S09.E24: Antiquities

[PrincessPurrsALot]

Main: Antiquities

Also: Fascists win in Italy; Liz Truss unveils new economic plan in the UK; shopping networks recognize Queen Elizabeth's death the only way they know how

Original air date 2022.10.02

[Annber03]

I feel like the guy who quoted Solomon's Law and the woman who talked about removing a baby who's being abused should get together. What a bizarre way to look at this issue. That footage of Native Americans looking at their precious mementos that were stored away in the basement...they showed plenty of emotion over seeing their things and yet they didn't feel a need to compare them to babies. 

(Loved, too, how the guy who led the group of Native Americans down to that basement was smiling once they got in there. Meanwhile, the group themselves were just looking on totally stone-faced, clearly upset about the fact this is where their items ended up.)

And yeah, I mean, I live in a Western nation and the chances of me getting to go to any of these museums anytime soon are exceedingly slim at best. So I can only imagine how much harder it might be for some people to be able to travel around and see various antiquities from their homelands. 

The whole thing about the museums apparently not bothering to vet the people they're getting the artifacts from to make sure they're on the up and up is disturbing, too. Either they need to find people who are actually good at that kind of job, or, worse yet, they know these people aren't on the up and up and just don't care, because hey, at least they got something prestigious that makes them look good, right? 

And that's the other frustrating thing, too. These people don't want these antiquities because they appreciate the history behind them. They just want them for the prestige and the "cool" factor. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that when they're showing off these antiquities to visitors, they discuss the history of them in very Western-centric/white-centric ways, without going into much depth about the item's history and its cultural significance to its home country and people. 

The end bit with Nanjiani was great. 

As for the story about the UK government, I mean...is anyone really that surprised at this point? You (general "you") put people like this into power, who push these kinds of policies that don't benefit the people in any way, shape, or form, this is the kind of mess you're going to get.  I could say the same thing about whatever inevitable scandals will likely happen with the new Italian government, or the mess with Bolsonaro, or certain politicians here in the States, or so on. This really shouldn't be a shock at this point.  

[swanpride]

Frankly, the Brits got what they deserved. That's what they were voting for, and when they were warned that "cutting red tape" is just another phrase for "removing protections" they put their fingers in their ears and screamed "Project Fear". 

Regarding the treasures: There are a couple of claims which are simply BS, like Italy wanting the Mona Lisa back, but most of them are pretty legit. And frankly, if the countries which own those treasures want to destroy them, it is their right - THEY are the owners, period. We can discuss those which were actually sold legally, but not the ones which were stolen for sure. 

[paigow]

Indiana Jones & Belok were not that far apart ideologically. One worked for a museum, the other for private collectors. Both believed that solving puzzles entitled them to things from other cultures.

[swanpride]

....Who cares about Corbyn? If they hadn't voted for Brexit, Truss wouldn't get away with half of the sh.... she is pulling. Nor would have Johnson....

And are you honestly claiming that Greece "didn't exist" back then? Yeah, let's just pretend a culture just vanishes because it is swallowed up by a conqueror for a time. Honestly, that the Greeks had no say in what happened makes the whole thing even worse, not better.  

[xaxat]

Well, that didn't take long. UK government forced to ditch plan to slash top rate of tax.

Good job John!

[swanpride]

Eh, I think in this case its not the LWT effect, the whole thing was doomed the moment it disrupted the markets that badly. 

[Rlb8031]

There is a simple answer to this problem. The large western museums can build smaller facilities in the countries where these antiquities were originally from, move the entire collection to those countries permanently and then display the treasures to the people who are descendants and part of the cultures being depicted rather than simply hoarding culture for themselves. Those same museums should also voluntarily enter into agreements with other museums in the receiving country to share/lend collections for further display. Imagine if there was a decision to work with the Lakota nation to build a museum on Lakota territory that displayed Lakota artifacts. 

Now, we all know that this isn't going to happen because the ownership/control/display of these items are fundamentally tied to colonialism, paternalism, racism, and the recasting of war crimes as manifest destiny. Imagine a burglar breaking into your home, stealing jewelry and your belongings, being caught and then in court testifying "Your honor, I did nothing wrong. S/he/they don't deserve to have any of these things because they couldn't stop me from stealing them." It's easy to at least make steps towards acknowledging past wrongs and attempting to right them, but in this case most of these museums (and countries) are not interested in doing either. The quiet part is that they don't think they did anything wrong, so there isn't anything to fix.

[JustHereForFood]

I guess that terrorist russia stealing 15% of Ukraine's land and threatening the whole World with nuclear weapons is not worth even mentioning to John. Not that I expect a segment about it at this point, but at least that longer talk in recap which was dedicated to UK's economics. I expected that protests in Iran might get a segmet this week, but those got one sentence. Maybe just rename the show from Last week tonight to Random topic that we decided to get outraged about this week?

As for the main topic, yeah, nothing new, former colonial countries have a lot of stolen artifacts, no they are not going to give them back. One argument that wasn't mentioned I think, one that I actually agree on to some extent is that many of those countries that have had things stolen have long ongoing armed conflicts or are under dictatorships, so the artifacts would probably get destroyed or stolen and sold on black market. But as was mentioned above, it's not really up to the countries that stole them in the first place to set themselves up as some kind of protectors who have been granted the position to guard those artifacts. If the rightful owner is possible to trace, it should be up to them to decide if they want it back to do as they want with it, or if they perhaps want some financial compensation instead and leave it to the museum or collector who has it now.

[swanpride]

LWT tonight is about pointing to stuff only a few people are talking about, not about stuff which is all over the news. 

[JustHereForFood]

3 hours ago, swanpride said:

LWT tonight is about pointing to stuff only a few people are talking about, not about stuff which is all over the news. 

Sometimes. The dozens of episodes about coronavirus and police brutality would disagree.

[swanpride]

Even those were about parts of the story which weren't really covered all that well. 

[Lantern7]

Not much I can add about last week’s episode. Once again, John showed us some appalling stuff, at least on a cultural level. It’s probably not easy for those certain museum people to not be snobs, given that the practice of taking other countries’ stuff and not giving it back has been long ingrained into society. That’s the sort of hurt not even Kumail Nanjiani inhaling the scent of three of Gerald Ford’s ribs can balance.

On 10/3/2022 at 7:56 AM, paigow said:

Indiana Jones & Belok were not that far apart ideologically. One worked for a museum, the other for private collectors. Both believed that solving puzzles entitled them to things from other cultures.

Can’t wait for the reboot! Or the final movie, where Indiana Jones brings back all the stuff he acquired before he passes on.

Sorry . . . I’m a bit tired, and that idea just seems amusing to me.

[ruby24]

This episode wasn't focused on something that is important enough to be talking about right now, imo. With everything else in the news? 

That's what I often find frustrating about John's show.

[DoctorAtomic]

Given the research effort required for these shows, I would think that the main topics for the episodes are planned and scheduled far in advance. To be fair, the show has always been billed on covering topics that's widely outside of the current coverage. The opening monologue is always topical and I would think can be rewritten up to air. 

[PrincessPurrsALot]

While the show focused on Europe, Africa, and South America, they also included indigenous communities in North America.  There are major projects underway regarding the return of tribal artifacts and to recover the bones that are in museums or in mass graves at schools.  So to me, this is topical.  

[DoctorAtomic]

Related, there is a piece today on PBSNewshour about Berkeley repatriating local Native American artifacts back to their tribes. 

[andromeda331]

It was so sad to see the Native Americans looking at their stuff in basements. It was so sad to see artifacts just sitting in a basement locked away.

I'm not really surprised by anything that was covered. Not the stolen cultural stuff, not the questionable provance or the 'tude from the museums. They really think their entitled to have the stuff and don't care who it was taken from. I kept being reminded of an episode of White Collar (okay a lot of them) where Alex's been hired by the Greeks to steal back their artwork and stuff or the Castle episode with the thief to steals from museums things that don't belong to them.  

I did love the part at the end. Hey what's good for the museums is good for that museum right? We would totally be cool with three of President Ford ribs being taken and put into a museum. Hey if the cemetaries aren't able to protect the stuff they shouldn't have it. 

[ShadowKnight2]

Kumail Nanjiani saved that episode in the end!

[ebk57]

Heard on the BBC Newshour this morning:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0d6r704

[Notwisconsin]

As to what was stolen and what was taken legally, let's look at the Elgin Marbles. At the time they were taken, Greece did not exist. It was part of Turkey, who gave Elgin permission after it was discovered that a lot of locals were using the Parthenon as a quarry to make lime.

Therefore, The Greeks have no claim on them. In 1817, they were nothing but garbage. That's the case with most archeology, this is about extremely old garbage. The Greeks didn't appreciate them at the time. What they think now doesn't matter. Same with Latin America. The great civilizations had collapsed of their own accord centuries earlier, and the stuff was just lying there. The governments of the time didn't really care about them until the early 20th century.

As to the Benin Bronzes, this is what National Geographic says:

"Benin was also heavily involved in the West African slave trade. They would capture men, women, and children from rival peoples and sell them into slavery to European and American buyers. This trade provided a significant source of wealth for the kingdom"

The British at the time were fighting to end the slave trade (Unlike, say, Belgium), which Benin was still trying to keep going. That's why they were attacked in the first place.