What Aliette de Bodard said, below, particularly the "my two cents" comment - because those are my two cents too. I don't think prancing around in a sexy "Indian Squaw" costume at Halloween is okay - but honestly, sometimes you AREN'T out to diss something. For the woman in the article itself, she's biracial, and she HAS Chinese blood, and if you desperately want to police things like that then she's entitled. But, folks... I once wrote a fantasy novel which was rooted deeply... in Imperial China. They sent me on book tour to seven cities. I did readings in Oregon, Colorado, California, New York City. *I wore a cheongsam for those readings*. It connected me to my story, to its background, to its audience. I did not do it to "steal" anything, I wasn't even claiming it as personally mine (in the entitlement sense) - I was wearing it because in the context of things it was a bridge and not a chasm. Not a single person - and many who came to those readings were Asian - ever said a thing to me about it, or demeaned either my act or myself, or demanded my justification for it. A Chinese woman's comment - and it pertained to my book, and not my dress - said to me at the conclusion of a reading that she "wished I was Chinese" - which I took as the greatest of compliments, and not a put-down. But yes, I wore a cheongsam in public That does not mean I have a claim to being Chinese, or that I wanted to exploit the rich cultural and mythological background of China solely for my own gains. But this then circles back to the original question - how DARED I write such a book in the first place? WHy didn't I kknow my own honky place in the world and stick to my own backyard?... And my answer to that is simply, the world is as much mine as it is anyone's - and so long as I am not making fun of things I don't understand, treating important cultural sensitivities as irrelevant or unimportant, or otherwise disrespecting anybody or their provenance, if I exist in the same world as some other part of it that I find interesting or engaging and I am willing to do enough research to do it respect and justice then I should be able to write about it... and sometimes wear appropriate clothing when I do a reading from the things I have written.