The War On Tiki Bars Our cultural watchdogs are telling us that they're "problematic." I've been to my share of tiki bars in Hawaii and Florida over the years. Their faux-Polynesian kitschiness makes for a fun, escapist atmosphere, but what I've heard lately indicates that the fun's illicit. That's what the ever-vigilant cultural appropriation police have been saying, anyway. The New York Times has jumped on the anti-tiki bandwagon with a recent, smug article, "Reclaiming The Tiki Bar." "They provide an intoxicating escape from the burden of the world," co-writers Sammi Katz and Olivia McGiff tell us while a pandemic's raging, before going on to explain why we should feel guilty ("genre’s history of racial inequity and cultural appropriation") about seeking out this sort of escape. Among the numerous problems with the article is that it appears to be little more than a rehash of one