Honestly never understood this aspect.. As a Indian, i would be really happy if someone loves my culture and wants to be part of it. My only issue would be if they doing it right. That's it...

I am a 62 year old white woman. My entire life, since childhood, I have admired, learned from, and tried to emulate so many good people. MLK, Gandhi, and even some fictional characters—-including Mulan, coincidentally—-who embody the kind of intrinsic qualities I want to have. Skin color and culture never mattered. What is inside is what always mattered to me. Is that racist? No, because you’re not basing it on race. Is it cultural appropriation? No, because intrinsic qualities are universal, so have no basis in culture. We humans are so much more alike than different, and admiring, emulating, and feeling like a kindred spirit with someone of a different race and culture because of who they are underneath all the surface noise means you actually SEE them on a much deeper level than most people who can never get past the surface can ever understand. OP and her daughter are perfectly fine and lovely people, the coworker isn’t, and probably never could be.

Ok but why? Why is this a problem? I have always identified with Mulan. We share a lot of struggles. It was big for me to see a Disney princess like Mulan and Jasmine and Pocahontas and Belle that wasn’t frilly and feminine because I never identified with that. The little girl is seeing the person, not the skin color. The adult woman is being racist. In all honesty(I am white so correct me if I’m wrong), but as long as you respect the culture, it’s not appropriation it’s appreciation

Ironically, in trying to protect others, the colleague discriminates against someone with a disability.

It could just be that it's early in the morning for me, but I'm not understanding the problem the woman has. The lesson that is often taught is love everyone equally. This girl identifies with someone and doesn't see an ethnic difference. Isn't that what we should want? It is right up there with the picture/story of the white girl who befriended a black girl and said they were twins because they had the same birthday.

NTA. What IS racist is a white woman saying a white child could not possibly resonate with an Asian character. What is NOT racist is a child resonating with a character because of who she is.

At 21 I was attending an école supèrieure in France. Played the flute, so joined an amateur orchestra. We were invited to participate in a musical event in Germany where local families hosted us while we participated. Since one of the electives I had chosen was to study Japanese language (in French!) I was assigned to a family where the husband was German and his wife Japanese. She took great pride and delight sharing her culture with me by encouraging my faltering attempts to communicate in Japanese and ceremonially dressed me in a formal kimono to take pictures. She also took me through formal tea ceremonies every day. I have no doubt some people would be outraged that I participated. They don’t comprehend the gratitude I felt nor the joy my hostess felt when I honoured her culture. As someone who identifies as agnostic, it was a near religious experience. I still have the pictures and the memories.

I'm Mexican, and it makes me sick when foreigners want to police how we should feel when others honour our traditions like day of the dead or dress like Catrinas, or identify with any other aspect of our culture. Let us decide what we can be "offended" about, and for the record, we don't take offence on little girls.

The desire to find racism, and virtue signal over it, is very strong in some white middle-class people.

I identify with Ursula from the Little Mermaid. Am I being offensive to sassy mer-squids? Your coworker sounds like a douchebag.

So this woman came up to OP and asked leading questions until she could find a way to say OP and her child were racist. Fun day.

I was obsessed with Pocahontas when it came out. I identified with her just second to Belle (my #1 because of her love of reading) but for some reason I just felt Pocahontas in my soul. I even spent an entire weekend stopping/playing/pausing the VHS so I could rewrite the entire movie as a school play. Unfortunately, I did not know about copyright and all those details and didn't understand when my teacher said we couldn't perform it lol. Never really considered the race at all I just adored her.

I'm so tired of white people being offended over sh*t that has nothing to do with them. Not her culture, not her complaint to make. It's always white people getting offended over this kind of stuff. Stop looking for reasons to be offended and mind your business. It's completely fine to relate to anyone for any reason. fwiw, I'm white if it matters.

Not seen the movie, but is the race/culture of the character in any way relevant? I wouldn't have even known that she's supposed to be of some particular ethnic origin, just that the animator has coloured her skin somewhat.

Tell this long nosed troublemaker to MYOFB! Problem solved.

Modern society has become absolutely disgusting. I'm about to turn 40 in a couple of weeks, for the entirety of my childhood everyone was trying to impress the importance of not seeing color. See WHO they are, not what they are....because that's the only way you can treat anyone, in any circumstance. How you treat others, your actions, the content and quality of your character, that's all that matters. It's still ALL THAT MATTERS, yet the virtue signaling outrage culture is trying to force the world to pretend that the only important parts of a person are the ones they have zero control over. Don't try to find common ground with someone that doesn't look like you, you couldn't possibly understand, don't pay any attention to what they say, how they say it or the validity of their logic, all that matters is they're ______ so you have to support them, which means agree with them, even when it's simply someone getting offended on behalf of a group they do not belong to. It's moronic.

Why are we teaching people that you can only identify with people who look like you? I have a lot of real-life people I find aspirational that look nothing like me, and people who check all my characteristic identity boxes that drive me insane. This is so racist, infantilizing and toxic.

As a Chinese person, I'm totally fine with a white girl idolising Mulan. If I was able to idolise Belle when I was eight, then there shouldn't be a problem with her relating to Mulan. As long as you're not being offensive, I'm cool with other people interacting with my culture.

This appropriation thing is getting more and more out of hand! I'm not american, and english isn't my first language, but even I understand that appropriation means taking something and calling it your own! How can people say that someone liking aspects of a different culture, be it food, music, etc., can mean appropriation?! So each of those people only listen to their culture's music and eat their culture's food?! That's just nonsense! If I want to cook myself an italian dinner, that's not appropriation! That's just me, cooking and it's a sign of appreciation for another culture's cuisine...... It just baffles me how people can be so oblivious and easily offended....

Another White person making racism all about them. That is so very common among a certain segment of wealthy White people, with women being more likely, but far from exclusively. It's a bunch of people who want to feel good about themselves and feel that they are the True Moral Persons, but are actually cowardly, miserly, and Too Delicate for physical discomfort. So donations, protest, working with others, or confrontation with anybody who can hurt them is out of the question. So they express extreme outrage on the internet, against children, and against people who look unlikely to retaliate.

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americans are exhausting 😂