to be asked stuff like this...

• Having an emphasis on quality, durability and robustness of garments and accessories.
• Keeping the number of new styles and collections being introduce each year low and slow.
• The label is a small-medium business, not a corporation.
• Incorporating sustainable or locally sourced materials that are low/no toxins and pesticides.
• The people making your clothing are paid fair wages for their labour.
• Your workers are in safe work environments (no sweatshops, child labour, slavery and mistreatment of workers).
• Having an ethical mission statement for your fashion business.

Questions like the 2nd and 3rd ones always make me roll my eyes and laugh out loud  - new styles? collections!!! Small - medium business!! fair wages...??!! 

Duhhhh....what a lot of shit this is. How can I be any more sustainable when I use second hand clothes and fabrics sourced from charity shops. Every individual garment is designed, cut by hand and sewed by me. I don't have any "people or children" working for me, I am the solitary sweat shop slave doing the whole shebang. Regrettably this slave doesn't get paid at all, let alone a "fair wage".

Then I go to these markets and insult is added to injury that they are full of stuff manufactured by outworkers from imported new textiles.

You know that old saying about "must have killed a lot of Chinamen in my last life" when people laughingly refer to their bad luck? Well....hahahahaa!!... I have a lot of Chinamen I would like to kill right now, in this life. 

How did I come to be living in this parallel universe where apparently some clothing manufacturers in China think 5 of my original garments are wonderful enough that they appropriated the photographic images (pictures taken by me - as if I could afford a professional photographer) from my blog to put them in their internet and instagram shops pretending that this is the product they're selling? Perhaps hundreds or thousands of women in Europe and America are buying these garments and sending money to those Chinamen. Perhaps the Chinamen are making 10s or 100s of thousands of dollars from my creative works? 

Back here on the farm in Australia I apply to markets 4-10 times a year and in 11 years no one thinks that same creative production is good enough? 

I don't whether to laugh, cry or hang myself. I sure as hell don't feel like going to my studio and make more stuff that isn't good enough for Australian markets but good enough for Chinamen to steal.

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Last week I showed this picture on Instagram of a pile of stuff I planned to make into something.

yes, a bit of wool is sticking out of the hole in my Ugg boots. I hope to have enough money to buy a new pair next Winter.

Some of the fabrics were printed

Sorry, the picture is sideways and the one above that hasn't been cropped. I usually take time to prepare my blog pictures to present nicely but I'm feeling so despondent today I really can't be bothered.

Then I spent 22 hours cutting and making this garment.

front

back

front neck detail

back neck detail

this section was stenciled then reverse appliqued

The detailed section in the picture above is reverse applique. I am asking Aus$230 plus postage if you would like to buy this fantastic original piece of wearable art. However in a months time Tusancat and the various other Chinamen will be faking a copy of this for $78.00$38.00!!! so why bother...?

I also hope the Chinamen will be grateful for my kindness in showing both the front and back of the garment to help them out with their next fakery. In their webshops they never show the back of the garments because unless a picture of it was shown on my blog they don't know what that looks like. I am almost intrigued enough to want to buy one of my own fakes just to find out what they do for the back. 

rainbows and storms

I had to stop on the roadside outside of Tamworth heading home about 3pm yesterday to take a picture of this rainbow.

I had to take Doris to Tamworth yesterday for a service. The old girl was seized up from overwork. Doris is my Janome 6600 sewing machine I've thrashed like sweatshop slave for 10 years and she is still going strong. Like most of these electronic machines the computer chip will likely die before I can wear out the mechanism. And when her eye blinks out I'll be forced to buy a new sewing machine because the manufacturers won't provide parts for an older model and this kind of forced obsolescence is relied upon as part of their business model to keep profitable. No point is making a sewing machine so sturdy it will last for the lifetime of the buyer!...though it would be entirely possible to do so.

I'm fed up and depressed about so much cynical capitalism in the world. My kneejerk reaction when I'm mugged and robbed like what those Chinese manufacturers are doing to small artisans is to fight back. I'm disgusted at all the energy and planning these fraudsters put into keeping themselves ahead of being stopped by having maybe 50 different business names. In this way they can duck, weave and re-invent themselves every week. Even before one "business" is stopped advertising on social media due to their copyright infringements another business has already spawned itself selling the same product. If they put all that energy into creating their own designs then they wouldn't need to appropriate the creative production of others. Or how about buying the design and paying for a license? (neither of which I would do anyway because I don't support the mass production business model).

Here are pictures of the completed skirt I was upcycling from used sheets, front and back with some close ups.

Meantime, here I sit in my pyjamas at 10am in the morning wondering if I should bother to get dressed and go down to the studio to create another design they can steal? Will I see my Freda Jacket for sale on Instagram next month for US79.00 $38.00! 

My annual insurance premium is due, which I need to maintain because I have an open studio so that members of the public can come into and watch me work. It also covers me for when I teach at outside venues and for having market stalls. I get a really good price for artist insurance through NAVA (National Association of Visual Artists) it is only about Aus$300. But I don't have that much money at this time to pay for it. The other thing I'd like to spend money on this month is to do the online sashiko and boro stitching course with amazing Japanese textile artist Atsushi Futatsuya, but I can't afford that either.

When I got Doris serviced the repair lady said all I needed to do was use better quality thread on my bobbin. There wasn't anything wrong with Doris, just the cheap shitty thread which is all I can afford was breaking all the time. With great relief I choofed off to Spotlight to get some good thread. Sadly, in Australia, we don't have much choice in the field of good quality sewing thread. The Birch haberdashery supply company has gradually eased out most of the competitors and operates a virtual monopoly for high quality sewing thread with their German Guterman product.

The very patient Spotlight employee added this up several times to keep getting the same total as I nearly had a heart attack that these 1000m reels of Guterman thread are Aus$23.00 each. FUCK!!! 3 cones of overlocker thread (which was the crap thread I'd been using on the bobbin that was making Doris seize), 1 small reel  and 9 spools of Guterman added up to $293. Its a good month when I make that much money.

How much do people pay for a 1000m reel of Guterman sewing thread in other countries?

So no wonder I get all queasy and despondent when some lazy hyena in China is visiting my blog to steal my creative output. I might even be better off financially being a sweat shop slave in one of their factories!

Though I'm now spending money on my credit card I indulged in a bit of shopping therapy spending $45 buying that great stack of unused fabric remnants from my favourite charity shop in Tamworth. Perhaps I'll make some gorgeous thing that the Chinese fraudsters can copy to resell as one of their hideous rags.

Rip and tear

Ugh, these fraudsters have no limit to what they will steal. This morning I found another of my garments is being advertised by a Chinese rip-off seller. Once again this is my picture they have lifted from a blog post. Heaven knows what the back of this coat will look like. I didn't help them out by showing that. Also their contempt for copyright law has been compounded by using that print on the left side of the coat. That beautiful fabric print is a cloth I designed with my digital artwork and is for sale in my Spoonflower shop.

Boho Banjo cloth shop on Spoonflower

Can I just remind everybody - if you buy from these websites you won't be getting what is in the picture. The garment in the picture being used in the Barbring promotion was a coat I made about a year ago that was sold to a very discerning local buyer who came into my studio. It was - like everything I make - a one of a kind original garment made by me. I am a textile artist and don't make more than 1 of each thing. I don't support mass manufacturing of clothing and it sickens me to see these thieves enrich themselves from my creative output when they represent everything I try to subvert.

ALL the garments advertised on these Chinese websites are stolen from other makers. These websites aren't taking pictures of their product. The pictures are appropriated from the original makers and you won't be getting what is in the picture but a poorly made and cheap copy. The fabric of the copy will be printed with a photographic reproduction of what you see in the picture but won't be patched, appliqued, printed and stitched as in the pirated pictures.

DON'T SUPPORT THESE FRAUDSTERS. THEY ARE STEALING FROM THE ORIGINAL MAKERS AND WANT TO STEAL YOUR MONEY

THIS IS appropriation...

Somebody emailed me last night to warn me one of my garments had been appropriated and was for sale on a Chinese website -

The picture of my jacket they are featuring in their website promotion has been lifted directly from one of my blog posts on December 18th last year. It has been altered in their version by elongating the picture from the original hip length to thigh length.

I haven't sold this jacket so I took a picture of it this morning to show you. The cover page of todays Sydney Morning Herald is stuck behind it....incidentally with a front page news item about Chinese involvement in gambling fraud...

December 18th blog post  - the picture used by Tusancat is the one in this blog post, elongated somewhat. Amusingly they are also offering it in 5 more colour versions which have been achieved by changing the colour balance in Photoshop.

This is a screenshot of the ripped off version by "Tusancat" currently being advertised on instagram....available for a mere US$42.

I've already heard from one lady who checked out this garment when it came up on her instagram feed, thinking it was so beautiful she might buy it.

Regrettably if she had bought it I can guarantee she would have been disappointed -  possibly even horrified at the cheap and nasty reproduction she'd paid for. 

The jacket I made was an upcycle, existing second hand item bought from Vinnies for $6. I covered the surface with appliques cut from my hand prints, patchwork and applied lots of elaborate stitching. The whole process to transform it took about 18 hours. The rip-off version you would receive from Tusancat will be a photographic reproduction of the surface, not the textured, patched and hand printed garment shown in the picture.

I tried to take some photos this morning which better show the surface of my original.

  

I'm also aware that one of my PDF patterns, the "Pheenie" dress is being manufactured at scale and sold by a Chinese clothing manufacturer. That doesn't particularly bother me as after 35 years in the clothing and textile world I'm well aware there is no legal protection to be enforced that could stop it. 

In truth I feel pretty blase about both my pattern and original item of art to wear clothing being expropriated, rather than angry or emotional. My first experience of having a print and clothing design stolen and reproduced was 30 years ago, when I walked into a shop to be surrounded by 200 dresses reproduced exactly from my original garment but in 5 different sizes. Ironically the copier claimed she thought the dress she copied was a no-name brand from Asia.

I'm not the only designer or textile artist being appropriated in this way currently. In fact, in a sardonic way I feel humbled to join the company of many famous and way more well known clothing brands. These advertisements started appearing on instagram about 3 months ago. Direct rip-offs from Magnolia Pearl and fellow Australian textile artist India Flint along with many, many more designers than that....dozens. I'm choosing not to name more than these 2 here. In all cases the copyists use the original pictures from the designer, which is another level of copyright violation on top of what they already do. Chinese businesses like Tusancat, Barbring, Cocochic + + + who are doing this obviously won't be drawing the line at exploiting the sewing businesses who do their manufacturing.

And that is what shits me the most about what these people are doing. The reality is they won't be affecting my income much as I only make and sell one-of-a-kind garments and aren't a "manufacturer" of any level. I work alone and don't have a single outworker. 

What super, super massively pisses me off is that these business operators are stealing my original concepts and totally subverting everything I try to stand for. Most of my work is made from upcycled used garments and discarded fabrics because I'm not supporting the polluting industry that keeps on churning out gazillions of metres of fabric and fast fashion disposable clothes every day. A wasteful, ignorant and arrogant industry that carelessly uses up resources and pollutes our shared environment for the financial enrichment of a small number of business owners, who aren't the ones doing the actual work of design or production. The ethical and moral vacuity which allows them to feel entitled to appropriate the visions and productions of genuine creatives extends to exploiting the labours of the women who work in third world clothing manufacturing. 

I'm appalled to have my work taken in this way to do all these things I actively work against -

1)  sweat shop working conditions  - low wages, long working hours

2)  lions share of the profits going to enrich a small number of business owners

3)  mass manufacturing that uses up lots of resources (clean water, soil nutrients, pollution from needlessly transporting stuff out of local zones and all around the planet....)

4)  mass manufacturing practices of the fashion industry create lots of wastage by over production

5)  the polluting side effects from the chemicals used in textile manufacturing and printing

Please help to stop these companies from making their exploitation profitable by not buying any of their product and letting everybody you know on all social media channels the immoral and fraudulent basis of how they operate.

Here are some simple suggestions if you want to wear clothing that minimises the harm done to others and our shared environment

BUY LOCAL FROM LOCAL MAKERS

SUPPORT ARTISANS BY BUYING THEIR HANDMADE PRODUCTS

MAKE YOUR OWN CLOTHES

UPCYCLE - RECYCLE - REMAKE - MAKE DO 

DON'T BUY CHEAP SHIT MASS MANUFACTURED CLOTHING  (especially if made in 3rd world countries)

 Lastly...I haven't sold this beautiful hand made jacket and are only asking a measly Aus$225 plus postage for it. PM me if you want to know the measurements. I accept payment by Paypal only.

Freda Jacket upcycle

Today I finished the grey denim jacket shown in a blog of couple of weeks ago. I refer to it as the "Freda" jacket because of the stencil on the left pocket (yes I know FKs name was spelled Frida, but thats just me being non conformist)

Many hours of hand stitching, stencil prints, machine embroidery and applique have transformed it into a unique work of wearable art. Its a smaller size than what I usually make at 10-12 (bust 34-36").

All the fabrics added to the Jacket came from discarded and used fabrics - coming mainly from some offcuts of upholstery fabric and a bedcover. The large motif on the back was cut from a quilt cover. It was machine stitched to the back then I used the lines of the motif as guide to apply free motion stitching, then cut out the "windows" to reveal the denim underneath layer.

 

more to make

Tuesday I visited Vinnies looking for treasures to upcycle. Here's a collection of 2 pillow covers and a tablecloth which might combine well together. Total cost for these 3 = $8.

That Chinese border around the tablecloth really appeals to me as well. I might get a piece of mylar plastic out to cut it as a stencil pattern. Then when the table cloth is cut into patches to remake I can print the pattern on other parts of the garment to use as it an integrating motif. The khaki linen cushion cover appliqued with the flower petals has lots of potential to be reworked with embroidered hand stitches into something really special.

However I set these pieces aside and started working on an $8 king size doona cover I bought (a "doona" cover is a removable bag that contains a quilt). Doona covers are a magnificent resource for metres and metres of fabric. Like most of these used functional items this one was soft and the print faded with wear and washing, which just makes it all the attractive to me. It was also unstained and the cotton/polyester mix fabric still had enough durability to last for decades. One side had a print of large black abstract flowers on a white background and the opposite side was wide stripes of black and beige.

the doona cover is on the left and the skirt appliqued with sections and motifs I cut from it on the right

this is day 1 on the skirt

Day 2 on the skirt a whole lot more details are being added with black and white running stitches

constructive things other than aggravating people

Have finally mostly gotten over my desire to be the most hated person of the Japanese.
The silence of the last week means I've been stitching. Three projects are on the go simultaneously and this A-line skirt was the first to be finished last night. 

front of upcycle skirt by Pearl Moon

It is made entirely from used clothes and fabrics bought at my local Vinnies. Patched, stenciled and stitched by me. Denim and cotton fabrics. It took 30 hours to make.

back of upcycle skirt by Pearl Moon

I'm not fond of zippers so I sewed dome tape into the side seam. The skirt is lined too.

  

The pictures above and below shows earlier stages of patching the textile together.

The ongoing work in progress for today is this used denim jacket that I'm adding many hand stitched and embroidered details to. This picture was taken after I'd sewed on the appliques and stenciled various areas before the hand stitched details. A lot has been done since this picture was taken a week ago. Will show the finished result in a couple of days.

Intersectional Identities

A picture so another great big blog full of text doesn't scare readers away. This is a piece of textile I've been working on to use a sample piece in classes. A combination of patchwork, stencil and hand sewed running stitch. Its entirely made from used clothes and textiles so it has a nice soft feel and a faded look. The round holes are where I cut out circular motifs from another stenciled piece to applique onto the piece to the left.

I finished Ijeoma Oluo’ “So you want to talk about racism” a few days ago and found it very insightful for building on what was learned from “White Fragility”. I’ve been going back re-listening to many chapters and making notes on my thoughts.

In this blog I'll talk about Chapter 5. Over the next week or 2 I'll talk about my thoughts and reactions to other chapters. Another thing that really intrigued me was how Oluo calls Pacific Islanders "Asians". This really astounded me because as a 60 year old dual citizen of NZ/Aus we have occasionally been prompted by politicians to think our nations as part of Asia. But never have I heard someone just lump us in with Philippinos, Japanese, Tongans, Chinese, Koreans, Hawaiians, Samoans and more. I've always thought of Pacific Islanders as Polynesians and Melanesians and quite distinct from Chinese, Koreans and many other nationalities Oluo named. She doesn't clarify if she would include Maori and indigenous Australians as Asians but the chapter does seem to imply she would. However....I'm pretty sure she wouldn't think of me as an Asian! though my european ancestors lived in the Pacific for 125years +, I was born a 4th generation NZer and many in my family married Maori and had children.....anyway chapter 14 is a discussion for another day....

Of the 17 chapters in the book I found #5 – What is intersectionality and why do it need it? – the most challenging to get my head around. After 6 listenings I hope to be getting it right, through strangely in retrospect this should have been the one concept most easy for me to relate to personally. I hope to try to clarify it here as even Oluo acknowledges it is little known and often misunderstood but she regards it as a foundational to her work towards social justice.

Here is the Wikipedia link for Intersectionality

Essentially I understand intersectionality as the contention that every individual lives in several overlapping identities and that when engaging with others or addressing an issue that person can be operating from more than one or multiple of their identifications at once. Oluo urges social justice advocates to keep this in mind when engaging with others because it can lead to misunderstandings of various scale developing. For example – imagine two people talking about what is “white privilege” but 1 person is male, black, 30 years old, has a prison record, is currently unemployed and is poor, talking to a white female, 50 years old, college education with a high paying job who has never been unemployed. I’ve outlined a very stark hypothetical so it jumps out how the disparity in life experience means each individual cannot help but form very different world views and understandings of how the world operates.

Another discussion Oluo spends time clarifying in several chapters that neatly overlaps with what I read in White Fragility is why BIPOC will either withdraw or refuse to get engaged in discussions where they feel unheard, mocked/ridiculed, dismissed, take up too much of their time and energy or recognise as coming from the challengers default white privilege.

Here, I’m acknowledging that is what I’ve done in the last few weeks with my blogging and ignorant expectation that I deserved to be addressed. Now I’m understanding why the various people I’ve called on – Emily Ito, Aja Barber and Makiko Hastings – won’t talk to me. My approach to challenging the assertion that using the description kimono for a sewing pattern was an unacceptable cultural appropriation was found to be offensively aggressive. I think they might have felt an interaction would give me unwarranted recognition for a view that didn’t have any credibility in the way they see things.

I now get the point that there won’t be any acknowledgment or discussion and are no longer perplexed why they won’t say anything and understand there is no point in continuing to ask them to say something. They are not listening and don’t care and I wholly get it. If I had been able to approach my queries with more subtlety and open mindedness perhaps the situation wouldn’t have become so distressing. I am sorry Makiko Hastings.

As an Aspergers person that my way of saying things, viewing the world and asking questions can be irritating and offensive to neurotypicals (NTs) is quite a familiar place for me. By saying this I don’t want people to interpret it as an emotive manipulation to try to exculpate my offensiveness or make the pretence that my cognitive dissonance gives me a special license to be rudely oblivious. Its everybodys obligation to educate ourselves about civility, respectful interaction, social mores and expectations. Aspergers might merit me maybe a few more inches of rope than NTs, but not a lot more. I will do better in the future about applying way more mindfulness in the way I ask about things.

What NTs experience as my “confrontational” attitude has been a problem all my life. My very first school report said I had to learn to play more with the other kids. So even at 5 years old Mrs Brown my teacher picked up behavior she perceived as insular and anti social. Throughout my entire school life I had no interest in making friends or playing. Every lunch time spent reading the library was the best part of school. I learned to spell deoxyribonucleic acid when I was 11 and knew the 4 components of DNA.

I have been disliked, bullied and kicked out of every workplace I’ve been in because of my pedantic, obsessive and (perceived) aggressive attitudes. People either dislike me or hate me, at best I get indifference. In 1983 I was evicted from the most permissive alternative lifestyle community in New Zealand by 60 adults chanting “fuck off, fuck off” at the top of their lungs. They couldn’t stand having me there any longer after 2 years though I’d given a baby I wasn’t able to mother to a couple in their community to adopt as their own. I also have the dubious infamy of being sacked from working in 2 brothels, so unfriendly has my behavior been perceived. I didn’t take drugs or fall asleep on the job, I just preferred reading newspapers and books rather than talking to the other workers.

What I believe is trying to live with integrity by educating myself about things is often perceived by NTs to be snobbery, self righteousness, aggressiveness and anti social behaviour.

This is describing the main intersectional identity I have to negotiate getting through the world with every day. Life isn’t easy or a bed of roses for anybody so this is not a claim for special privileges but just hoping for some empathy for mistakes made.

wish I had an asbestos kimono

On Sunday afternoon the offer I'd made to donate the proceeds of sales for the Sencha Kimono over 10 days ended. I sold 27 patterns for $1 (actually after paying shop fees I got 92c each) and one buyer paid the full price of $14 acknowledging it was going to be a donation. I already make an automatic  monthly donation of $20 to the ASRC but this morning I made an additional one off donation of $104, more than doubling what was raised.

Asylum Seeker Resource Centre

Thank you to all those who bought the pattern. Our donation will assist someone who seeking asylum to live in Australia.
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Today we are hearing Kim K has backed down on trademarking Kimohno

KK apology

I remain in awe of this womans genius marketing skills. It is no wonder she has clawed her way with steel talons to the top of a pyramid of "would be, if they could be" celebrities. Now she can double down profiting by capitalising on her newfound humility and desire to listen.

The independent clothing design businesses that changed their sewing pattern names also followed a similar script, though I'm pretty sure their initial naming came out of ignorance of the sensitivity, rather than a calculated marketing ploy like KK. Their apologies were so effusive and fulsome that some people cynically suggested they were using the situation for virtue signalling.

Throughout this week of moral panic I've been sloughing through my reading list about what is racism. In light of that it's been fascinating to observe how KK can get away with her activities with such marginal criticism. Being a POC seems to put her into an asbestos armor that protects her from being immolated in a racist polemical. If she were "white" the whole situation would have been a conflagration of white privilege accusations. How sweet for her.

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I started writing a different post this morning but decided to delete it and address this instead.

Makiko Hastings is a Japanese ceramic artisan living in the UK. I follow her blog and Instagram. In blogging about the kimono naming issue I've read some of her comments and put links in past posts to what she has written. I'm publishing a comment I tried make in reply to what Makiko Hastings wrote me on her Instagram today but I may have been blocked.

So with some reluctance and a heavy heart, I put it out here in public.

A few days ago Makiko made a long comment on Instagram about feeling emotionally disturbed and that she was seeking professional help.

This what I said in a comment to that:

Much love to you Makiko. I'm saddened that so much has weighed you down recently. You have so much resilience to still pour so much love and inspiration into your art while at the same time feeling burdens pressing from the demands of the unfeeling outside world. Love will always give us the strength to get through and you are much loved!

A day later this how she responded to me:

 Hello Pearl. With all respect of you showing kindness here, I have to be honest with you, it makes me feel uncomfortable. Do you know why? This post was meant to be about cultural appropriation on naming kimono, yet again, as you might have guessed from my story, but I did not write about it in words in order to protect my energy, precisely because what it took for me to write and encounter some backlash last time I wrote about it, which you also left a comment on the grid so I thought you read my post (?). Anyway, following your message, I have read many blog posts in your site, and noticed that you are very strongly and almost obsessively disagreeing with my friend Emi Ito @little_kotos_closet and her work. You were even criticising her identity as an American Japanese to speak out about it, which I find it harmful. My upbringing might be different from hers, but I do respect her and her hard work, which required so much energy, pain and time. When people voice their hurt, it is not just personal, because C/A is not a personal matter. I actually mentioned her name in my blog and I stand with her in solidarity. Most of Japanese people might not voice as much, (which I also mentioned why) but that does not mean they don’t have one. I appreciate her action because she precisely gave me the courage to speak out.
So criticising her bitterly in your space, then coming to my space in a friendly manner, whilst both of us stand on the same ground talking about the same topic, it appears to me that your action is a contradiction, not consistent, and even making me feel unsafe to reply to you. I could not comprehend why you do so when I first saw your message, but now it makes me wonder if you are trying to ‘cherry pick’ me because I am a Japanese, and wanting me to justify what you do - making garment for profit, naming kimono. I feel fearful. I do not wish to go into the details of what you say in your blog in my space, but please be aware that your inconsistent action not just confuse the readers, but also is insensitive and can be harmful.

I saw this 4 hours later and tried to say this in reply, but I think my posts are either being blocked or possibly moderated: 

Makiko, I feel awful that you find my opinions inconsistent and offensive. I am confused why you think because I have strongly disagreed with Emi Itos opinion that means therefore I must dislike and disrespect all Japanese people? Nothing can be further from the truth…I do have the utmost respect for Japanese artisanship. I have acknowledged since the 1980s my admiration for Japanese fashion designers and how they influenced the clothing styles I love and publish as sewing patterns. Your work is beautiful and I admire it. I post that publicly to you because as an artist I know it is so important to get positive feedback from others. I feel sympathy when you discuss feeling hurt and struggling in the world and want to reach out to help you feel better. There are many, many other people I follow on Instagram that I make comments to in this same desire to be supportive.

On my blog I have tried to clarify and explain why I disagree with the kimono naming issue. I come at it from an academic understanding of what is defined as C/A and don’t believe kimono comes into that definition. At times it is true I have said some personal opinions about Emi Ito but that is becos I’m frustrated that she doesn’t speak. I tried to join her Instagram but was removed and blocked within minutes, I did take that personally. It does anger me that she has set herself up as an advocate and is happy to talk to people, media and publications that are supportive but censors and ignores any person that is too hard.

It is demanding, even exhausting when you take a position publicly, but that is part of the obligation if you want to put statements out into the world. I have been affected by my position too with trolling and angry people shaking their finger. I can deal with that. The hardest thing, as you yourself has acknowledged, is having time and energy taken away from your work. In the last 5 weeks I’ve probably reduced my studio time and output by 80%.

I respect your comment here to me, but feel hurt that you think I am such a small person that I can’t separate intellectual issues from people. I don’t automatically dislike people just because they have different opinions from me. I don’t disregard people because they come from different cultural backgrounds from me. I understand from what you’ve said here that you don’t separate my person from my opinions. Because of what I think and say you dislike me and would rather not have communications. This is truly hurtful to me and makes me feel sick that I’ve caused such distress to you. From now on I will only ever make anonymous likes and never comment again. Remove me if you feel better that way. I want to keep following you and other Japanese I like and respect becos it’s important to me to stay in touch with what your opinions are and how you feel about things. I don’t try to fill my world with only people that agree with me.

Lastly, can I say in self defence regarding Makiko suggesting I disingenuously ignored that her original post about being in pain was over the kimono issue. I am Aspergers and are notoriously stupid when it comes to deciphering the obtuse messaging that may seem completely obvious to neurotypicals. I do my best but are often totally baffled why people have to be so convoluted, just straight out say what you think and mean or thickos like me just don't get it.

Kim - Oh - Nooooo!!!!

About 4 weeks ago I got huffed up enough to start writing many pieces about my opinion on whether the use of kimono by non Japanese was a disrespectful cultural appropriation. After a month of picking up the issue, examining the top, bottom, sides and lots of hidden facets I still have the opinion that while it may offend some people, particularly those of Japanese – American heritage, and it may even qualify to a degree as an “appropriation” it just cannot be stopped, legally or morally. 

Essentially kimono has been used in the english language for around 200 years and has gradually segued into a generic descriptor word. Outside of Japan most people regard a kimono as a robe type  garment usually having wide sleeves and banded edges. 

I think the most heartening thing I can say to the Japanese who find it’s hijacking offensive is that the vast majority of people still understand what the traditional Japanese garment is and don’t confuse it with contemporary iterations of the style.

Hitting the headlines in the last few days has been the American celebrity Kim Kardashian doing her own version of cultural appropriation by suggesting she is going to trademark kimono as part of the name for her underwear collection.

Kim Kardashian Shapewear

Ugh, that really is awful. 

How many of you might agree with my cynical impression that she is welcoming the uproar because it makes so much free advertising for her product worldwide?

Personally I do find her appropriation in this case quite offensive because her undies don't have even the vaguest relationship to a kimono - but there is nothing that can be done to prevent her using kimono to peddle her wares. It is a generic word that can't be protected and you can bet your last buck that Ms Kardashian has access to top level legal advice and would be well aware of that. 

Perhaps she is relishing all the uproar and laughing all the way to the bank....?

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During my writings I’ve become aware that examining anything to do with cultural appropriation will inevitably lead to touching on racism. Several of my blog posts did poke the beast and made me feel defensive. In honesty racism isn’t a thing that is much present in my daily life. Though I’ve lived in Australia for 34 years I’ve barely met any indigenous people and never had a friendship with an aboriginal person. 

In the tiny bush town where I’ve lived for 11 years, with a population about 900, I’m told there may be 3-4 people that identify as aboriginal but I don’t know any of them. Over the last decade a lot of Indian families have moved here and now run possibly half the local businesses – the Chemist shop, our only grocery shop (which includes agencies for the Post Office and Bank), 2 petrol stations, 2 motels and our medical doctor and hospital consultant is Pakistani. I welcome them all very much and would be totally comfortable to have more Indian people than white Australians in this town. They run their businesses professionally, have many children in the local primary school and contribute their time and resources to our local community organisations such as meals on wheels and the volunteer Fire Brigade. What more could you want of any citizen in your community?

Without question I acknowledge racism exists and is a hideous institution that needs to be dismantled. Because I’ve been a bit bewildered getting comments pointing out my white privilege lately I knew it was time to have a look into why it stung me. 

Recently I described myself as a good “listener” and a person who is trying to live in a conscious paradigm of integrity. We all think we are “good” people of course, but sometimes you must scratch off the surface to find out if any borer has got into the wood behind….

A week ago I launched a reading project. This is my reading list at the moment. Most are audiobooks so I can work in the studio and listen at the same time. Some weren’t available in that format so I bought them for Kindle.

White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo

So you Want to Talk About Race, by Ileoja Oluo

Sister Outsider; Essays and Speeches, by Audre Lorde

We Should All be Feminists, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

White Identity Politics, by Ashley Jardina

A Haven Amongst Perdition, by Sidra Owens (this is actually a novel)

Not purchased yet but I intend to get “Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia” an anthology by Anita Heiss  and Stan Grants “Australia Day” because I need to keep in touch with how racism manifests in my own community.

White Fragility was the first book read and I found it shattering. I listened to the whole book over one day and was left feeling gutted. For me this book is one that has reset my world view. There is now a pre White Fragility world and a post White Fragility world.

I had read We Should All be Feminists a few years ago and re-read that.

At present I’m half way through listening to Ileoja Oluo’ So You Want to Talk About Race and this is great too. Its nearly 20 years since I did a year of Sociology at the University of Newcastle when I was doing my Visual Art degree so I’ve had to dust off some of my feminist theory. I’ve re-listened to Oluos chapter about “intersectionality” 3 times. This has intrigued me enough to do some additional research as I don’t feel this fits me well.

If anybody would like to recommend me some more good contemporary writing about racism I welcome your suggestions.