Demi Lovato: "calling aliens aliens is offensive." Also Demi Lovato: "Let me buy these fake or stolen artifacts from a culture I have no connection to"
kenny williams no they were referring to extra terrestrials not immigrants because in regards to immigrants I agree completely but that’s not what they were talking about
@@kennywilliams8580 I agree that using this word with humans is derogatory, but she was speaking about extraterrestrial beings, not humans. The reason why the word is bad to use for immigrants is because the word is dehumanising because it is the word for "extraterrestrial creatures" and using it for human beings kind of means they are not seen as human by the person or institution using that word, but beings from other planets literally *are not humans* and therefore "alien" is the correct word for them.
I am currently completing my PhD at the University of Pennsylvania in Near Eastern Archaeology, and this LITERALLY BOILS MY BLOOD. People outside of the discipline have no idea how much real damage this causes. I have excavated in Israel and Iraq, and have worked with collections from Egypt and Turkey as well. Here are the main points I wish people would understand about this topic: 1. Buying any artifacts, AT ALL, promotes looting of sites and the LITERAL DESTRUCTION OF HISTORY. Every site I have worked at in the Middle East has had to have LITERAL ARMED GUARDS to protect both the site and the archaeologists from looters. If we found great artifacts, we would have to stay on site until they were all excavated and safely taken out so they could be brought to locked storage, sometimes having to work 4-5 extra hours in a day just to make sure things would not be looted. Looters are dangerous, and are willing to hurt other people to get artifacts and sell them illegally. 2. Once an artifact is taken out of the site, MORE THAN HALF ITS HISTORIC VALUE IS GONE! Artifacts are only as meaningful as the context in which they were found. Archaeologists often care far more about excavation notes and documentation than we do about the object themselves. Without knowing the exact location, depth, soil type, depositional layer, surrounding artifacts, evidence of disturbance, etc etc, most of the value that object had for illuminating history IS COMPLETELY LOST. 3. The promotion of collecting artifacts actively harms the practice of scientific archaeology, work that is done to promote the truth of our human past. Even if not illegally looted, by collecting artifacts at all (as a private person or unaccredited institution) you are promoting illegal artifact looting and dealing, and the value of objects over actual historical information. I literally have so much more I could say on this, but will leave it at this. Please like this comment so people will see it. @Swell Entertainment , Please pin this comment. I would also be happy to answer any questions you have about this topic from someone who works in the field of Near Eastern Archaeology and had seen first hand the repercussions of actions like these.
As an archaeologist I totally agree! I hate the buying and selling of artifacts, it makes me physically ill sometimes when I see whats for sale and all the information that has been lost. Everyone that watches this video, please note that archaeology has nothing to do with Indiana Jones/Looting and the sale of artifacts.
Yes! I am by no means an archaeology expert but was an anthropology major and one of the first things we learned was that the value of artifacts is in what they can tell us about the humans of the past. The concept of archaeology has become grossly misconstrued by people outside the field, it’s about learning about human history, not being antique collectors. Everything about looting and buying and selling artifacts is dangerous and damaging.
The only person I'm ok with haveing a massive private collection is Phil Collins bc his private collection is on loan (might be a permanent loan situation) to a real museum
A lot of it is common enough it's not sought out by museums. Stuff like ancient roman and greek coins are pretty cheap, depending on the specific coin and quality. A lot of it is common enough museums aren't interested, or museums already have similar items collecting dust in storage. It's a bit different for super rare pieces of course
Yeah I went to Glypoteket in Copenhagen and was really inspired and wanted to get some antique/renaissance statues for my apartment but like... you can just buy reproductions? Or commission statues/sculptures? Sure you won't have the knowledge that it's super duper old but if it's meaningful to you then it's meaningful to you.
It's using art as a financial investment that grosses me out the most. Like did they buy that painting/sculpture because they like looking at it or because they think it's going to increase in value?
Yeah, it feels kinda icky. Old coins and stuff is less gross because they are so common, but, as someone else pointed out here, just buy a reproduction if you like how it looks so much! If you're fascinated by the culture, visit the country (if you can), go to their museums, LEARN about them, don't just buy stuff
We have such amazing museums here in Africa showing OUR history. There are issues such as the Timbuktu Records in Mali being threatened of being destroyed by terrorists - but many want them to be held temporarily in another African country because we do not trust the Europeans to give them back if they hold them.
They wouldn't. So many artifacts in European museums are there because obviously the people from the countries those articles come from couldn't be able to take care of them, we need white people to protect them from ourselves 🙏
I feel like there’s so much more value in collecting goods from around the world made by people who are still alive. I have a beautifully crafted camel wallet from Tunisia and the money from my purchase benefitted Tunisian craftsman who were severely impacted by covid. You can have beautiful, unusual things without destroying history.
I think so, too! unfortunately I also think too many people are "interested in culture" only when it comes to obsessing over the static, romanticized past. they'd rather focus on stolen/fake artifacts than support living, breathing, dynamic aspects of culture 😒
@@kkuudandere yeah people love ancient Egypt but couldn’t care less about anything they’ve done in the past thousand years. People also like rare/difficult to obtain things as status symbols which is gross
Buying directly from craftspeople is definitely a better thing to do! And it's good to support people directly, but just speaking as someone who's indigenous and has seen it first hand the tourist market can also "destroy history" sometimes. When it's peoples livlihoods on the line, indigenous people can and will change what their making to appeal to what tourists want to buy, even if it means completely changing our practices to a different cultures that's ironically perceived as more "authentic". One example from my culture is cowichan sweaters. They weren't actually a part of coast salish culture pre-colonially and are inspired by shetland/other european knits but with our own unique style. The demand for these items played into the demise of our blanket weaving practices because the sweaters were more profitable in a time where we were prohibited from other sources of work for income. BUT also in the 60s/70's a tourist interest helped sustain a salish weaving revival with the salish weavers guild. So it can definitely go both ways!
Sorry for the long-winded response!!! Also I really don't mean to shame anyone for supporting tourist markets as it's not a black and white issue! I really do think in general it's a positive thing, I just felt like there needed to be some nuance explored in the idea that craft tourist markets(even when they're goods made from the community of origin) can't be capable of degrading historical practices.
@@ectoplastiic totally agree and was going to mention this, but your perspective was definitely appreciated as someone who watched it happen to your own culture. But yes tourism can def have both a negative and positive impactive on especially indigenous but also poc population. Little bit of a tangent, but def adjacent, I live in metrodetroit so I’ve watched how detroit and surrounding cities have gained and lost funding, and especially right now, are being pushed to be heavily gentrified. And what ends up happening is the local, small, bipoc owned business are relying on the same white middle class to keep them afloat that is currently pushing them out of their long-time homes, and it’s really fucking sad. Oh the joys of the intricacies of systematic racism.
Can we talk about the fact the reason we don’t have many mummies (considering how many were excavated) because the Victorians would crush them up into powder and eat them because they thought they had healing properties. They had mummy parties and everything where they’d buy a mummy to do this and it’s absolutely horrific. We can thank my art history professor for bringing that to my class’s attention
@@mr.pinkbread ty for this knowledge and I started looking into it and found a quote from time magazine from the managing director of the last company who discontinued it and he said “we might have a few odd limbs lying around somewhere, but not enough to make any paint” (1964 Time)…….. I am now even more disgusted with humanity than I already was, and I was already pissed about the people eating them and I’m just astonished that crushing dead peoples bodies for paint was seen as legal as of 1964, that’s less than 50 years ago
This seems 100% on-brand for Demi Lovato. I took an art history class in college and am a HUGE fan of the show “Antiques Roadshow” and if you watch it just a few times, you understand how important provenance is for almost anything - let alone ancient artifacts and incredibly immoral items. Demi deserves all backlash coming, regardless of if these antiquities are real or not. How dumb.
This is the same reason I do not shop at Hobby Lobby. The owners of Hobby Lobby bought and hid ancient artifacts for a Bible museum. This is true and you can search it. It makes me so angry. I am a historian and history professor and it makes me angry when people but and bring artifacts that belong to other countries into the United States.
As someone from SEA I just need the British museum to return OUR artifacts that they stole. We want them in our museums they are our culture. its unfair that they stole everything from us and display in their museums or are owned by their royal family. This is just odd. Why can't these people just buy copies knowing they are copies.
I'm not saying it's 100% right, but one of the reasons these artifacts stay in british museums is because a lot of the countries they stole from are war torn and just not safe places for these extremely important pieces of history. You could definitley make the argument that the reason these countries are war torn in the first place is because of colonialism, and you'd usually be correct, however it doesn't negate the fact that these artificats need to be kept in a secure location and a lot of these countries just aren't secure.
@@alexbush714 Yeah but you can also ask yourself who is profiting from them right now? Who is charging entry fees for people to see these stolen pieces of history? Where is that money going?
@@alexbush714 if we REALLY cared about that then we wouldn’t be bombing the countries with that heritage and architecture. Unless we plan on transporting entire buildings to the British museum.
Why does Demi KEEP doing crazier and crazier stuff?! And then putting it out there to show people in this masochistic cycle? Just- why. It's just not healthy. I went from being one of their biggest fans to absolutely done within the span of 2 years.
Because poor person fried their brain with fame and poor mental health i feel bad for her but its like a bad car crash its awful but you keep watching anyway
Their brush with death probably messed them up so much that focusing on themselves probably triggers mental breakdowns. Which is sad. They need professional help. So much for saying they weren’t going to change in the La La Land machine. They need more help than they realize. I truly don’t believe figuring out their pronouns, verbally assaulting a fro-yo shop on the internet, having a show about aliens, and buying fake artifacts helps them in any way whatsoever. Whoever their friends are aren’t real friends. Real friends know when to tell them the truth.
@@Divinelywriting I mean, they literally have brain damage from the OD - officially physical as blindness/ blind spots in vision but it's not certain if they can't also have mental damage that wasn't diagnosed yet. I've seen what heavy use can do to people, let alone ODing to the point one needs to be hospitalized. Paired with nearly death and everything else traumatic that happened during their life since childhood and you have this effect. Ofc it's just speculating, but if it's certain the brain was damaged, question only is how much
i'm an archaeology student, and i honestly gotta admit that private collections sounds egoistic to me, it's like, look how much money i have!! so many artefacts would rather benefit from being in a museum, where people could see them. not that all museums have obtained artifacts the right way *cough british musum cough*, but i would still say that it's the lesser of two evils if we first are to remove things!
I said pretty much the same thing in another comment thread on this video, it pisses me enough when rich people have private collections of any prolific/famous art and paintings from THIS century, let alone artefacts that are ancient cultures' . It blows my mind how dumb Demi can be
Ditto for Paleontology, vaguely knew a guy who had a collection of fossils from Mongolia and his own country, some which might have been one of a kind. (Hard to tell when you cant get legitimate professionals to look at them.) Here's hoping they were expensive forgeries, but I fear that they might instead be lost data because someone had some money and wanted to show off.
@@indigophoenix12 THIS. I follow a few fossil hunting accounts on ig that find some amazing stuff, but are mistrustful of academics and all I can think about is the data lost of private collections.
i literally just don’t understand the desire to own antiquities from a culture you have no connection to? like i was super interested in ancient egypt when i was younger & i would’ve found it so cool to be able to see/interact with egyptian antiquities irl, but even then i knew that i had no claim over them just bc i liked them. it’s a very imperialist mindset & it’s wild to me, like that’s a piece of human history & it’s incredibly likely that there are descendants of the people who originally made/owned those items who would be thrilled to be connected to them so why would u want to rob them of that?
And the culture they originate from would also be able to contextualize them and create extremely interesting exhibits using lots of their own artifacts. The passion, respect, and love that the culture could show through the exhibition of their history is unbeatable, the meaning would be more real and true to form.
Yeah, and if you are really interested in a culture you can buy decor or books or general stuff that isn't a literal artefact of great importance to said culture?
@@emilyfletcher7124 exactly, like buying a replica isn't a bad thing and especially if museums sold replicas online to raise funds from a global audience, it could help museums operate in areas with smaller tourism industries
Anytime I see this it reminds me of back in the Victorian Era when wealthy people would buy and sometimes eat mummies. Also as an indigenous woman I personally find it very gross to take other people's historical and cultural items. Not a fan of people having more money than sense in cases like this. The certificate reminds me of the papers that come when you buy a build a bear 🤭
I think they genuinely think it’s like getting a build a bear… I’m African and every time I see things like this I just can’t seem to understand why white people feel the need to own cultural pieces that don’t concern them. It’s weird. Watching Demi do a haul of these artifacts genuinely triggered my fight or flight. 😪
@@sakiva I agree with you. It's nothing to do with their history but they want to colonize the items. It's not a good look. It's sad that they view such important things like expensive party favors
another indigenous lady here, people always use our culture as halloween costumes and or take our history and culture. it makes me so upset and i wish we could do something about it
I work at a small public museum in the US and there's a few nearby sites that we don't name on our public-facing object labels because we're concerned about people going to dig there and looting objects.
Pretty common, in a certain section of florida, there are a couple of sites off hiking trails that are simply not mentioned by anyone who knows and cares.
Hi Amanda, as an Egyptian living here in Cairo I'd like to add that this is a big topic of conversation we have over here. From my perspective the desire to own ancient Egyptian artifacts is just a form of modern day colonialism. You have no right to steal/buy items not from your culture. That's only a small version of of what many countries have stolen from Egypt over the years. Are every major European city has its own obelisk. And the US has several giant parts of temples, and no one bats an eye
You're wrong. It doesn't matter if you're not from that culture. You shouldn't own artifacts period. They don't belong to someone's private collection because they are cultural heritage and should be appreciated by anyone. That's why I think they should be reserved to a museum. Because most people anyway don't care about their history; they simply aren't interested. But maybe, someone from another country actually studying that stuff might be more interested and actually know more about it than said people. But it's just not fair that anyone could be able to buy historical artifacts.
If I had the money to do stuff like this I'd buy so much ceramic art from small artists... you could commission different artists to do murals on every wall of every room of your house...
I always wanted a room with floor tiles of a scene from the cretaceuous, and a series of four chinese seasonal paintings where each season also represented a different era of the mesozoic (the last would be winter and there would be birds and a few of the surviving reptiles near the bottom)
This! I already try to support “small” artists as much as I can, it’d be so cool to commission some to make all the things and do all the designs like I was a wealthy patron of the arts from days gone by😅😁☺️ I had a prof who was slowly replacing all her dish ware with ceramics she made herself and it was so cool!
*Few months back:* Demi Lovato makes a big deal out of sugar free froyo "because it's fatphobic" + "aliens is offensive so now I say ET" *Now:* pulls sh!t like colonialist comportment 101 on their IG story. Feels like a Buzzfeed skit: "what if Indiana Jones had Instagram" 🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️ FYI: UNESCO is an acronym pronounced as a single word, like _U • ness (=Loch Ness) • co_
I just wanna really emphasize your point that you CAN'T just drop something off at a museum that you think should be there. Legitimate institutions can not legally go through the process to make an acquisition of an item when there isn't a formal, documented transfer of ownership to the institution. I've been interning at an anthropology museum and we always get people trying to drop things off at the front desks or receiving dock, and people also just literally leave stuff at the front doors at night when the museum is closed. When this happens the museum can't legally accept the donation and put it in collections. We are a teaching institution so most of the teaching collection is made up of these types of objects since the museum can't legally add them to the collections, which means potentially it's just going to be destroyed for conservation students to repair. If collections staff think it might be of significant cultural value they just kind of stay in collections purgatory though because the museum can't actually legally do anything with it.
During my internship a curator gave me a basket that was left at the museum in this way, and while I appreciate it because it's from my culture, and can tell it's a more recent basket done for the tourist market in the 20th century and therefore probably sold legally from the artist themselves.....it still just feels ODD.
this has been my experience, too! while I worked at the (very large) museum in my city, we'd have people calling in at least once a week to offer us stuff they simply had in their home. 99% of time we refused just taking random items from strangers. provenance is a big deal. considering my museum only displays probably a fifth of the items they actually have (overwhelming majority is kept in storage for protection), the idea that a legitimate "museum" would have "surplus" that they can just..... GIVE out to people is hilarious to me
@@kkuudandere FR 😭 I checked their website too and they advertise that they're like a market that museums regularly buy from and trust me almost no museums are looking to buy authentic antiquities just cuz, let alone dubious fakes. My museum did a big overhaul/renewal in 2010 and despite being a small-ish museum(I think were around 7k sq with a large portion being taken up by oversize objects like totem poles) and have I think at least 20k objects in visible storage for the public and its STILL mostly in the back and despite getting a shit ton of new storage in 2010 were already running out of space bc of the overwhelming amount of donations. One of their recent acquisitions had like, 3000 goat horn spoons in a single lot 😭. The movement to push for repatriation is the right one but also overwhelming at times lol.
This is the first I've heard about Demi Lovato buying antiquities but I had heard about a different example of some biblical literalists (I think they had some connection to Hobby Lobby or something) building a bible museum and buying looted artifacts.
As others have pointed out, that would be the owner of Hobby Lobby himself. He built a museum, filled with ‘biblical artifacts’ & particularly focused on Dead Sea scrolls, only for most of them to be fakes or looted. Wild stuff tbh
@@amelia3146 yeah it's crazy lol, i read a few articles when I heard about it and turns out the owners of hobby lobby may have accidentally funded ISIS by buying smuggled and looted artifacts from 'sellers' that were tied to them 😬 luckily the stuff was returned to the nation, but big yikes
i mean it definitely seems to me like the ones demi bought were fake but yeah they should absolutely NOT be promoting any of this nonsense. i get being really into ancient history like i read percy jackson i was obsessed with ancient greece for like 2 years but i think it's really easy to stick to the just doing a lot of research and watching a lot of documentaries and going to museums. like museums definitely have their own set of issues but this is just adding a bunch of new issues and solving 0 of the ones that already exist
as someone from the west asia/north african region i think it's very unethical for anyone except us to own our artifacts tbh. it's playing into colonization, taking our history from us and forcing us to pay money to even see it. even white people coming to dig up our history is questionable territory for me because they rarely treat us with any respect. i love your compassion on these topics
Its a bit hypocritical that they're the one collecting this stuff seeing how they're always running their mouth about civil rights and stuff like that.
I never felt the need to acquire ancient antiquities, but I have heard about cuneiform practice on clay. Making cuneiform gingerbread would probably be really fun!
As an Anthropology student (Archaeology is a sect hello my artifact loving brethren how are you) this whole situation is ✨vomit inducing.✨ It's like the whole thing with people keeping Clovis Points or owning valuable sites. Can't wait to show this to my Arch prof though to hear him shriek in terror at least lmao.
Sometimes the vomit is induced from within the house. My dad helped excavate an early archeology site with his proffessor, a burial with a woman who had a ceramonial point in her sternum. However that archeologist had a fued with the university, and when they fired him, she, and all of the paperwork about her dissapeared. (this might have been because the university museum was looking to return most of their collection- dad doesnt know, it was thirty years past his graduation when someone called him to ask if he had any information about what happened her. The best he had was a copy of the old paper, which the student calling him already had.
I am an Egyptologist, so I a subject matter expert in this field. Private ownership of Egyptian antiquities is a thing. As long those antiquities were legally exported from Egypt prior to the UN World Heritage Convention of 1972, it can be legal to own said antiquities. But private ownership is controversial in some circles. And some have argued that private ownership has encouraged looting and the production of forgeries. There are lot of legitimate antiquities that are on the market and can be purchased from auction houses. But there is nothing wrong with buying a copy knowing it is copy, and the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities is preparing to offer high quality copies for private purchase. I would encourage Demi to talk to real Egyptologists and learn about what she's interest in. Most of us are quite approachable. 😄
My villain origin story is thinking Killmonger was right but went the wrong way about it. Definitely shouldn't have killed those people in the museum, but made some valid fucking points.
At least Demi probably did this out of stupidity. It's the Hobby Lobby level of intentional theft that is really concerning. But what can we expect from Hobby Lobby?
I don't study ancient societies(I study the rococo era) but the idea that Demi would just casually buy what they believed was a real ancient items is absolutely wild like how is that allowed
I'm doing an art history masters in Provenance rn and it's so interesting to hear someone outside of the sector discussing this!! You handled it really well and discussed all the major ethics discussion as well. Maybe there's an Art Crime professorship in you yet ;)
I'm an archaeologist who was litterally talking about the illegal traffiking of artifacts by rich people in America today I have never felt so called out by notification in my life girl I clicked SO FAST
I got my degree in History, and spent at least a day or two in every ancient history class I took talking about the ethics of artifact collecting. There are some horrendous examples, like the Athenian Marbles being kept in the British Museum for "safety reasons" despite Athens building an entire museum specifically to safely house them. But then theres good examples, like bordering nations in war-torn countries taking artifacts away to be safe from bombs and other hazards of war. However, one person having artifacts has always struck me as immoral. That being said, these are probably fake. And if they're not, they were likely deemed so historically insignificant that they were sold to highest bidder.
I was in an oddities shop the other day and they had a German helmet on sale. It was advertised of still having the dead nazi's blood in it after a fatal blow from a soviet. Didn't sit well with me. Who would want to own that? Who could feel right with that in their homes?
I totally agree that artifacts should stay where they are but even if Demi didn't want to visit Egypt (where they have incredible museums and tours) it is very well known that the British museum, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Met, and many others already have extensive collections of Egyptian art and artifacts. I'm sure someone as rich as them could afford a high quality, ethically made replica or print of an artifact if seeing thousands of them in museums isn't enough. "Egyptology" was very popular throughout history and until the 1920s there was little to no standard for recording the archeological process or for the security of dig sites. It's basic knowledge that European and American archeologists just took whatever during the day and locals looted the sites at night. Nowadays those artifacts are mostly in museums and any documented or newly uncovered artifacts are *very* strictly regulated. Looting definitely still happens but it's much easier for someone to create new fake artifacts than risk the repercussions of looting a dig site or museum. The name "museum surplus" alone tells you how little Demi understands the topic because museums literally collect more than is possible to display due to ongoing preservation, changing exhibits, etc lol
you can also buy cool enough replicas from Egypt. even if you arent fooled by such proffessional websites as Museum Surplus, modern and ethical replicas still can be pretty cool.
Something you should look into I just found out about is Faithful Minis and Peabody the horse. This clip went viral on tiktok and instagram of a miniature horse that was so small that it was about the same size as the family's french bulldog. But people noticed that he didn't look healthy and his cage looked extremely dirty, with piles of soiled pee pads. It turns out that Peabody was not only a miniature horse, but also had dwarfism. It's unclear whether he was specifically bred for dwarfism (to get yet smaller horses), or if it was the result of inbreeding. Either way, it left him with a lot of health problems. He was born deaf, with two bad legs, and a messed up jaw that prevented him from eating. He died after only four months (allegedly) from liver failure. The owners (Faithful Minis) claim they bought him at 3 days old. From where is not specified. Why they bought him, when they themselves are miniature horse breeders, is also not clear. It's possible, since he's the smallest recorded miniature horse, that they were intending to use him to breed minis with dwarfism. This is all I know. But it's really sad because the owners were being invited to do all this press, like be on the Kelly Clarkson show, when it seems like they're really shady backyard breeders, that don't care at all about the health of the animals they breed, as long as they look cute for four months so they can make a sale.
Oh my god it should be illegal. I don’t even think teacup dogs or cats with dwarfism should be bred. The dogs always have health problems and their bones break very easily. I can’t imagine how many pups were killed that didn’t turn out right. Cats with legs so short some tummies hit the ground can’t jump like a regular cat and that’s one of their joys! To be on top of things looking down watching everything! Of course they look cute but genetically messing with animals should be illegal when it is strictly for our enjoyment and makes like tougher for them.
😭😭😭 they could have just commissioned an artist (like a sculptor) for a good replica without worrying about the possibility of stolen goods and proudly admit the fact. They could get museum souvenirs, plenty of them sell items like prints or goods with the image on it without it being tacky. Or better yet you want authentic goods then support the community its from, like visiting indigenous museums & shops or the equivalent of it. Support the culture, not steal it.
11:31 My brain created a whole narrative of “dinosaur schools” being the correct term for a complete skeleton of a dinosaur until I realized it was supposed to say skulls
But when another museum buys and showcases them, that isn't theft? I'm confused about when it's theft, and when it's ok. Probably depends on whether the "right people" are profiting.
@@chance2413 still theft and looting. The key aspect would be to revise provenance and date of arrival to the collection to figure out how and where they were taken from. Additionally, museum exhibitions are compelled to work on the future preservation of the artifact or object, which is not a guarantee either. The problem with Hobby Lobby is that not only did they engage in contemporary massive illegal purchasing, their illegal activities support groups that are terrorizing and destroying cultural heritage in the Middle East without enough sanctions from the US government who is supposed to oversee their activities. However, let me really emphasize that no museum collection has a clean, legally acquired record of ownership, unless it’s a site museum with confirmed collaborative practices and community involvement (which are extremely rare)
@@ameliatorres6162 Thank you, thank you, thank you for your last comment about how no museum is squeaky clean. The amount of shit I’ve gotten from people about working in places with stolen artifacts like I did it myself when nobody was looking is insane. Museums originated out of “cabinets of curiosities” in the homes of wealthy nobles and were filled with random objects they gathered on travels. There was no paperwork, no trail of information, and nobody really keeping track of where things came from over the generations. We can’t change the past of how objects ended up where they did. The only thing we can do now is put protocols in place to protect museums from taking in objects of ill background. Does that still happen? Yes, of course, hobby lobby was correctly brought up. It’s the fact that this happened in modern day (and to the degree that it did) that was heinous of them
I feel like its kind of different bc Hobby Lobby bought them from ISIS which violates US sanctions. Not saying that what Demi Lovato did is good or anything, but people seem to gloss over details and apply a one sized fits all mindset about any story thats remotely similar. Like, the knowing cooperation with terrorists was the big thing. Not necessarily a botched providence
How to make cuneiform gingerbread cookies: 1. Learn Ugaritic cuneiform, since it is mostly alphabetic and is easier than Akkadian or Hittite cuneiform. 2. Carve a triangular stylus out of a chopstick. You might want to practice your cuneiform technique on a piece of modelling clay. 3. Whip up a batch of gingerbread. Make sure it's the eating kind of gingerbread, not the gingerbread house kind of gingerbread, otherwise you will break people's teeth. 4. Form your cookies into small loaf-like squares. 5. Write your cuneiform message on each cookie and bake in an oven until done.
Oh my god they’re also on Mercari and depop! I was introduced to the rabbit hole from the MBMBAM podcast, and it’s so funny to see how people try to authenticate haunted dolls
Those, at least dont rob a culture of part of their history so some rich douche can swing around their 'importance.' Its up to you to decide if buying a haunted doll is believable ethical :)
I am by no means a historian, art crime professor, or even a person with expertise in my own job field, but as someone who makes Props and is working on a show that requires a ton of distressing, Lovato's stuff looks distressed in a similar way to how I did it (also if you are distressing something lowkey a belt sander doesn't seem like the way to go in my experience)
I have a weirdly close perspective on this. I sell high end designer mid century and Danish modern furniture from the 50s-70s (based in NYC) and because of this I have a close relationship with a lot of affluent auction houses, antique dealers, resellers etc. You run into these ill-gotten antiquities waaayyy more often than you’d think. I steer clear of any of that as I am a huge proponent of making sure historical objects stay in their country of origin (if possible) and are not sold for profit. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff that comes up in auction houses (who are suppose to vet items and make sure they weren’t trafficked/fakes/come from war torn areas were looting is common). It’s often considered that items sold at trusted auction houses get a bolstered reputation and validate some of the authenticity of the object seemly by being sold there. These places are willing to stake their highly coveted reputations on these questionable antiquities because there absolutely is a market of private individuals ready and willing to purchase. Everything from Egyptian artifacts to human remains to slave trade items to dinosaurs bones. It’s absolutely sickening but it’s the worst kept secret of the affluent that these pieces are not that hard to obtain. If Demi had a money manager, knowledge assistant, art procurer or simply knew the actual market better/asked around, this is where they would have gone. It’s the same with high end antique stores that seem to think just because a piece is old that it somehow erases any human suffering (old or new) attached to that item. I’ve seen some truly bizarre objects in antique stores in the US but European antique stores take the cake on ethical issues. At the end of the day, the practice of selling and coveting these antiquities, by western audiences, from a culture and place you were not a part of is simply another form of colonialism and imperialism.
I find a good way to not switch up "provenance" with "providence" is to really lean into the Frenchness of the word. "Prah-vaughn-AHNCE". It's easy to mix them up but I've found that's a good trick to get past it, at least for me.
"I'm just a chick on the internet with a camera" is definitely an understatement girl! Love your videos ❤ found you cause of the Jon's bones situation and somehow found the video very entertaining and funny, given the subject matter. I honestly had different views on ownership of these types of things, and even the Jon's bones situation, until listening to you explain how this is maybe not the respectful nor ethical. Keep up the hard work, it shows in your videos. ❤
I haven't started the video but from first min I can tell I'll hate Demi even more. Egypt & it's history was and are still threatened today by looting & "archeologists" (Western grave robbers) picking and choosing the cultural & religious artifacts that they'll take to America, UK, EU etc. It actually makes me sick. There's museums in America that's willing to show dubious artifacts (possibly stolen before UN convention came in place) & they're UNWILLING to work with the respective African countries to possibly give their history back. (Obvs England & EU etc also) I'm a big history nerd & always had a soft spot for Egyptian history (being from Africa myself, it felt more "real" than Ancient Rome or Ancient Greece), & I would love to view their historical artifacts IN EGYPT. Hoarding it in another continent really leave a bitter taste in my mouth, because who's suppose to be the audience? White Europeans/Americans? To other and objectify another culture & their history? So "keeping it in museums" is not the answer. If the museums is in Egypt or Africa, yes, because it's THEIR history. And having this artifacts be owned by rich people - definitely no. They're the reason you see artifacts in museums -they loan it to them (and are unwilling to give it back to the countries of origin). So private individuals making choices about historical artifacts and who has access to it or not, also screams white saviourism & Western dominance to me. Those who own history can change it. The Hobby Lobby people bought illegal documents from IS*S, but one of the documents were a long lost fragment of Sappho, that are lost to academia and further research. A lot of "lost pieces" are also documents that were hoarded by rich families & therefore academics can't access it.
The idea of buying cultural objects stolen from a country just to prove my wealth (not even my passion or knowledge.. which doesn't make it right) purely disgusts me. I used to love Demi but nowadays I don't know who she is anymore
I definitely do not have Demi Lovato money but once again that has saved me from being this dumb with money. I literally just can't afford to be this dumb with money. I'm not good at Photoshop but even I could forge better paperwork than that. Not even getting into the issue with buying the artefacts of another culture and keeping it to yourself. At the very least loan it to someone who will put it on public display or keeps it safe and can do research with it. That happened in my city with a bunch of very expensive old books a private person bought them and then gave them for free as a permanent loan to the university library so people can look at them and learn how to conserve them too because my local university offers that course as well. Pretty sure they've been at the library for two decades or longer now and apparently the private owner has put it in writing that once they pass it permanently goes to the library.
There is always someone who is dumb with spending money, therefore there is always someone else who wants to separate that fool from their money by any means.
Im an undergrad in anthropology, specifically with a concentration in archeology and this topic gives me oh so may thoughts. The process of rich people buying cultural artifacts for personal collections is by no means a new idea and is generally how the practice of archeology started, as rich white men gatherered cabinets of curiosities full of stolen or fake artifacts and created a market for them and created public interest by showing them to the public.
There are some fantastic museum replicas you can buy - just as beautiful as the originals, but much more affordable and you don't have to worry about the ethical concerns. I bought some great ones from the Roemisch Germanisches museum when I visited Cologne in Germany years ago. I have a beautiful necklace based on one found in a riverbank, and I love it so much. I'm not sure that I'd feel ok with buying genuine artifacts, particularly from the likes of Egypt considering most of them are funerary decorations.
There's a museum in Greece where the displays have spaces for the pieces in the British museum. Hobby Lobby was involved with illegal artifact trade that almost definitely funded a terrorist group but definitely destroyed a cultural site that would have been important for archaeology
All the creators are talking about how nfts are fungible because online scarity isn't real while Amanda is explaining why forgeries mean collectible scarity and manufactured scarity aren't real either. Amanda said how many layers deep are you? lol
hey, you may never read this but i’ve been having a really hard time recently, and your content has been a good comfort during this rough patch. just got out of a friendship that in hindsight was very emotionally abusive but for a long while it was extremely difficult to let go of because they were my only friend…. looking back it was because they kept arguing with all of my other friends even starting fights just to call them names. but now that i’m away from them and on my own, i find a huge comfort and company in your videos that i didn’t feel in calls with them. just thank you for creating the content that you do. the casual nature and lighthearted tone is contagious and has really lifted my mood. thanks :)
@swell entertainment: as much as i'm not a fan of logan paul, the pokimon that he bought was 'sealed boxes' and he did have someone verify that they were authentic....as best as you can authenticate 'sealed' packages. as you may or may not know, 'sealed' collectables are worth much more than 'unsealed'. he didn't just spend all that money willy nilly.
@@gsesquire3441 and then on top of that, didn’t inform his fans he got his money back, UNTIL AFTER he got that Ad money; and of course his fans buying his merch to “reimburse” his “losses”. Even though he already got the refund. 🤦🏽♀️😂
It’s just funny how little research people do. If you have any kind of a platform, you have an obligation to use it for good. When I first saw this pop up on Twitter, I immediately thought about the ethical dilemma. The idea that the name “Museum Surplus” implies, that there are just extra artifacts we don’t need and are selling for a few hundred bucks, is absolutely absurd.
Loved the video! I just graduated with a masters in Library and Information Science which is essentially archival work. Everything you said was accurate. You'd be surprised how many fakes are floating around! If you want an absolutely wild rabbit hole you should look up the family who owns hobby lobby. They're notorious for smuggling artifacts into the US and purchasing dubious items for their museum of the bible. I did a research paper on them and it was WILD.
As a pastry chef who helped make an ancient Egyptian themed gingerbread scene for a local museum’s King Tut exhibit, I say yes to cuneiform tablet cookies! Let’s do it!!
a few weeks back there were reports of a few tv shows having their replicas stolen. like, the crown, which has replicas of the royal family's jewels and such, had a bunch of those things stolen. and the first thing that came to mind seeing those news was that people were gonna try and sell those and pretend they're the real deal
I mean, if you're talking the british crown, I root for the theives, turn about is fair play after all... unless the british museum wants to start returning things and the royal family is willing to invest in artifact repatriation and helping pay to preserve those objects in their rightful homes.
I am a historian, researcher, and as a kid I wanted to be an archeologist for the longest time both because i loved Egypt and loved Indiana Jones. As i grew older, i only wanted this more as I discovered things like Otzi, The Franklin Expedition, and the dozens of mysterious mummies from the Valley of the Kings. Then my mom sat me down and made me watch a documentary. It showed the real danger of being an archeologist. Being shot at by looters and cartels looking to sell artifacts for big bucks or trying to protect their culture. After that, i decides i would rather be a teacher. What Demi did here is not just irresponsible, it is the perfect example of ignorant priviledged rich people throwing their wealth around to seem cultured. It kind of pisses me off because if these artifacts are stolen she is basically contributing to the ongoing plunder of Egypt and the political turmoil it funds. Hell, she could have bought art, modern reproductions, made by an egyptian artist struggling due to covid but that just doesn't have the same social media clout as buying artifacts. Sorry, this story really pissed me off
As a Geology and Archaeology student this is very worrying especially if they are stolen. It’s also a very interesting time for her to post that as Project Pandora V is still gaining arrests for the illegal selling of artifacts worldwide. Once artifacts are taken from the site incorrectly it’s pretty much impossible to gain anything from them as they are stripped of all context. I do think they these ones are fake but I’m not an expert in this field of archaeology.
While opening RUclips, I thought “oh I’ll continue watching the videos I was watching yesterday” and then saw your and had to watch this first, hearing your intro, I was like “omg same” so now I gotta stick around for the end!! I was a longtime fan of Demi and the last big thing I remember was the confidence uprising. No clue what’s been going on the past couple years so anything Demi, I have to watch to be up-to-date.
No matter the culture ancient artifacts should not be any where other then where they were found or in a museum especially if the museum is in said original country found.
I hope you don't end up like me, but I've had memory issues for a year and a half now since covid. It sucks so much, but in some ways, it's always kinda gratifying to hear other people have them as well, bc the people around me generally do not believe me. It's infuriating.
My cousin has artifacts all over his house. It’s a flex for him. He’s probably the wealthiest person I know and the family member that makes me roll my eyes the most frequently 🙄🙄
Demi Lovato just keeps accepting a shovel to dig themselves (Shoot forgot they are nonbinary. Corrected. Sorry.) deeper into trouble. Might end up in Egypt at some point. Anyway, I think its wrong to take/purchase artifacts from another culture/country. Wouldn't it be culturally richer to go to that country and know the world of where the artifacts came from? Instead people like Demi are using it for their own self-indulgence. How selfish.
This interests me greatly. I have possession of dinosaur bones that are very dear to me, as they are the only gift that truly hit my heart from my dad. He and a friend traveled to Big Bend National Park some 30 years ago while paleontologists were doing a dig. Dad found a number of bone fragments in the area and cleared it with the scientists that it wss ok to bring them home to his nerdy daughter. None of them were scientifically important, so they said sure and even identified the pieces as leg, tooth, egg shell, etc. Many look like just rocks until you realize what you're looking at. The important thing for me is that he collected them himself and thought to get permission. No money changed hands, just knowledge. I dont know how I feel about human historical items. I, personally, would be seeking to return them if i learned items were looted goods from a current country.
I'm not a fan of removing cultural artifacts from country's of origin. I think the items should be put in a museum for viewing and learning of the past cultural. A rich person buying it for themselves to show off to their other rich friends isn't really preserving the past. I guess they could buy a bunch of things and open their own museum for the public but one, that never happens and two, in Demi Lovato's case, I doubt they has plans of opening a museum. I don't see anything wrong with re-creations as long as everyone involved knows and it's explicitly stated that's it's a re-creation.
In this case, if they are fake and Demi bought them thinking they are real, then that's fraud, the nature of which can extend to either criminal or civil fraud. Same for Nic Cage with the bones and Logan Paul and the Pokemon cards, though the difficult part is often jurisdiction and actually finding the seller in the first place.
@@Xpndable I believe Demi genuinely thought they were real and has been frauded and should peruse civil and possibly criminal charges but as you said, finding the seller will be the difficult part.
But make sure the museum is in the artifacts' place of origin. So many foreign museums profit off stolen cultural artifacts. :/ So sending artifacts back to their original place, and making a museum there, can help make a profit for the locals. Ofc, it's not always possible, but for the ones that are.. why not?
Let's say, hypothetically, museums had a surplus. No way in hell would they sell it off, not even considering for that low price. They would store it, like many do. They might loan it to other museums, or even send it to other museums in their country. But hey, Demi-Lovato-money doesn't make you smart. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
As a student of archaeology and hopefully a future archaeologist with a PhD, this is SO INFURIATING! The literal FIRST thing we we're taught is: This is not Indiana Jones type deal, if you came here inspired by him, rethink your choice of studying in this field. Archaeology IS NOT grave robbing. It was in the past, yes (think Wooley and the Royal Tomb of Ur excavation, an utter disgrace), but times have changed. Archaeologists do not just come, dig up stuff, put it in bags and leave the site. They do it methodologically, carefully, and with no intention of destroying / making profit of the site or its artifacts. We look for historic value in things, not monetary value! To think that there are people who sell artifacts online with the caption "gotten ethically from sites" or "gotten legally"..... No. There is NOTHING legal about selling artifacts that were STOLEN from sites. NONE of these were gotten via archaeological excavations or investigations, trust me on that. No archaeologist in his right mind would do this, unlike these bastards whose actions throw dirt on the field of science that archaeology is. The artifacts were dug up illegally and gathered for sale. And especially from sites in Egypt or Middle East, since there is SO much yet to uncover and it is all well preserved in the dry climate. I am personally against anyone owning artifacts from sites, no matter how "legal" it might be. Copies, sure, but the real ones are reserved for museums in their countries of origin. To end off, thank you @Swell Entertainment for addressing this issue, as it is a big one.
I may be but a humble Classical Civilizations student, but the idea that anyone would mistake that fourth grade craft project for an Eye of Horus is nuts.
The Logan Paul Pokemon card thing is a different situation because Logan did that. It's just that the people who he got to verify it (who have a very good track record) got duped too. The guy selling them just pulled the biggest fast one.
Demi Lovato: "calling aliens aliens is offensive."
Also Demi Lovato: "Let me buy these fake or stolen artifacts from a culture I have no connection to"
They said the word alien (like if you’re calling a human one which the govt does) is derogatory so they don’t use it & they’re not wrong.
Oh for sure, and I agree, they just also say that calling actual like, space aliens aliens is derogatory to the space aliens.
kenny williams no they were referring to extra terrestrials not immigrants because in regards to immigrants I agree completely but that’s not what they were talking about
@@kennywilliams8580 I agree that using this word with humans is derogatory, but she was speaking about extraterrestrial beings, not humans. The reason why the word is bad to use for immigrants is because the word is dehumanising because it is the word for "extraterrestrial creatures" and using it for human beings kind of means they are not seen as human by the person or institution using that word, but beings from other planets literally *are not humans* and therefore "alien" is the correct word for them.
Even if that's the case, you would maybe think "are these true artifacts? Should I have these?"
I am currently completing my PhD at the University of Pennsylvania in Near Eastern Archaeology, and this LITERALLY BOILS MY BLOOD. People outside of the discipline have no idea how much real damage this causes. I have excavated in Israel and Iraq, and have worked with collections from Egypt and Turkey as well. Here are the main points I wish people would understand about this topic:
1. Buying any artifacts, AT ALL, promotes looting of sites and the LITERAL DESTRUCTION OF HISTORY. Every site I have worked at in the Middle East has had to have LITERAL ARMED GUARDS to protect both the site and the archaeologists from looters. If we found great artifacts, we would have to stay on site until they were all excavated and safely taken out so they could be brought to locked storage, sometimes having to work 4-5 extra hours in a day just to make sure things would not be looted. Looters are dangerous, and are willing to hurt other people to get artifacts and sell them illegally.
2. Once an artifact is taken out of the site, MORE THAN HALF ITS HISTORIC VALUE IS GONE! Artifacts are only as meaningful as the context in which they were found. Archaeologists often care far more about excavation notes and documentation than we do about the object themselves. Without knowing the exact location, depth, soil type, depositional layer, surrounding artifacts, evidence of disturbance, etc etc, most of the value that object had for illuminating history IS COMPLETELY LOST.
3. The promotion of collecting artifacts actively harms the practice of scientific archaeology, work that is done to promote the truth of our human past. Even if not illegally looted, by collecting artifacts at all (as a private person or unaccredited institution) you are promoting illegal artifact looting and dealing, and the value of objects over actual historical information.
I literally have so much more I could say on this, but will leave it at this. Please like this comment so people will see it. @Swell Entertainment , Please pin this comment. I would also be happy to answer any questions you have about this topic from someone who works in the field of Near Eastern Archaeology and had seen first hand the repercussions of actions like these.
Aaaaaaamen.
As an archaeologist I totally agree! I hate the buying and selling of artifacts, it makes me physically ill sometimes when I see whats for sale and all the information that has been lost.
Everyone that watches this video, please note that archaeology has nothing to do with Indiana Jones/Looting and the sale of artifacts.
I hope they see this comment and reaches out to you if they have any questions!
Yes! I am by no means an archaeology expert but was an anthropology major and one of the first things we learned was that the value of artifacts is in what they can tell us about the humans of the past. The concept of archaeology has become grossly misconstrued by people outside the field, it’s about learning about human history, not being antique collectors. Everything about looting and buying and selling artifacts is dangerous and damaging.
Giving this a bump
I do research before I buy Redd's artwork in Animal Crossing so it's weird that these people aren't doing research before they spend actual money
I do that too lol
LITERALLY hahaha ❤
💯
👏👏👏
OMG yes this 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻🙌🏻
I find it kinda extremely terribly gross that rich people buy cultural artifacts to have as like dust collecting paper weights.
The only person I'm ok with haveing a massive private collection is Phil Collins bc his private collection is on loan (might be a permanent loan situation) to a real museum
A lot of it is common enough it's not sought out by museums. Stuff like ancient roman and greek coins are pretty cheap, depending on the specific coin and quality. A lot of it is common enough museums aren't interested, or museums already have similar items collecting dust in storage. It's a bit different for super rare pieces of course
Yeah I went to Glypoteket in Copenhagen and was really inspired and wanted to get some antique/renaissance statues for my apartment but like... you can just buy reproductions? Or commission statues/sculptures? Sure you won't have the knowledge that it's super duper old but if it's meaningful to you then it's meaningful to you.
It's using art as a financial investment that grosses me out the most. Like did they buy that painting/sculpture because they like looking at it or because they think it's going to increase in value?
Yeah, it feels kinda icky. Old coins and stuff is less gross because they are so common, but, as someone else pointed out here, just buy a reproduction if you like how it looks so much! If you're fascinated by the culture, visit the country (if you can), go to their museums, LEARN about them, don't just buy stuff
We have such amazing museums here in Africa showing OUR history. There are issues such as the Timbuktu Records in Mali being threatened of being destroyed by terrorists - but many want them to be held temporarily in another African country because we do not trust the Europeans to give them back if they hold them.
That's a perfectly legitimate fear because Europeans countries would absolutely keep them.
@@ArcAngle1117 Or burn them, like it happened to a lot a mummies, apparently
@@icp7201 even worse a lot of them were eaten or used as medicine
Yeah trusting a western country to return the artefacts etc is … not advised
They wouldn't. So many artifacts in European museums are there because obviously the people from the countries those articles come from couldn't be able to take care of them, we need white people to protect them from ourselves 🙏
I feel like there’s so much more value in collecting goods from around the world made by people who are still alive. I have a beautifully crafted camel wallet from Tunisia and the money from my purchase benefitted Tunisian craftsman who were severely impacted by covid. You can have beautiful, unusual things without destroying history.
I think so, too! unfortunately I also think too many people are "interested in culture" only when it comes to obsessing over the static, romanticized past. they'd rather focus on stolen/fake artifacts than support living, breathing, dynamic aspects of culture 😒
@@kkuudandere yeah people love ancient Egypt but couldn’t care less about anything they’ve done in the past thousand years. People also like rare/difficult to obtain things as status symbols which is gross
Buying directly from craftspeople is definitely a better thing to do!
And it's good to support people directly, but just speaking as someone who's indigenous and has seen it first hand the tourist market can also "destroy history" sometimes.
When it's peoples livlihoods on the line, indigenous people can and will change what their making to appeal to what tourists want to buy, even if it means completely changing our practices to a different cultures that's ironically perceived as more "authentic".
One example from my culture is cowichan sweaters. They weren't actually a part of coast salish culture pre-colonially and are inspired by shetland/other european knits but with our own unique style. The demand for these items played into the demise of our blanket weaving practices because the sweaters were more profitable in a time where we were prohibited from other sources of work for income.
BUT also in the 60s/70's a tourist interest helped sustain a salish weaving revival with the salish weavers guild.
So it can definitely go both ways!
Sorry for the long-winded response!!! Also I really don't mean to shame anyone for supporting tourist markets as it's not a black and white issue! I really do think in general it's a positive thing, I just felt like there needed to be some nuance explored in the idea that craft tourist markets(even when they're goods made from the community of origin) can't be capable of degrading historical practices.
@@ectoplastiic totally agree and was going to mention this, but your perspective was definitely appreciated as someone who watched it happen to your own culture. But yes tourism can def have both a negative and positive impactive on especially indigenous but also poc population.
Little bit of a tangent, but def adjacent, I live in metrodetroit so I’ve watched how detroit and surrounding cities have gained and lost funding, and especially right now, are being pushed to be heavily gentrified. And what ends up happening is the local, small, bipoc owned business are relying on the same white middle class to keep them afloat that is currently pushing them out of their long-time homes, and it’s really fucking sad. Oh the joys of the intricacies of systematic racism.
Can we talk about the fact the reason we don’t have many mummies (considering how many were excavated) because the Victorians would crush them up into powder and eat them because they thought they had healing properties. They had mummy parties and everything where they’d buy a mummy to do this and it’s absolutely horrific. We can thank my art history professor for bringing that to my class’s attention
They also made paint from mummies called mummy brown or egyptian brown. It was discontinued in 1964 because they ran out of mummies to grind up
@@mr.pinkbread ty for this knowledge and I started looking into it and found a quote from time magazine from the managing director of the last company who discontinued it and he said “we might have a few odd limbs lying around somewhere, but not enough to make any paint” (1964 Time)……..
I am now even more disgusted with humanity than I already was, and I was already pissed about the people eating them and I’m just astonished that crushing dead peoples bodies for paint was seen as legal as of 1964, that’s less than 50 years ago
This is definitely some ignorant shit Demi partake in if they were alive back then 👀👀
🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
I’m so disgusted
This seems 100% on-brand for Demi Lovato. I took an art history class in college and am a HUGE fan of the show “Antiques Roadshow” and if you watch it just a few times, you understand how important provenance is for almost anything - let alone ancient artifacts and incredibly immoral items. Demi deserves all backlash coming, regardless of if these antiquities are real or not. How dumb.
antiques roadshow slaps
If these are real Egyptian artifacts, she’s gonna get some backlash alright…and I’m not talking about from the internet…
This is the same reason I do not shop at Hobby Lobby. The owners of Hobby Lobby bought and hid ancient artifacts for a Bible museum. This is true and you can search it. It makes me so angry. I am a historian and history professor and it makes me angry when people but and bring artifacts that belong to other countries into the United States.
!!!!!!!!!
As someone from SEA I just need the British museum to return OUR artifacts that they stole. We want them in our museums they are our culture. its unfair that they stole everything from us and display in their museums or are owned by their royal family.
This is just odd. Why can't these people just buy copies knowing they are copies.
Yes, you are right 💖 museums of countries in the global north are full of stolen things from the cultures of the global south.
I'm not saying it's 100% right, but one of the reasons these artifacts stay in british museums is because a lot of the countries they stole from are war torn and just not safe places for these extremely important pieces of history. You could definitley make the argument that the reason these countries are war torn in the first place is because of colonialism, and you'd usually be correct, however it doesn't negate the fact that these artificats need to be kept in a secure location and a lot of these countries just aren't secure.
@@alexbush714 Yeah but you can also ask yourself who is profiting from them right now? Who is charging entry fees for people to see these stolen pieces of history? Where is that money going?
@@alexbush714 if we REALLY cared about that then we wouldn’t be bombing the countries with that heritage and architecture. Unless we plan on transporting entire buildings to the British museum.
@@fierceANM True!
Why does Demi KEEP doing crazier and crazier stuff?! And then putting it out there to show people in this masochistic cycle? Just- why. It's just not healthy. I went from being one of their biggest fans to absolutely done within the span of 2 years.
Because poor person fried their brain with fame and poor mental health i feel bad for her but its like a bad car crash its awful but you keep watching anyway
Their brush with death probably messed them up so much that focusing on themselves probably triggers mental breakdowns. Which is sad. They need professional help. So much for saying they weren’t going to change in the La La Land machine. They need more help than they realize. I truly don’t believe figuring out their pronouns, verbally assaulting a fro-yo shop on the internet, having a show about aliens, and buying fake artifacts helps them in any way whatsoever. Whoever their friends are aren’t real friends. Real friends know when to tell them the truth.
I think she’s bipolar or something, she have severe mental issues
@@Divinelywriting I mean, they literally have brain damage from the OD - officially physical as blindness/ blind spots in vision but it's not certain if they can't also have mental damage that wasn't diagnosed yet. I've seen what heavy use can do to people, let alone ODing to the point one needs to be hospitalized. Paired with nearly death and everything else traumatic that happened during their life since childhood and you have this effect.
Ofc it's just speculating, but if it's certain the brain was damaged, question only is how much
Mental illness and self medication.
i'm an archaeology student, and i honestly gotta admit that private collections sounds egoistic to me, it's like, look how much money i have!! so many artefacts would rather benefit from being in a museum, where people could see them. not that all museums have obtained artifacts the right way *cough british musum cough*, but i would still say that it's the lesser of two evils if we first are to remove things!
I said pretty much the same thing in another comment thread on this video, it pisses me enough when rich people have private collections of any prolific/famous art and paintings from THIS century, let alone artefacts that are ancient cultures' . It blows my mind how dumb Demi can be
Ditto for Paleontology, vaguely knew a guy who had a collection of fossils from Mongolia and his own country, some which might have been one of a kind. (Hard to tell when you cant get legitimate professionals to look at them.)
Here's hoping they were expensive forgeries, but I fear that they might instead be lost data because someone had some money and wanted to show off.
@@indigophoenix12 THIS. I follow a few fossil hunting accounts on ig that find some amazing stuff, but are mistrustful of academics and all I can think about is the data lost of private collections.
i literally just don’t understand the desire to own antiquities from a culture you have no connection to? like i was super interested in ancient egypt when i was younger & i would’ve found it so cool to be able to see/interact with egyptian antiquities irl, but even then i knew that i had no claim over them just bc i liked them. it’s a very imperialist mindset & it’s wild to me, like that’s a piece of human history & it’s incredibly likely that there are descendants of the people who originally made/owned those items who would be thrilled to be connected to them so why would u want to rob them of that?
exactly💔
And the culture they originate from would also be able to contextualize them and create extremely interesting exhibits using lots of their own artifacts. The passion, respect, and love that the culture could show through the exhibition of their history is unbeatable, the meaning would be more real and true to form.
Yeah, and if you are really interested in a culture you can buy decor or books or general stuff that isn't a literal artefact of great importance to said culture?
@@emilyfletcher7124 exactly, like buying a replica isn't a bad thing and especially if museums sold replicas online to raise funds from a global audience, it could help museums operate in areas with smaller tourism industries
In this case though, no one is closely tied to the ancient Egyptian culture. It’s more about preserving and learning about the extinct culture.
Anytime I see this it reminds me of back in the Victorian Era when wealthy people would buy and sometimes eat mummies. Also as an indigenous woman I personally find it very gross to take other people's historical and cultural items. Not a fan of people having more money than sense in cases like this. The certificate reminds me of the papers that come when you buy a build a bear 🤭
I think they genuinely think it’s like getting a build a bear… I’m African and every time I see things like this I just can’t seem to understand why white people feel the need to own cultural pieces that don’t concern them. It’s weird. Watching Demi do a haul of these artifacts genuinely triggered my fight or flight. 😪
@@sakiva I agree with you. It's nothing to do with their history but they want to colonize the items. It's not a good look. It's sad that they view such important things like expensive party favors
I'm sorry, WHAT.
EAT?
@@francinesmith7884 They wrongly believed it was medicinal...they also created paint with mummy remains
another indigenous lady here, people always use our culture as halloween costumes and or take our history and culture. it makes me so upset and i wish we could do something about it
I work at a small public museum in the US and there's a few nearby sites that we don't name on our public-facing object labels because we're concerned about people going to dig there and looting objects.
Pretty common, in a certain section of florida, there are a couple of sites off hiking trails that are simply not mentioned by anyone who knows and cares.
Celebs getting scammed sometimes feels like it could be some kind of tax dodge.
Well, the show didn't do so well even after the singing to a ghost to let them pass into the other side saga blew up so uh...could be?
@@lemonnomel9416 the WHAT
Hi Amanda, as an Egyptian living here in Cairo I'd like to add that this is a big topic of conversation we have over here.
From my perspective the desire to own ancient Egyptian artifacts is just a form of modern day colonialism. You have no right to steal/buy items not from your culture. That's only a small version of of what many countries have stolen from Egypt over the years. Are every major European city has its own obelisk. And the US has several giant parts of temples, and no one bats an eye
You're wrong. It doesn't matter if you're not from that culture. You shouldn't own artifacts period. They don't belong to someone's private collection because they are cultural heritage and should be appreciated by anyone. That's why I think they should be reserved to a museum. Because most people anyway don't care about their history; they simply aren't interested. But maybe, someone from another country actually studying that stuff might be more interested and actually know more about it than said people. But it's just not fair that anyone could be able to buy historical artifacts.
If I had the money to do stuff like this I'd buy so much ceramic art from small artists... you could commission different artists to do murals on every wall of every room of your house...
If I ever have enough money to own a house, I’d love to have my ceiling painted based on Roman/Greek inspiration
I always wanted a room with floor tiles of a scene from the cretaceuous, and a series of four chinese seasonal paintings where each season also represented a different era of the mesozoic (the last would be winter and there would be birds and a few of the surviving reptiles near the bottom)
This! I already try to support “small” artists as much as I can, it’d be so cool to commission some to make all the things and do all the designs like I was a wealthy patron of the arts from days gone by😅😁☺️
I had a prof who was slowly replacing all her dish ware with ceramics she made herself and it was so cool!
*Few months back:* Demi Lovato makes a big deal out of sugar free froyo "because it's fatphobic" + "aliens is offensive so now I say ET"
*Now:* pulls sh!t like colonialist comportment 101 on their IG story. Feels like a Buzzfeed skit: "what if Indiana Jones had Instagram" 🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
FYI: UNESCO is an acronym pronounced as a single word, like _U • ness (=Loch Ness) • co_
Now I’m just imagining Demi complaining about sugar free froyo while hosting a mummy unwrapping party
I just wanna really emphasize your point that you CAN'T just drop something off at a museum that you think should be there.
Legitimate institutions can not legally go through the process to make an acquisition of an item when there isn't a formal, documented transfer of ownership to the institution.
I've been interning at an anthropology museum and we always get people trying to drop things off at the front desks or receiving dock, and people also just literally leave stuff at the front doors at night when the museum is closed.
When this happens the museum can't legally accept the donation and put it in collections.
We are a teaching institution so most of the teaching collection is made up of these types of objects since the museum can't legally add them to the collections, which means potentially it's just going to be destroyed for conservation students to repair.
If collections staff think it might be of significant cultural value they just kind of stay in collections purgatory though because the museum can't actually legally do anything with it.
During my internship a curator gave me a basket that was left at the museum in this way, and while I appreciate it because it's from my culture, and can tell it's a more recent basket done for the tourist market in the 20th century and therefore probably sold legally from the artist themselves.....it still just feels ODD.
this has been my experience, too! while I worked at the (very large) museum in my city, we'd have people calling in at least once a week to offer us stuff they simply had in their home. 99% of time we refused just taking random items from strangers. provenance is a big deal.
considering my museum only displays probably a fifth of the items they actually have (overwhelming majority is kept in storage for protection), the idea that a legitimate "museum" would have "surplus" that they can just..... GIVE out to people is hilarious to me
@@kkuudandere FR 😭 I checked their website too and they advertise that they're like a market that museums regularly buy from and trust me almost no museums are looking to buy authentic antiquities just cuz, let alone dubious fakes.
My museum did a big overhaul/renewal in 2010 and despite being a small-ish museum(I think were around 7k sq with a large portion being taken up by oversize objects like totem poles) and have I think at least 20k objects in visible storage for the public and its STILL mostly in the back and despite getting a shit ton of new storage in 2010 were already running out of space bc of the overwhelming amount of donations.
One of their recent acquisitions had like, 3000 goat horn spoons in a single lot 😭.
The movement to push for repatriation is the right one but also overwhelming at times lol.
This is the first I've heard about Demi Lovato buying antiquities but I had heard about a different example of some biblical literalists (I think they had some connection to Hobby Lobby or something) building a bible museum and buying looted artifacts.
I think I saw that hobby lobby thing on a list of controversies about the store
It's the family that owns Hobby Lobby.
As others have pointed out, that would be the owner of Hobby Lobby himself. He built a museum, filled with ‘biblical artifacts’ & particularly focused on Dead Sea scrolls, only for most of them to be fakes or looted. Wild stuff tbh
@@amelia3146 yeah it's crazy lol, i read a few articles when I heard about it and turns out the owners of hobby lobby may have accidentally funded ISIS by buying smuggled and looted artifacts from 'sellers' that were tied to them 😬 luckily the stuff was returned to the nation, but big yikes
Check out Fundie Fridays video on Hobby Lobby it's really informative on how bad they actually are
i mean it definitely seems to me like the ones demi bought were fake but yeah they should absolutely NOT be promoting any of this nonsense. i get being really into ancient history like i read percy jackson i was obsessed with ancient greece for like 2 years but i think it's really easy to stick to the just doing a lot of research and watching a lot of documentaries and going to museums. like museums definitely have their own set of issues but this is just adding a bunch of new issues and solving 0 of the ones that already exist
And if you really want an artifact, just buy a replica, if it's made properly chances are it is almost indistinguishable by looking at ot.
Reminds me of that TikToker with a room full of human spines.
Edit: Oh. There's a Swell Entertainment video on it. I'm gonna watch it later.
as someone from the west asia/north african region i think it's very unethical for anyone except us to own our artifacts tbh. it's playing into colonization, taking our history from us and forcing us to pay money to even see it. even white people coming to dig up our history is questionable territory for me because they rarely treat us with any respect. i love your compassion on these topics
This does raise the question though of…..what if someone wants to sell their artifacts?
Its a bit hypocritical that they're the one collecting this stuff seeing how they're always running their mouth about civil rights and stuff like that.
I never felt the need to acquire ancient antiquities, but I have heard about cuneiform practice on clay. Making cuneiform gingerbread would probably be really fun!
Omg I love that idea!! How cool!!
Edit: i didn’t realize this was part of the video 🤦♀️
We had an extra credit assignment in 6th grade to make our own cuneiform tablets and we all had so much fun with it!
As an Anthropology student (Archaeology is a sect hello my artifact loving brethren how are you) this whole situation is ✨vomit inducing.✨ It's like the whole thing with people keeping Clovis Points or owning valuable sites. Can't wait to show this to my Arch prof though to hear him shriek in terror at least lmao.
Also hello fellow Linguistic and Cultural Anthropology people.
Sometimes the vomit is induced from within the house. My dad helped excavate an early archeology site with his proffessor, a burial with a woman who had a ceramonial point in her sternum. However that archeologist had a fued with the university, and when they fired him, she, and all of the paperwork about her dissapeared. (this might have been because the university museum was looking to return most of their collection- dad doesnt know, it was thirty years past his graduation when someone called him to ask if he had any information about what happened her. The best he had was a copy of the old paper, which the student calling him already had.
The MOMENT my poor ass heard 'Museum Surplus' I thought 'Suuuuuuuuuure, THAT sounds SUPER legit....'
That's why I always shop at Museum factory outlet!
@@indigophoenix12 Mention my name and Tony will give you 10% off! ;)
@@indigophoenix12 They’ve got great BOGOs right now for Black Friday!
I am an Egyptologist, so I a subject matter expert in this field. Private ownership of Egyptian antiquities is a thing. As long those antiquities were legally exported from Egypt prior to the UN World Heritage Convention of 1972, it can be legal to own said antiquities. But private ownership is controversial in some circles. And some have argued that private ownership has encouraged looting and the production of forgeries. There are lot of legitimate antiquities that are on the market and can be purchased from auction houses. But there is nothing wrong with buying a copy knowing it is copy, and the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities is preparing to offer high quality copies for private purchase. I would encourage Demi to talk to real Egyptologists and learn about what she's interest in. Most of us are quite approachable. 😄
My professor in college was an Egyptologist, Robert Schoch - he was amazing and fascinating to talk to
@@allisontamayo9048 Schoch is a geophysicist, not an Egyptologist. However, I have no doubt that he was fascinating to talk to. 😁
@@ancientegyptandthebible He referred to himself as an Egyptologist in class - that's where I learned the word haha
The brain fog and memory loss from COVID is no joke. I had very mild COVID back in December 2020 and I still have memory issues.
My villain origin story is thinking Killmonger was right but went the wrong way about it. Definitely shouldn't have killed those people in the museum, but made some valid fucking points.
At least Demi probably did this out of stupidity. It's the Hobby Lobby level of intentional theft that is really concerning. But what can we expect from Hobby Lobby?
I don't study ancient societies(I study the rococo era) but the idea that Demi would just casually buy what they believed was a real ancient items is absolutely wild like how is that allowed
I'm doing an art history masters in Provenance rn and it's so interesting to hear someone outside of the sector discussing this!! You handled it really well and discussed all the major ethics discussion as well. Maybe there's an Art Crime professorship in you yet ;)
I'm an archaeologist who was litterally talking about the illegal traffiking of artifacts by rich people in America today I have never felt so called out by notification in my life girl I clicked SO FAST
girl no you are not😭
@@josieerin505 💀
@@josieerin505 And 49 others that clicked so I guess at least 50 archeologists! I’m sure they’re all real too.
I got my degree in History, and spent at least a day or two in every ancient history class I took talking about the ethics of artifact collecting. There are some horrendous examples, like the Athenian Marbles being kept in the British Museum for "safety reasons" despite Athens building an entire museum specifically to safely house them. But then theres good examples, like bordering nations in war-torn countries taking artifacts away to be safe from bombs and other hazards of war.
However, one person having artifacts has always struck me as immoral. That being said, these are probably fake. And if they're not, they were likely deemed so historically insignificant that they were sold to highest bidder.
I was in an oddities shop the other day and they had a German helmet on sale. It was advertised of still having the dead nazi's blood in it after a fatal blow from a soviet.
Didn't sit well with me. Who would want to own that? Who could feel right with that in their homes?
I would
I totally agree that artifacts should stay where they are but even if Demi didn't want to visit Egypt (where they have incredible museums and tours) it is very well known that the British museum, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Met, and many others already have extensive collections of Egyptian art and artifacts. I'm sure someone as rich as them could afford a high quality, ethically made replica or print of an artifact if seeing thousands of them in museums isn't enough.
"Egyptology" was very popular throughout history and until the 1920s there was little to no standard for recording the archeological process or for the security of dig sites. It's basic knowledge that European and American archeologists just took whatever during the day and locals looted the sites at night. Nowadays those artifacts are mostly in museums and any documented or newly uncovered artifacts are *very* strictly regulated. Looting definitely still happens but it's much easier for someone to create new fake artifacts than risk the repercussions of looting a dig site or museum. The name "museum surplus" alone tells you how little Demi understands the topic because museums literally collect more than is possible to display due to ongoing preservation, changing exhibits, etc lol
you can also buy cool enough replicas from Egypt. even if you arent fooled by such proffessional websites as Museum Surplus, modern and ethical replicas still can be pretty cool.
Something you should look into I just found out about is Faithful Minis and Peabody the horse.
This clip went viral on tiktok and instagram of a miniature horse that was so small that it was about the same size as the family's french bulldog. But people noticed that he didn't look healthy and his cage looked extremely dirty, with piles of soiled pee pads.
It turns out that Peabody was not only a miniature horse, but also had dwarfism. It's unclear whether he was specifically bred for dwarfism (to get yet smaller horses), or if it was the result of inbreeding. Either way, it left him with a lot of health problems. He was born deaf, with two bad legs, and a messed up jaw that prevented him from eating. He died after only four months (allegedly) from liver failure.
The owners (Faithful Minis) claim they bought him at 3 days old. From where is not specified. Why they bought him, when they themselves are miniature horse breeders, is also not clear. It's possible, since he's the smallest recorded miniature horse, that they were intending to use him to breed minis with dwarfism.
This is all I know. But it's really sad because the owners were being invited to do all this press, like be on the Kelly Clarkson show, when it seems like they're really shady backyard breeders, that don't care at all about the health of the animals they breed, as long as they look cute for four months so they can make a sale.
Oh my god it should be illegal. I don’t even think teacup dogs or cats with dwarfism should be bred. The dogs always have health problems and their bones break very easily. I can’t imagine how many pups were killed that didn’t turn out right. Cats with legs so short some tummies hit the ground can’t jump like a regular cat and that’s one of their joys! To be on top of things looking down watching everything! Of course they look cute but genetically messing with animals should be illegal when it is strictly for our enjoyment and makes like tougher for them.
Are those new glasses? They're so round you look like an academic! 🙆♀️
That eyeshadow is also soo on point! 👀
Yeah!! It makes her look very professional! Professor Swell
😭😭😭 they could have just commissioned an artist (like a sculptor) for a good replica without worrying about the possibility of stolen goods and proudly admit the fact. They could get museum souvenirs, plenty of them sell items like prints or goods with the image on it without it being tacky. Or better yet you want authentic goods then support the community its from, like visiting indigenous museums & shops or the equivalent of it. Support the culture, not steal it.
When you said Nicholas Cage, I was immediately ready to hear that he stole the Declaration of Independence.
11:31 My brain created a whole narrative of “dinosaur schools” being the correct term for a complete skeleton of a dinosaur until I realized it was supposed to say skulls
This really reminds of the time when Hobby Lobby bought looted And stolen artifacts for their bible museum. It's all I can think of
But when another museum buys and showcases them, that isn't theft? I'm confused about when it's theft, and when it's ok. Probably depends on whether the "right people" are profiting.
@@chance2413 still theft and looting. The key aspect would be to revise provenance and date of arrival to the collection to figure out how and where they were taken from. Additionally, museum exhibitions are compelled to work on the future preservation of the artifact or object, which is not a guarantee either. The problem with Hobby Lobby is that not only did they engage in contemporary massive illegal purchasing, their illegal activities support groups that are terrorizing and destroying cultural heritage in the Middle East without enough sanctions from the US government who is supposed to oversee their activities. However, let me really emphasize that no museum collection has a clean, legally acquired record of ownership, unless it’s a site museum with confirmed collaborative practices and community involvement (which are extremely rare)
@@ameliatorres6162 Thank you, thank you, thank you for your last comment about how no museum is squeaky clean. The amount of shit I’ve gotten from people about working in places with stolen artifacts like I did it myself when nobody was looking is insane. Museums originated out of “cabinets of curiosities” in the homes of wealthy nobles and were filled with random objects they gathered on travels. There was no paperwork, no trail of information, and nobody really keeping track of where things came from over the generations. We can’t change the past of how objects ended up where they did. The only thing we can do now is put protocols in place to protect museums from taking in objects of ill background. Does that still happen? Yes, of course, hobby lobby was correctly brought up. It’s the fact that this happened in modern day (and to the degree that it did) that was heinous of them
I feel like its kind of different bc Hobby Lobby bought them from ISIS which violates US sanctions. Not saying that what Demi Lovato did is good or anything, but people seem to gloss over details and apply a one sized fits all mindset about any story thats remotely similar.
Like, the knowing cooperation with terrorists was the big thing. Not necessarily a botched providence
How to make cuneiform gingerbread cookies:
1. Learn Ugaritic cuneiform, since it is mostly alphabetic and is easier than Akkadian or Hittite cuneiform.
2. Carve a triangular stylus out of a chopstick. You might want to practice your cuneiform technique on a piece of modelling clay.
3. Whip up a batch of gingerbread. Make sure it's the eating kind of gingerbread, not the gingerbread house kind of gingerbread, otherwise you will break people's teeth.
4. Form your cookies into small loaf-like squares.
5. Write your cuneiform message on each cookie and bake in an oven until done.
Oh, demi...I can't believe anyone would keep going online just to look like a total idiot. It's really hard to watch.
This weirdly reminded me of "haunted dolls" and other artifacts on eBay... Check it out, it's a weird "harmless" rabbit hole
Oh my god they’re also on Mercari and depop! I was introduced to the rabbit hole from the MBMBAM podcast, and it’s so funny to see how people try to authenticate haunted dolls
@@cl5uo beepadeepdeeepdeepbeepbeepbeep
I love them, it's how we got the *"haunted x doll that drinks all your pepsi and calls you a bitch"* meme
@@IHate4Kids wait I don’t think I’ve seen that I need it in my life
Those, at least dont rob a culture of part of their history so some rich douche can swing around their 'importance.'
Its up to you to decide if buying a haunted doll is believable ethical :)
I am by no means a historian, art crime professor, or even a person with expertise in my own job field, but as someone who makes Props and is working on a show that requires a ton of distressing, Lovato's stuff looks distressed in a similar way to how I did it (also if you are distressing something lowkey a belt sander doesn't seem like the way to go in my experience)
I have a weirdly close perspective on this. I sell high end designer mid century and Danish modern furniture from the 50s-70s (based in NYC) and because of this I have a close relationship with a lot of affluent auction houses, antique dealers, resellers etc. You run into these ill-gotten antiquities waaayyy more often than you’d think. I steer clear of any of that as I am a huge proponent of making sure historical objects stay in their country of origin (if possible) and are not sold for profit.
You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff that comes up in auction houses (who are suppose to vet items and make sure they weren’t trafficked/fakes/come from war torn areas were looting is common). It’s often considered that items sold at trusted auction houses get a bolstered reputation and validate some of the authenticity of the object seemly by being sold there. These places are willing to stake their highly coveted reputations on these questionable antiquities because there absolutely is a market of private individuals ready and willing to purchase. Everything from Egyptian artifacts to human remains to slave trade items to dinosaurs bones. It’s absolutely sickening but it’s the worst kept secret of the affluent that these pieces are not that hard to obtain. If Demi had a money manager, knowledge assistant, art procurer or simply knew the actual market better/asked around, this is where they would have gone.
It’s the same with high end antique stores that seem to think just because a piece is old that it somehow erases any human suffering (old or new) attached to that item. I’ve seen some truly bizarre objects in antique stores in the US but European antique stores take the cake on ethical issues.
At the end of the day, the practice of selling and coveting these antiquities, by western audiences, from a culture and place you were not a part of is simply another form of colonialism and imperialism.
I find a good way to not switch up "provenance" with "providence" is to really lean into the Frenchness of the word. "Prah-vaughn-AHNCE". It's easy to mix them up but I've found that's a good trick to get past it, at least for me.
"I'm just a chick on the internet with a camera" is definitely an understatement girl! Love your videos ❤ found you cause of the Jon's bones situation and somehow found the video very entertaining and funny, given the subject matter. I honestly had different views on ownership of these types of things, and even the Jon's bones situation, until listening to you explain how this is maybe not the respectful nor ethical. Keep up the hard work, it shows in your videos. ❤
Artifacts look like they earned a spot on the middle school honor roll, based on those certs.
I'm proud of that clay tablet for graduating middle school, top of its class. It's amazing because it's probably less than a year old!
@@antiarmadillosociety lmaoo what a prodigy
I haven't started the video but from first min I can tell I'll hate Demi even more. Egypt & it's history was and are still threatened today by looting & "archeologists" (Western grave robbers) picking and choosing the cultural & religious artifacts that they'll take to America, UK, EU etc. It actually makes me sick. There's museums in America that's willing to show dubious artifacts (possibly stolen before UN convention came in place) & they're UNWILLING to work with the respective African countries to possibly give their history back. (Obvs England & EU etc also)
I'm a big history nerd & always had a soft spot for Egyptian history (being from Africa myself, it felt more "real" than Ancient Rome or Ancient Greece), & I would love to view their historical artifacts IN EGYPT. Hoarding it in another continent really leave a bitter taste in my mouth, because who's suppose to be the audience? White Europeans/Americans? To other and objectify another culture & their history?
So "keeping it in museums" is not the answer. If the museums is in Egypt or Africa, yes, because it's THEIR history. And having this artifacts be owned by rich people - definitely no. They're the reason you see artifacts in museums -they loan it to them (and are unwilling to give it back to the countries of origin). So private individuals making choices about historical artifacts and who has access to it or not, also screams white saviourism & Western dominance to me.
Those who own history can change it. The Hobby Lobby people bought illegal documents from IS*S, but one of the documents were a long lost fragment of Sappho, that are lost to academia and further research. A lot of "lost pieces" are also documents that were hoarded by rich families & therefore academics can't access it.
The idea of buying cultural objects stolen from a country just to prove my wealth (not even my passion or knowledge.. which doesn't make it right) purely disgusts me. I used to love Demi but nowadays I don't know who she is anymore
I definitely do not have Demi Lovato money but once again that has saved me from being this dumb with money. I literally just can't afford to be this dumb with money.
I'm not good at Photoshop but even I could forge better paperwork than that. Not even getting into the issue with buying the artefacts of another culture and keeping it to yourself. At the very least loan it to someone who will put it on public display or keeps it safe and can do research with it.
That happened in my city with a bunch of very expensive old books a private person bought them and then gave them for free as a permanent loan to the university library so people can look at them and learn how to conserve them too because my local university offers that course as well.
Pretty sure they've been at the library for two decades or longer now and apparently the private owner has put it in writing that once they pass it permanently goes to the library.
I didn't know that Demi Lovato was the British museum
"The baby didn't like the skeleton, so they were trying to get rid of it."
I don't blame them. Babies are a dime a dozen.
There is always someone who is dumb with spending money, therefore there is always someone else who wants to separate that fool from their money by any means.
Im an undergrad in anthropology, specifically with a concentration in archeology and this topic gives me oh so may thoughts. The process of rich people buying cultural artifacts for personal collections is by no means a new idea and is generally how the practice of archeology started, as rich white men gatherered cabinets of curiosities full of stolen or fake artifacts and created a market for them and created public interest by showing them to the public.
There are some fantastic museum replicas you can buy - just as beautiful as the originals, but much more affordable and you don't have to worry about the ethical concerns.
I bought some great ones from the Roemisch Germanisches museum when I visited Cologne in Germany years ago. I have a beautiful necklace based on one found in a riverbank, and I love it so much. I'm not sure that I'd feel ok with buying genuine artifacts, particularly from the likes of Egypt considering most of them are funerary decorations.
There's a museum in Greece where the displays have spaces for the pieces in the British museum. Hobby Lobby was involved with illegal artifact trade that almost definitely funded a terrorist group but definitely destroyed a cultural site that would have been important for archaeology
All the creators are talking about how nfts are fungible because online scarity isn't real while Amanda is explaining why forgeries mean collectible scarity and manufactured scarity aren't real either. Amanda said how many layers deep are you? lol
Another fine example of how money can't buy taste or cultural respect.
I will never ever get tired of your intro.
hey, you may never read this but i’ve been having a really hard time recently, and your content has been a good comfort during this rough patch. just got out of a friendship that in hindsight was very emotionally abusive but for a long while it was extremely difficult to let go of because they were my only friend…. looking back it was because they kept arguing with all of my other friends even starting fights just to call them names. but now that i’m away from them and on my own, i find a huge comfort and company in your videos that i didn’t feel in calls with them. just thank you for creating the content that you do. the casual nature and lighthearted tone is contagious and has really lifted my mood. thanks :)
I feel like Demi was just watching The Mummy and got the idea of purchasing some artifacts and came across the first website she found on google
I'm so glad I found this channel!!
I wanna make cuneiform gingerbread cookies with you🥺 also I’m convinced Demi must’ve both those high. That website looks so sketch
@swell entertainment: as much as i'm not a fan of logan paul, the pokimon that he bought was 'sealed boxes' and he did have someone verify that they were authentic....as best as you can authenticate 'sealed' packages. as you may or may not know, 'sealed' collectables are worth much more than 'unsealed'. he didn't just spend all that money willy nilly.
@@gsesquire3441 and then on top of that, didn’t inform his fans he got his money back, UNTIL AFTER he got that Ad money; and of course his fans buying his merch to “reimburse” his “losses”. Even though he already got the refund. 🤦🏽♀️😂
Poot Lavato would've never done this
It’s just funny how little research people do. If you have any kind of a platform, you have an obligation to use it for good. When I first saw this pop up on Twitter, I immediately thought about the ethical dilemma. The idea that the name “Museum Surplus” implies, that there are just extra artifacts we don’t need and are selling for a few hundred bucks, is absolutely absurd.
Loved the video! I just graduated with a masters in Library and Information Science which is essentially archival work. Everything you said was accurate. You'd be surprised how many fakes are floating around! If you want an absolutely wild rabbit hole you should look up the family who owns hobby lobby. They're notorious for smuggling artifacts into the US and purchasing dubious items for their museum of the bible. I did a research paper on them and it was WILD.
As a pastry chef who helped make an ancient Egyptian themed gingerbread scene for a local museum’s King Tut exhibit, I say yes to cuneiform tablet cookies! Let’s do it!!
a few weeks back there were reports of a few tv shows having their replicas stolen. like, the crown, which has replicas of the royal family's jewels and such, had a bunch of those things stolen. and the first thing that came to mind seeing those news was that people were gonna try and sell those and pretend they're the real deal
I mean, if you're talking the british crown, I root for the theives, turn about is fair play after all... unless the british museum wants to start returning things and the royal family is willing to invest in artifact repatriation and helping pay to preserve those objects in their rightful homes.
Praise to the algorithm for your channel recommendation. Lovely work. Quite the psychic as well, I don’t have Demi Lovato money.
I am a historian, researcher, and as a kid I wanted to be an archeologist for the longest time both because i loved Egypt and loved Indiana Jones. As i grew older, i only wanted this more as I discovered things like Otzi, The Franklin Expedition, and the dozens of mysterious mummies from the Valley of the Kings. Then my mom sat me down and made me watch a documentary. It showed the real danger of being an archeologist. Being shot at by looters and cartels looking to sell artifacts for big bucks or trying to protect their culture. After that, i decides i would rather be a teacher. What Demi did here is not just irresponsible, it is the perfect example of ignorant priviledged rich people throwing their wealth around to seem cultured. It kind of pisses me off because if these artifacts are stolen she is basically contributing to the ongoing plunder of Egypt and the political turmoil it funds. Hell, she could have bought art, modern reproductions, made by an egyptian artist struggling due to covid but that just doesn't have the same social media clout as buying artifacts. Sorry, this story really pissed me off
Your mom didnt show you that documentary on the horrors of being a teacher?
I kid.
me, buying an ancient artifact: why is there still eyeliner on my hand?
As a Geology and Archaeology student this is very worrying especially if they are stolen. It’s also a very interesting time for her to post that as Project Pandora V is still gaining arrests for the illegal selling of artifacts worldwide.
Once artifacts are taken from the site incorrectly it’s pretty much impossible to gain anything from them as they are stripped of all context.
I do think they these ones are fake but I’m not an expert in this field of archaeology.
While opening RUclips, I thought “oh I’ll continue watching the videos I was watching yesterday” and then saw your and had to watch this first, hearing your intro, I was like “omg same” so now I gotta stick around for the end!! I was a longtime fan of Demi and the last big thing I remember was the confidence uprising. No clue what’s been going on the past couple years so anything Demi, I have to watch to be up-to-date.
Now go look into the family that runs Hobby Lobby -- they have enough illegal artifacts that they literally made a museum for them
No matter the culture ancient artifacts should not be any where other then where they were found or in a museum especially if the museum is in said original country found.
This topic was super interesting 👍🏽 Thanks Amanda
I hope you don't end up like me, but I've had memory issues for a year and a half now since covid. It sucks so much, but in some ways, it's always kinda gratifying to hear other people have them as well, bc the people around me generally do not believe me. It's infuriating.
Memory issues after COVID are super common. Even my super mild COVID definitely still affected me a bit.
I own something that could be classified as an "artifact", but it's a 170 years old pipe that was found in a local closed down copper mine.
omg hey!! i was just thinking about you the other day!!
Society: "what do you do with an associates in english?"
Swell: "hold my beer"
My cousin has artifacts all over his house. It’s a flex for him. He’s probably the wealthiest person I know and the family member that makes me roll my eyes the most frequently 🙄🙄
Logan Paul had his cards authenticated and guaranteed by the authenticator. He did it right. It was the biggest payout that company ever had to do.
Demi Lovato just keeps accepting a shovel to dig themselves (Shoot forgot they are nonbinary. Corrected. Sorry.) deeper into trouble. Might end up in Egypt at some point.
Anyway, I think its wrong to take/purchase artifacts from another culture/country. Wouldn't it be culturally richer to go to that country and know the world of where the artifacts came from? Instead people like Demi are using it for their own self-indulgence. How selfish.
This interests me greatly. I have possession of dinosaur bones that are very dear to me, as they are the only gift that truly hit my heart from my dad. He and a friend traveled to Big Bend National Park some 30 years ago while paleontologists were doing a dig. Dad found a number of bone fragments in the area and cleared it with the scientists that it wss ok to bring them home to his nerdy daughter. None of them were scientifically important, so they said sure and even identified the pieces as leg, tooth, egg shell, etc. Many look like just rocks until you realize what you're looking at. The important thing for me is that he collected them himself and thought to get permission. No money changed hands, just knowledge. I dont know how I feel about human historical items. I, personally, would be seeking to return them if i learned items were looted goods from a current country.
I'm not a fan of removing cultural artifacts from country's of origin. I think the items should be put in a museum for viewing and learning of the past cultural. A rich person buying it for themselves to show off to their other rich friends isn't really preserving the past. I guess they could buy a bunch of things and open their own museum for the public but one, that never happens and two, in Demi Lovato's case, I doubt they has plans of opening a museum. I don't see anything wrong with re-creations as long as everyone involved knows and it's explicitly stated that's it's a re-creation.
In this case, if they are fake and Demi bought them thinking they are real, then that's fraud, the nature of which can extend to either criminal or civil fraud. Same for Nic Cage with the bones and Logan Paul and the Pokemon cards, though the difficult part is often jurisdiction and actually finding the seller in the first place.
@@Xpndable I believe Demi genuinely thought they were real and has been frauded and should peruse civil and possibly criminal charges but as you said, finding the seller will be the difficult part.
*they Demi goes by they/them pronouns :)
But make sure the museum is in the artifacts' place of origin. So many foreign museums profit off stolen cultural artifacts. :/ So sending artifacts back to their original place, and making a museum there, can help make a profit for the locals.
Ofc, it's not always possible, but for the ones that are.. why not?
@@frogurtcremebrulee5252 You are absolutely right. That was an oversight on my part that has been corrected.
someone needs to take demi’s social media away
Let's say, hypothetically, museums had a surplus. No way in hell would they sell it off, not even considering for that low price. They would store it, like many do. They might loan it to other museums, or even send it to other museums in their country. But hey, Demi-Lovato-money doesn't make you smart. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
"You don't have demi lavato money"
My bank account: 👁👄👁 $9.34
As a student of archaeology and hopefully a future archaeologist with a PhD, this is SO INFURIATING!
The literal FIRST thing we we're taught is: This is not Indiana Jones type deal, if you came here inspired by him, rethink your choice of studying in this field.
Archaeology IS NOT grave robbing. It was in the past, yes (think Wooley and the Royal Tomb of Ur excavation, an utter disgrace), but times have changed. Archaeologists do not just come, dig up stuff, put it in bags and leave the site. They do it methodologically, carefully, and with no intention of destroying / making profit of the site or its artifacts. We look for historic value in things, not monetary value!
To think that there are people who sell artifacts online with the caption "gotten ethically from sites" or "gotten legally"..... No. There is NOTHING legal about selling artifacts that were STOLEN from sites. NONE of these were gotten via archaeological excavations or investigations, trust me on that. No archaeologist in his right mind would do this, unlike these bastards whose actions throw dirt on the field of science that archaeology is. The artifacts were dug up illegally and gathered for sale.
And especially from sites in Egypt or Middle East, since there is SO much yet to uncover and it is all well preserved in the dry climate.
I am personally against anyone owning artifacts from sites, no matter how "legal" it might be. Copies, sure, but the real ones are reserved for museums in their countries of origin. To end off, thank you @Swell Entertainment for addressing this issue, as it is a big one.
Props to you for using their correct pronouns
My only commentary is how hard Demi is fighting to stay relevant and in people's minds.
Is anyone else UwU to make cuneiform gingerbread cookies with Amanda? 🥺
I may be but a humble Classical Civilizations student, but the idea that anyone would mistake that fourth grade craft project for an Eye of Horus is nuts.
The Logan Paul Pokemon card thing is a different situation because Logan did that. It's just that the people who he got to verify it (who have a very good track record) got duped too. The guy selling them just pulled the biggest fast one.
Also, “museum surplus” itself sound so sketchy☠️