Do you think tiki bars are offensive?

[Aiko_E_Lara]

Or just using tikis as motifs. Some might think "They're just tikis" but the thing is, some of them are actual gods and there are still believers of it today but they're reduced to nothing but just party decors and brochures. Like nothing but just brands to get tourists. I know other countries do the same like marketing their mosques, temples and churches in their travel brochures but the thing difference is those religions are major and already well known that people will respect them instead of taking them for granted. So right now, I have a tiki mug intron of me and I'm also thinking, "do i have a Hawaiian equivalent of a crucifix just in a mug form?" I get that using religious motif as a decor is fine and can show appreciation but the tikis can get to the point where they become so cartoonized that they get sily, people don't even know they're gods. The word tiki may just be translated to "image" in English but imagine this, what if we have "God bars" full of crosses and crucifix, angels and saints in it?

Updates

8 mo

by the way, I googled it before I made this question. There are indeed people claiming it's controversial and I thought it was thought provoking as someone who goes to tiki bars a lot.

[Chazmatazz269]

I am not offended by the use Tiki symbols in any way. Given what you wrote, i could definitely understand if some people did.
I’d have to know more about the religion to make the comparison to Christianity. Let’s face facts here, God is a party pooper. Not all gods are. The polytheistic cultures had multiple gods for which they literally celebrated. Bacchanalia is a fancy word for party, derived from Bacchus, the Roman god of wine and revery. Dionysus was the Greek counterpart. Something tells me that there’s probably a Tiki for raucous celebrations as well. But i’m just speculating based on peripheral data.


That said, i am not a fan of weaponizing the term “cultural appropriation” as wildly out of context as it is typically used. So if people are offended, i would hope they’d be open to educating others so that they might continue to appreciate the cultural significance without desecrating it. As opposed to canceling them, getting their establishments shut down and costing them their livelihoods. But maybe that’s just me.

[Aiko_E_Lara]

I know some gods are party poopers but there are also parties dedicated to god but think about it, it's the americans making that trend. Using god as a brand not even bothering to learn about it in the first place. It would've been fine if it was the native hawaiians themselves who popularize the tiki bars.

[Chazmatazz269]

I didn’t realize that Tiki bars didn’t originate in the Polynesian islands.

[jshm2]

No. Just like Marvel and DC making comics from "Norse gods" is not offensive. They are using artistic license to sell an image - not proselytize

[Aiko_E_Lara]

"They are using artistic license to sell an image" That's exactly what makes it understandable why they'd get uneasy with it. It's not even the polynesians that made the tiki bars but it's the americans who made it.

[alice55]

I don't think so but at the same time I know nothing of the culture of the people where that come from so

[Aiko_E_Lara]

so by default you say no even if you didn't know about that culture. It's like "I'm not sure about christianity but I think it's ok to mock them"