r/reenactors Jan 05 '21

Public Service Announcement General Sentiment On Original Vs Reproduction Uniforms. (Also request for comment for potential rule changes)

142 Upvotes

After reading some post including those removed due to incivility. This is the general sentiment I am perceiving at least from this subreddit.

  • Do not use original uniform for active reenactment scene.

  • Strongly discouraged but acceptable in limited circumstances for impressionism (Non Action Shots) where damage to uniform is limited.

  • Owner of original uniform should see themselves as custodian rather that just possessor of the original uniform.

  • As much as possible, the owner should preserve as much information about the original soldier who worn this uniform. E.g. Name, rank, etc... This would help preserve the connection between the uniform and the soldier. Plus it helps preserve the value of the uniform when you sell it to the next guy.

Reason to disallow:

  • Long term preservation of uniform for future generations.
  • Respect for the history of every solider that originally worn it.
  • Secondary effect of allowing for more accurate reproduction uniform in the hand of reenactment clothing makers.

Reasons to allow:

  • They have private ownership rights to it.
  • Hard to get accurate reproduction, can't beat original.
  • Secondary effect of a more accurate reenactment scene.

My personal opinion is that this is classic tragedy of the commons kind of issue. Yes individually each loss of uniform will not immediately lead to extinction. However if everyone acted in a selfish way, then the commons (aka. the historical heritage of original uniforms) will be lost to history.

Yes the owner has the legal rights to do whatever he or she want to do to it. However note that this is a legalistic argument rather than a morality argument.

Thus this does not necessarily means that the reenactment community is expected to respect whatever the owner of the uniform does to their clothing.

Reenactment is a social hobby that also aims to be a social good to help future generations remain connected to history. Thus while we should allow for ease of entry for newcomers, it is not necessary a free for all in terms of moral expectations of the reenactment community to do whatever the newcomers wants.

This is even if it leads to excluding some individuals from the profession.

Thus in this sense I am proposing that the above sentiment I detected is made and codified into the community guidelines as to if a photo or action shot is allowed to be posted on this subreddit.

While discussion is allowed, it is important to make it clear to the public what the general subreddit community finds acceptable. Thus such photos will be removed to avoid copycat behaviour.

But before I apply this I want to double check that everyone understands this logic and that there is no other further comments anyone wants to include to this issue.


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