You do not seem to mind such variations in Halflings or Elves, so why do Orcs bother you so much?
On the one hand, the variations exist for orcs too in the sense that if I had a player who really wanted to play a full-blooded Orc character rather than settlig for a half-orc, I'd make it happen for them with the same caveat that they understand their character is exceptional, but if the party ends up facing down Orc opponents, it should generally be understood those Orcs are evil. I can also see the concept of an Orc subtype that is akin to Orc's as a whole what Drow and Duergar are to Elves and Dwarves, so there is a ready option from which to draw good Orcs - I believe Faerun has Grey Orcs; and while poking about the net I came across this Yellow Orc (5e Race) - D&D Wiki (dandwiki.com).
Yeah, Yellow Orcs (and Red Orcs) are both from Mystara. And they're both extremely racist. They were explicitly based off of East Asians (primarily Mongolians), and are a major problem. (Red Orcs were based off of Native Americans, and were just as bad.)
If you want better examples of different styles of orcish cultures that aren't extremely racist or monotonous (like almost all of Greyhawk's and the Forgotten Realms' Orcs), look up the Orcish cultures of Eberron and Exandria.
(Eberron's Orcs still have the "primal" and "passionate" themes of most orcs, but use it for good. They saved the world once by imprisoning some eldritch abominations that were going to corrupt everything/everyone and take over the world, and they're primarily druids, which is a craft that they were taught by an Ancient Black Dragon. Exandria's Orcs were originally cursed by Gruumsh to be like Greyhawk and the Forgotten Realms' Orcs, but they can break free of that curse. There's a lot of different cultures that they can have, most of them just end up having the same culture as others around them, but a lot of them worship Kord or the Luxon.)
On the other hand however, like the 'Cops-and-Robbers' analogy from a few posts ago, at least part of this game can can be boiled down to 'Heroes-and-Monsters' as the simplest and most reduced expression of the dualist conflict theme. I'm bothered by the executive decision to shift-click so many creature types out of the Monster Box and into the Heroes Box. Orcs in particular, and Goblins as well, being of the classic and therefor most-favored and well known go-to monster types that fans of the genre are already familiar with and love to see. Rather than taking it as a given that monsters are just monsters however, folks are pre-supposing their apparent 'humanity', and are exclaiming at me: "It's harmful to describe a group of PEOPLE in such a fashion".
...and I'm sitting here feeling like someone's just told me I should be vegan because it's wrong to eat people...
Now, I get that some people see the descriptions, are reminded of RL human history, and are upset by the reminder; but aside from changing the nature of my world; which I don't want to do and don't like that WotC is doing it; I don't know how to reconcile their feelings about the subject with mine: that it is a necessity for this game to have clearly defined and distinct monsters that are not there to be sympathised with or have 'humanity' imposed upon them; they are there to be obsticales in your path while on a heroic quest -thats the function and purpose of that particualr creation.
Yes, it is harmful to describe whole races of people as being "monsters" or "100% evil". Because if a game says that it's okay to label a whole race of people as evil and commit genocide against them, like it or not, that will influence people in the real world.
Like we've given examples for, Orcs haven't been universally evil for at least 25 years. That's older than I am. The same applies to Drow, Goblinoids, Gnolls, Giants, Yuan-Ti, and so on. This is not a new change. If you didn't complain about it back then, you probably shouldn't be complaining about it now.
And like we've said before, you are absolutely free to keep those races as "kill on sight" monsters at your table. No one has said otherwise. If you and your players like that style of play keep doing it. The reason why WotC is making this errata and similar changes is to open up the base game to allow for a more diverse amount of playstyles. They're not doing anything for/to you, so there's no reason for you to care about this. They're doing this for people like me that don't have those races as mono-cultural monsters, and supporting both playstyles at the same time. Me having my cake doesn't take away your cake.
And, like we've said, there have been real people harmed by past depictions of these races. The Vistani were racist. Yellow and Red Orcs are racist. Drow had awful and bigoted implications (that dark skin is a curse). Hobgoblins are still based off of multiple parts of Japanese culture (they still wear Samurai Armor/Ninja Clothing in their 5e art).
That's the reason for the changes. Not to tell you that you can't keep playing D&D how you want, but to get rid of the parts of it that were harming people, and to make it more inclusive. If it doesn't effect you and isn't hurting anyone else, you have no right to complain about it.
I have this sinking feeling that when I aquiesse on the subject of Orcs, -given what I've been told about about Gary, and also about Tolkiens origonal intentions; and some of those links to other players experiences;- and decide "alright let's shift Orcs out of the Monster Category and henceforth afford them 'humanity' with all the dignity and respect due to all people that comes with it"; than it wont be much longer before nearly ALL my monsters are people instead: that's going to change the nature of my world...
The thing is . . . Gary didn't care about Tolkien's original intentions for symbolism in the orcs. He didn't care. If he did, he would have used it. He would have coded Orcs as being ultra-industrial. He would have made them warlike in an attempt to spread the message that war is hell and it destroys everything. He didn't do that. He didn't respect Tolkien's depictions of Orcs. (To be honest, if there's one thing that Gary Gygax was definitely not, it was respectful towards other people's IPs. He stole from everything; the Cthulhu Mythos, Middle Earth, Jack Vacne's Dying Earth series, and so on.)
However, if you want to have Orcs in your world be more like Tolkien's Orcs, feel free to do that. Have them be uber-industrial and militaristic. Have them pollute the world and try to turn it all into Mordor. Have them be pure embodiments of what Tolkien thought were the worst parts of humanity (war, industrialization, destruction/corruption of nature, unemphatic, etc). Have them be a corrupted type of Elf to show what can happen when the best parts of society are inverted. If you want your Orcs to be respectful to Tolkien's intent for them . . . don't use D&D Orcs. Any of them. They're not what you're looking for it you're looking for Tolkien's Orcs.
Again, as I pointed out earlier, Tolkien was conflicted whether or not Orcs in Middle Earth are/should be totally irredeemable. If you want truly irredeemable bad guys, use Gygax's Orcs. If you want symbolism for the worst parts of society, while possibly being redeemable, use Tolkien's Orcs. If you want fantasy-inserts for real world marginalized peoples to illustrate how unfair the world is to those people, use the Elder Scrolls' Orcs/Orsimer or Exandria's Kryn Dynasty Orcs.
There's a variety of options. . . and that's a good thing. That's a really good thing. More options means that it's more likely for any one of them to click for somebody and make them get into D&D. If you want mono-cultural orcs that are only used as cannon-fodder in adventures for D&D combat . . . frankly, that's a really bad idea, both for the hobby and for story telling. Diversity is a good thing.
nods, I've just watched my favorite youtube optimizer do a build for a psionicist using an Ebberon Orc. It was cool build.
Edit: delete
Nods, that's what I'm thinking, maybe homebrew my Orcs to better match tolkeins. They can have a redemption path, I just need a mguffin to sever them from their dark lords influence.
What I'm saying is that people who partake of fiction and use that to cause harm IRL is problematic.
The relationship between "art" and "reality"'; "play" and "seriousness" just aren't as compartmentalized as your ... I guess argument or point is trying to make them. You're simply making an assertion to give you some comfort that this discussion is about nothing and there's no need to be reflective or mindful when you're "having fun." Conventional wisdom, most self aware people realize when someone or group of someone's are upset about something and someone responds to the upset with "it's not a big deal" and dismissing it as nothing or inconsequential or "just a game" or "just a story" or what have you .., that respondent is exhibiting precisely the callousness, literal insensitivity they're contending against.
You can continue to flippantly dismiss it or use very simplistic understandings between the relationship between fictional representation and implications and harm (which is nothing to do with game violence and school shootings) but there are a lot of thoughts here that outweigh those light contributions.
At the end of the day entertainment is part of life, and everyone should feel comfortable in entertainment environments, and not seeing tropes and language that perpetuates notions of fun at someone else's or a group's expense. It's not rocket science, it's pretty hard to deny the positive sentiment.
What I'm saying is that people who partake of fiction and use that to cause harm IRL is problematic.
It seems that I did misunderstand you, I apologize. I do think you misunderstood the point being made in the original post you were responding to, which I believe led to confusion.
"Because if a game says that it's okay to label a whole race of people as evil and commit genocide against them, like it or not, that will influence people in the real world. "
Yo...
If people can't separate fantasy from reality they have no business partaking of that fantasy.
Ah, that thread. It's kind of a miracle that it never got locked. (Oh, and to anyone reading this, please do not necro it. If you want to read the discussion, great, but nothing that could be said hasn't already been said. We don't need to restart that flamewar.)
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
There is nothing wrong with enjoying a game or really getting into character. The problem comes when you (not you specifically) bring that fantasy (whether thoughts, concepts or actions) into reality where it can be (but doesn't necessarily have to be) harmful.
You recognize that the character(s) you play belong to a fantasy environment that is separate from objective reality. If someone thought hurting a person IRL was no big deal because they play a cleric in DND and think they can magically heal them, that's a problem. Not with the game, but with the person.
And, no, I don't support the gross generalization that video games cause school shootings.
I don't support that, either. However, there is evidence that while first-person-shooter games don't cause violence, they can desensitize you to certain types of violence (kinda like how if you see a character in a TV show get shot in the shoulder with an arrow 10 times every episode for 10 seasons, it might make you start to think that that sort of injury isn't that serious. It probably won't, but it might, and on a large enough scale, like by that show or game having a huge fanbase, it could end up influencing behavior in the real world).
I discussed this more in this post from that great thread Ophidimancer linked.
The problem is when people try to take fantasy and treat is as reality. That's where propaganda and racism/white supremacy come from (trying to use fictional examples to influence real world behavior). As I've said before, if you want a good example of a real world attempt to paint a different race as monstrous from less than a century ago, look up the Tokio Monster from American Propaganda during WW2 or Nazi Propaganda about Jews from around the same time-period.
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
The vast majority of people can tell the difference between reality and games quite easily. The thing is, our mentalities, our views, our modalities are all shaped by our surroundings. What we read and play is a part of that. If you read books that have lots of swearing, you'll find that your own language will include bad language. If you read lots of books that have a Nationalistic bent to them, you'll start noticing things in a Nationalistic way. If you read lots of books that mock and downgrade the French, you'll find that your own attitude towards the French will slip. That doesn't mean that if you play GTA, you'll become a school shooter. That's silly. However, the media you consume normalises certain things which influences you, even if only subconsciously.
If WotC recognised this and decided that they didn't want to be a part of encouraging people to view race as a determinant of morality or behaviour, then that's upto to them and perhaps to be commended. If I remember rightly though, that wasn't their motivation at all. In the explanation letter fornthe errata, itnwas just that they didn't want to guide people into choosing a certain alignment when creating characters. So player races have had the alignment removed, while non player races haven't.
It wasn't ever really about being woke or not. They felt that it wouod improve character creation and that's it. You're welcome to disagree on that, it's just not a "woke v non woke" thing.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
People from outside the hobby, predisposed to control their children, who didn't know what they were talking about VS people from inside the hobby who have first hand experience how the depiction of the other in dnd has influenced their life for the worse. Hmmm a realthough choice there.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
Did you miss the part where I said the lingering effects on people's thoughts is not even the most immediate effect of racially insensitive language, but rather it is the immediate retraumatizing of people who are already hurt? Is that not enough?
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
This comparison of what folks are endeavoring to communicate regarding overall harm reduction and inclusive gaming to the Satanic Panic is incredibly off base. Like literally incredibly in that I find it hard to believe a mind participating in this discussion in good faith would make that association unless like others they simply want the conversation to go away. "I was there" too and if you're seeing a correlation between that and what WotC has been doing with their editorial direction I have to question whether you really understand what happened back then in the 80s.
The Satanic Panic (S.P.) was hysteria over games, styles of music, I'd say comic books but the mainstream ones had already caved to the Comics Code Authority (CCA) decades before and the 'underground' comics scene was more truly fugitive and marginal back then to the degree that the S.P. movement wouldn't have known who to point the blame finger at (kinda like TTRPGs), etc. - hysteria that certain self-styled community leaders fear mongered to create organized efforts to use the tools of government (regulation in terms of book/game banning from libraries and school systems, record labeling, and a couple of instances of bogus prosecution that went nowhere other than a waste of public resources and the loss of time and stress inflicted on the accused) to combat what they deemed a "subversive" force in America that they felt perpetuated late 60 early 70s counter cultural questioning or disregard or disrespect for "commonly held" authority, an earlier "culture war" that so called moral majoritarians thought they won in 1980. Despite the truth that the kids actually were all right (see what I did there?) the alarmists framed white christian middle class values contending with frankly adolescent irreverence toward those values as a battle between good vs. evil. Decades prior there was a movie "Rebel without a Cause," this was the sequel "Authorities without a Clue."
Editorial decisions in the present moment aren't that at all. It's not industry rolling over to appease ill informed outrage (like the CCA, MPAA, record labeling system etc ... note the TTRPG industry never really had to perform that sort of show). It's an effort by industry to adapt its product to maximize its market share. Those moves happen to align with the values of a not insignificant portion of the growing TTRPG player community who want to see their games more welcoming to all (and that alignment seems good for business). One of the ways industry does that alignment is by doing a close reading and hard think over norms and tropes that are inessential to the game (I say inessential because I don't think anyone can say folks playing Orcs the so called "new way" are not playing D&D). This requires nuanced thinking into the academically well documented analysis of race and colonialist tropes in the myths and fantasies from which a lot of D&D is derived (surprised no one's brought up colonialism ... another factor in the rethink of humanoid races is humanoids are a stand in for colonial ventures and "open frontier" myths ... open aside from the "savages" who were there first). If someone wants to play the old tropes, they can without a hearing on the matter. It's just that the new defaults give the game a lot more options than that, and options that are more in line with many other players' ideas of what fantasy role playing can be.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
You do not seem to mind such variations in Halflings or Elves, so why do Orcs bother you so much?
On the one hand, the variations exist for orcs too in the sense that if I had a player who really wanted to play a full-blooded Orc character rather than settlig for a half-orc, I'd make it happen for them with the same caveat that they understand their character is exceptional, but if the party ends up facing down Orc opponents, it should generally be understood those Orcs are evil. I can also see the concept of an Orc subtype that is akin to Orc's as a whole what Drow and Duergar are to Elves and Dwarves, so there is a ready option from which to draw good Orcs - I believe Faerun has Grey Orcs; and while poking about the net I came across this Yellow Orc (5e Race) - D&D Wiki (dandwiki.com).
Yeah, Yellow Orcs (and Red Orcs) are both from Mystara. And they're both extremely racist. They were explicitly based off of East Asians (primarily Mongolians), and are a major problem. (Red Orcs were based off of Native Americans, and were just as bad.)
If you want better examples of different styles of orcish cultures that aren't extremely racist or monotonous (like almost all of Greyhawk's and the Forgotten Realms' Orcs), look up the Orcish cultures of Eberron and Exandria.
(Eberron's Orcs still have the "primal" and "passionate" themes of most orcs, but use it for good. They saved the world once by imprisoning some eldritch abominations that were going to corrupt everything/everyone and take over the world, and they're primarily druids, which is a craft that they were taught by an Ancient Black Dragon. Exandria's Orcs were originally cursed by Gruumsh to be like Greyhawk and the Forgotten Realms' Orcs, but they can break free of that curse. There's a lot of different cultures that they can have, most of them just end up having the same culture as others around them, but a lot of them worship Kord or the Luxon.)
On the other hand however, like the 'Cops-and-Robbers' analogy from a few posts ago, at least part of this game can can be boiled down to 'Heroes-and-Monsters' as the simplest and most reduced expression of the dualist conflict theme. I'm bothered by the executive decision to shift-click so many creature types out of the Monster Box and into the Heroes Box. Orcs in particular, and Goblins as well, being of the classic and therefor most-favored and well known go-to monster types that fans of the genre are already familiar with and love to see. Rather than taking it as a given that monsters are just monsters however, folks are pre-supposing their apparent 'humanity', and are exclaiming at me: "It's harmful to describe a group of PEOPLE in such a fashion".
...and I'm sitting here feeling like someone's just told me I should be vegan because it's wrong to eat people...
Now, I get that some people see the descriptions, are reminded of RL human history, and are upset by the reminder; but aside from changing the nature of my world; which I don't want to do and don't like that WotC is doing it; I don't know how to reconcile their feelings about the subject with mine: that it is a necessity for this game to have clearly defined and distinct monsters that are not there to be sympathised with or have 'humanity' imposed upon them; they are there to be obsticales in your path while on a heroic quest -thats the function and purpose of that particualr creation.
Yes, it is harmful to describe whole races of people as being "monsters" or "100% evil". Because if a game says that it's okay to label a whole race of people as evil and commit genocide against them, like it or not, that will influence people in the real world.
Like we've given examples for, Orcs haven't been universally evil for at least 25 years. That's older than I am. The same applies to Drow, Goblinoids, Gnolls, Giants, Yuan-Ti, and so on. This is not a new change. If you didn't complain about it back then, you probably shouldn't be complaining about it now.
And like we've said before, you are absolutely free to keep those races as "kill on sight" monsters at your table. No one has said otherwise. If you and your players like that style of play keep doing it. The reason why WotC is making this errata and similar changes is to open up the base game to allow for a more diverse amount of playstyles. They're not doing anything for/to you, so there's no reason for you to care about this. They're doing this for people like me that don't have those races as mono-cultural monsters, and supporting both playstyles at the same time. Me having my cake doesn't take away your cake.
And, like we've said, there have been real people harmed by past depictions of these races. The Vistani were racist. Yellow and Red Orcs are racist. Drow had awful and bigoted implications (that dark skin is a curse). Hobgoblins are still based off of multiple parts of Japanese culture (they still wear Samurai Armor/Ninja Clothing in their 5e art).
That's the reason for the changes. Not to tell you that you can't keep playing D&D how you want, but to get rid of the parts of it that were harming people, and to make it more inclusive. If it doesn't effect you and isn't hurting anyone else, you have no right to complain about it.
I have this sinking feeling that when I aquiesse on the subject of Orcs, -given what I've been told about about Gary, and also about Tolkiens origonal intentions; and some of those links to other players experiences;- and decide "alright let's shift Orcs out of the Monster Category and henceforth afford them 'humanity' with all the dignity and respect due to all people that comes with it"; than it wont be much longer before nearly ALL my monsters are people instead: that's going to change the nature of my world...
The thing is . . . Gary didn't care about Tolkien's original intentions for symbolism in the orcs. He didn't care. If he did, he would have used it. He would have coded Orcs as being ultra-industrial. He would have made them warlike in an attempt to spread the message that war is hell and it destroys everything. He didn't do that. He didn't respect Tolkien's depictions of Orcs. (To be honest, if there's one thing that Gary Gygax was definitely not, it was respectful towards other people's IPs. He stole from everything; the Cthulhu Mythos, Middle Earth, Jack Vacne's Dying Earth series, and so on.)
However, if you want to have Orcs in your world be more like Tolkien's Orcs, feel free to do that. Have them be uber-industrial and militaristic. Have them pollute the world and try to turn it all into Mordor. Have them be pure embodiments of what Tolkien thought were the worst parts of humanity (war, industrialization, destruction/corruption of nature, unemphatic, etc). Have them be a corrupted type of Elf to show what can happen when the best parts of society are inverted. If you want your Orcs to be respectful to Tolkien's intent for them . . . don't use D&D Orcs. Any of them. They're not what you're looking for it you're looking for Tolkien's Orcs.
Again, as I pointed out earlier, Tolkien was conflicted whether or not Orcs in Middle Earth are/should be totally irredeemable. If you want truly irredeemable bad guys, use Gygax's Orcs. If you want symbolism for the worst parts of society, while possibly being redeemable, use Tolkien's Orcs. If you want fantasy-inserts for real world marginalized peoples to illustrate how unfair the world is to those people, use the Elder Scrolls' Orcs/Orsimer or Exandria's Kryn Dynasty Orcs.
There's a variety of options. . . and that's a good thing. That's a really good thing. More options means that it's more likely for any one of them to click for somebody and make them get into D&D. If you want mono-cultural orcs that are only used as cannon-fodder in adventures for D&D combat . . . frankly, that's a really bad idea, both for the hobby and for story telling. Diversity is a good thing.
nods, I've just watched my favorite youtube optimizer do a build for a psionicist using an Ebberon Orc. It was cool build.
Edit: delete
Nods, that's what I'm thinking, maybe homebrew my Orcs to better match tolkeins. They can have a redemption path, I just need a mguffin to sever them from their dark lords influence.
Actually, Tolkien was wrong about the origins of orcs, and he was conflicted just because he was ignorant about his religion, and it also ties to D&D
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
This comparison of what folks are endeavoring to communicate regarding overall harm reduction and inclusive gaming to the Satanic Panic is incredibly off base. Like literally incredibly in that I find it hard to believe a mind participating in this discussion in good faith would make that association unless like others they simply want the conversation to go away. "I was there" too and if you're seeing a correlation between that and what WotC has been doing with their editorial direction I have to question whether you really understand what happened back then in the 80s.
The Satanic Panic (S.P.) was hysteria over games, styles of music, I'd say comic books but the mainstream ones had already caved to the Comics Code Authority (CCA) decades before and the 'underground' comics scene was more truly fugitive and marginal back then to the degree that the S.P. movement wouldn't have known who to point the blame finger at (kinda like TTRPGs), etc. - hysteria that certain self-styled community leaders fear mongered to create organized efforts to use the tools of government (regulation in terms of book/game banning from libraries and school systems, record labeling, and a couple of instances of bogus prosecution that went nowhere other than a waste of public resources and the loss of time and stress inflicted on the accused) to combat what they deemed a "subversive" force in America that they felt perpetuated late 60 early 70s counter cultural questioning or disregard or disrespect for "commonly held" authority, an earlier "culture war" that so called moral majoritarians thought they won in 1980. Despite the truth that the kids actually were all right (see what I did there?) the alarmists framed white christian middle class values contending with frankly adolescent irreverence toward those values as a battle between good vs. evil. Decades prior there was a movie "Rebel without a Cause," this was the sequel "Authorities without a Clue."
Editorial decisions in the present moment aren't that at all. It's not industry rolling over to appease ill informed outrage (like the CCA, MPAA, record labeling system etc ... note the TTRPG industry never really had to perform that sort of show). It's an effort by industry to adapt its product to maximize its market share. Those moves happen to align with the values of a not insignificant portion of the growing TTRPG player community who want to see their games more welcoming to all (and that alignment seems good for business). One of the ways industry does that alignment is by doing a close reading and hard think over norms and tropes that are inessential to the game (I say inessential because I don't think anyone can say folks playing Orcs the so called "new way" are not playing D&D). This requires nuanced thinking into the academically well documented analysis of race and colonialist tropes in the myths and fantasies from which a lot of D&D is derived (surprised no one's brought up colonialism ... another factor in the rethink of humanoid races is humanoids are a stand in for colonial ventures and "open frontier" myths ... open aside from the "savages" who were there first). If someone wants to play the old tropes, they can without a hearing on the matter. It's just that the new defaults give the game a lot more options than that, and options that are more in line with many other players' ideas of what fantasy role playing can be.
You took my comment out of context. There was at least one person claiming that playing fantasy games influences real life behavior. That's what I was specifically responding to. During the Satanic panic, groups claimed that playing D&D would negatively influence real world behavior. For the vast majority of people it didn't.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
I was there. LOL I still have on my bookshelf the copy of “Like Lambs to the Slaughter” I was given by my friend’s ultra-religious family after learning of my hobby in like 1988 or something. It is vital to note that very few, if any, of the people pushing the claims behind the Satanic Panic were players of the game or members of the TTRPG hobby community. They were in no position to assess the nature of the game or the possibility of harm, having never played the game. They were acting on speculation and hysteria, having never played the game. They wanted to stop as many people as they could from playing.
In contrast, in this discussion you have heard from active members of the TTRPG community, most of whom are players, describing the deleterious nature of older, less “woke” materials as relevant to their actual life experiences. People in the position to asses the nature of the game and the possibility of harm, having played the game. People acting upon reality and facts, having played the game. These people want to get as many people as they can playing.
How can anyone reasonably claim these are similar?
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
Did you miss the part where I said the lingering effects on people's thoughts is not even the most immediate effect of racially insensitive language, but rather it is the immediate retraumatizing of people who are already hurt? Is that not enough?
I interpreted your post and others to be a blanket statements, meaning "everyone" is effected. If you were referring to some people rather than everyone, then yes, it's enough. I acknowledge their feelings, I just have an issue with people making broad brush statements
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
<Midnightplat's historical comparision snipped>
You took my comment out of context. There was at least one person claiming that playing fantasy games influences real life behavior. That's what I was specifically responding to. During the Satanic panic, groups claimed that playing D&D would negatively influence real world behavior. For the vast majority of people it didn't.
Right gotcha. Yeah, what we're seeing there seems to be people reacting to some articulations of trauma theory (with examples provided by some posters' experiences} by invoking theories behind media depictions of fictional violence's correlation to instances of real world violence. It's an apples and oranges conversation where some folks are talking about effects of trauma and others are contesting it with their understanding of causes of violence. Yeah, both are talking about "the mind" but are really talking past each other. And other posters are trying to thread the needle between the two.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
Fiction does influence real life--countless studies have demonstrated that marginalization of cultures and identities in fiction results in promulgation of those negative stereotypes in the general populace and internalization of negativity by the members of those marginalized groups.
And that is why your post is a false equivalency.
The Satanic Panic of the 80s (or 90s with Magic: the Gathering, or 2000s with Harry Potter) are about changing behavior--those who buy into the Satanic Panic nonsense believe that a particular work of fiction are going to morph individuals from their normal selves into something completely different. That is unsupported by science.
Here is a completely different situation. In this case, the problematic fiction is not changing minds, it is affirming stereotypes that already exist within people's minds. The overwhelming data shows that type of affirmation does have massive negative effects on marginalized individuals, either causing them distress or actively turning them away from the game.
And that is why these kinds of changes are needed--Wizards should not try to affirm negativity, given the well-documented effects such affirmation can cause.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
Did you miss the part where I said the lingering effects on people's thoughts is not even the most immediate effect of racially insensitive language, but rather it is the immediate retraumatizing of people who are already hurt? Is that not enough?
I interpreted your post and others to be a blanket statements, meaning "everyone" is effected. If you were referring to some people rather than everyone, then yes, it's enough. I acknowledge their feelings, I just have an issue with people making broad brush statements
Every person of color in our society has experienced racial trauma to some degree or other and I would argue that white people also suffer, in that the privilege of being insulated from this comes at an opportunity cost in empathy and compassion. I'm not going to say this is a blanket universal, but I don't think it needs to be in order to say that whatever your "issue" is ... stow it. I really don't feel like you're bringing anything productive to the conversation, it feels like you just keep making comments sniping at points and aren't here to further anyone's ideas or make a stand about anything. Do you really honestly think that the recent changes represent the kind of fear mongering and xenophobia that we saw with the Satanic Panic?
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
I was there. LOL I still have on my bookshelf the copy of “Like Lambs to the Slaughter” I was given by my friend’s ultra-religious family after learning of my hobby in like 1988 or something. It is vital to note that very few, if any, of the people pushing the claims behind the Satanic Panic were players of the game or members of the TTRPG hobby community. They were in no position to assess the nature of the game or the possibility of harm, having never played the game. They were acting on speculation and hysteria, having never played the game. They wanted to stop as many people as they could from playing.
For those who have never seen it and want a glimpse into that mindset, the hilariously ridiculous Mazes and Monsters (starring a baby Tom Hanks!) is on Tubi, the free streaming service
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
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nods, I've just watched my favorite youtube optimizer do a build for a psionicist using an Ebberon Orc. It was cool build.
Edit: delete
Nods, that's what I'm thinking, maybe homebrew my Orcs to better match tolkeins. They can have a redemption path, I just need a mguffin to sever them from their dark lords influence.
Thank you for your time and please have a very pleasant day.
You misunderstand me.
What I'm saying is that people who partake of fiction and use that to cause harm IRL is problematic.
Ahh, I did misunderstand you. But now this is not even remotely what we've been talking about at all.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
The relationship between "art" and "reality"'; "play" and "seriousness" just aren't as compartmentalized as your ... I guess argument or point is trying to make them. You're simply making an assertion to give you some comfort that this discussion is about nothing and there's no need to be reflective or mindful when you're "having fun." Conventional wisdom, most self aware people realize when someone or group of someone's are upset about something and someone responds to the upset with "it's not a big deal" and dismissing it as nothing or inconsequential or "just a game" or "just a story" or what have you .., that respondent is exhibiting precisely the callousness, literal insensitivity they're contending against.
You can continue to flippantly dismiss it or use very simplistic understandings between the relationship between fictional representation and implications and harm (which is nothing to do with game violence and school shootings) but there are a lot of thoughts here that outweigh those light contributions.
At the end of the day entertainment is part of life, and everyone should feel comfortable in entertainment environments, and not seeing tropes and language that perpetuates notions of fun at someone else's or a group's expense. It's not rocket science, it's pretty hard to deny the positive sentiment.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
It seems that I did misunderstand you, I apologize. I do think you misunderstood the point being made in the original post you were responding to, which I believe led to confusion.
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Ah, that thread. It's kind of a miracle that it never got locked. (Oh, and to anyone reading this, please do not necro it. If you want to read the discussion, great, but nothing that could be said hasn't already been said. We don't need to restart that flamewar.)
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I don't support that, either. However, there is evidence that while first-person-shooter games don't cause violence, they can desensitize you to certain types of violence (kinda like how if you see a character in a TV show get shot in the shoulder with an arrow 10 times every episode for 10 seasons, it might make you start to think that that sort of injury isn't that serious. It probably won't, but it might, and on a large enough scale, like by that show or game having a huge fanbase, it could end up influencing behavior in the real world).
I discussed this more in this post from that great thread Ophidimancer linked.
The problem is when people try to take fantasy and treat is as reality. That's where propaganda and racism/white supremacy come from (trying to use fictional examples to influence real world behavior). As I've said before, if you want a good example of a real world attempt to paint a different race as monstrous from less than a century ago, look up the Tokio Monster from American Propaganda during WW2 or Nazi Propaganda about Jews from around the same time-period.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
The vast majority of people can tell the difference between reality and games quite easily. The thing is, our mentalities, our views, our modalities are all shaped by our surroundings. What we read and play is a part of that. If you read books that have lots of swearing, you'll find that your own language will include bad language. If you read lots of books that have a Nationalistic bent to them, you'll start noticing things in a Nationalistic way. If you read lots of books that mock and downgrade the French, you'll find that your own attitude towards the French will slip. That doesn't mean that if you play GTA, you'll become a school shooter. That's silly. However, the media you consume normalises certain things which influences you, even if only subconsciously.
If WotC recognised this and decided that they didn't want to be a part of encouraging people to view race as a determinant of morality or behaviour, then that's upto to them and perhaps to be commended. If I remember rightly though, that wasn't their motivation at all. In the explanation letter fornthe errata, itnwas just that they didn't want to guide people into choosing a certain alignment when creating characters. So player races have had the alignment removed, while non player races haven't.
It wasn't ever really about being woke or not. They felt that it wouod improve character creation and that's it. You're welcome to disagree on that, it's just not a "woke v non woke" thing.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The last few post in this thread about fiction influencing RL reminds me of the Satanic Panic of the 1980's.
There were groups claiming that playing D&D would turn people into Satan worshiping homicidal maniacs.
That didn't happen....
People from outside the hobby, predisposed to control their children, who didn't know what they were talking about VS people from inside the hobby who have first hand experience how the depiction of the other in dnd has influenced their life for the worse. Hmmm a real though choice there.
Did you miss the part where I said the lingering effects on people's thoughts is not even the most immediate effect of racially insensitive language, but rather it is the immediate retraumatizing of people who are already hurt? Is that not enough?
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
This comparison of what folks are endeavoring to communicate regarding overall harm reduction and inclusive gaming to the Satanic Panic is incredibly off base. Like literally incredibly in that I find it hard to believe a mind participating in this discussion in good faith would make that association unless like others they simply want the conversation to go away. "I was there" too and if you're seeing a correlation between that and what WotC has been doing with their editorial direction I have to question whether you really understand what happened back then in the 80s.
The Satanic Panic (S.P.) was hysteria over games, styles of music, I'd say comic books but the mainstream ones had already caved to the Comics Code Authority (CCA) decades before and the 'underground' comics scene was more truly fugitive and marginal back then to the degree that the S.P. movement wouldn't have known who to point the blame finger at (kinda like TTRPGs), etc. - hysteria that certain self-styled community leaders fear mongered to create organized efforts to use the tools of government (regulation in terms of book/game banning from libraries and school systems, record labeling, and a couple of instances of bogus prosecution that went nowhere other than a waste of public resources and the loss of time and stress inflicted on the accused) to combat what they deemed a "subversive" force in America that they felt perpetuated late 60 early 70s counter cultural questioning or disregard or disrespect for "commonly held" authority, an earlier "culture war" that so called moral majoritarians thought they won in 1980. Despite the truth that the kids actually were all right (see what I did there?) the alarmists framed white christian middle class values contending with frankly adolescent irreverence toward those values as a battle between good vs. evil. Decades prior there was a movie "Rebel without a Cause," this was the sequel "Authorities without a Clue."
Editorial decisions in the present moment aren't that at all. It's not industry rolling over to appease ill informed outrage (like the CCA, MPAA, record labeling system etc ... note the TTRPG industry never really had to perform that sort of show). It's an effort by industry to adapt its product to maximize its market share. Those moves happen to align with the values of a not insignificant portion of the growing TTRPG player community who want to see their games more welcoming to all (and that alignment seems good for business). One of the ways industry does that alignment is by doing a close reading and hard think over norms and tropes that are inessential to the game (I say inessential because I don't think anyone can say folks playing Orcs the so called "new way" are not playing D&D). This requires nuanced thinking into the academically well documented analysis of race and colonialist tropes in the myths and fantasies from which a lot of D&D is derived (surprised no one's brought up colonialism ... another factor in the rethink of humanoid races is humanoids are a stand in for colonial ventures and "open frontier" myths ... open aside from the "savages" who were there first). If someone wants to play the old tropes, they can without a hearing on the matter. It's just that the new defaults give the game a lot more options than that, and options that are more in line with many other players' ideas of what fantasy role playing can be.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Actually, Tolkien was wrong about the origins of orcs, and he was conflicted just because he was ignorant about his religion, and it also ties to D&D
You took my comment out of context. There was at least one person claiming that playing fantasy games influences real life behavior. That's what I was specifically responding to. During the Satanic panic, groups claimed that playing D&D would negatively influence real world behavior. For the vast majority of people it didn't.
I was there. LOL I still have on my bookshelf the copy of “Like Lambs to the Slaughter” I was given by my friend’s ultra-religious family after learning of my hobby in like 1988 or something. It is vital to note that very few, if any, of the people pushing the claims behind the Satanic Panic were players of the game or members of the TTRPG hobby community. They were in no position to assess the nature of the game or the possibility of harm, having never played the game. They were acting on speculation and hysteria, having never played the game. They wanted to stop as many people as they could from playing.
In contrast, in this discussion you have heard from active members of the TTRPG community, most of whom are players, describing the deleterious nature of older, less “woke” materials as relevant to their actual life experiences. People in the position to asses the nature of the game and the possibility of harm, having played the game. People acting upon reality and facts, having played the game. These people want to get as many people as they can playing.
How can anyone reasonably claim these are similar?
I interpreted your post and others to be a blanket statements, meaning "everyone" is effected. If you were referring to some people rather than everyone, then yes, it's enough. I acknowledge their feelings, I just have an issue with people making broad brush statements
Right gotcha. Yeah, what we're seeing there seems to be people reacting to some articulations of trauma theory (with examples provided by some posters' experiences} by invoking theories behind media depictions of fictional violence's correlation to instances of real world violence. It's an apples and oranges conversation where some folks are talking about effects of trauma and others are contesting it with their understanding of causes of violence. Yeah, both are talking about "the mind" but are really talking past each other. And other posters are trying to thread the needle between the two.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Fiction does influence real life--countless studies have demonstrated that marginalization of cultures and identities in fiction results in promulgation of those negative stereotypes in the general populace and internalization of negativity by the members of those marginalized groups.
And that is why your post is a false equivalency.
The Satanic Panic of the 80s (or 90s with Magic: the Gathering, or 2000s with Harry Potter) are about changing behavior--those who buy into the Satanic Panic nonsense believe that a particular work of fiction are going to morph individuals from their normal selves into something completely different. That is unsupported by science.
Here is a completely different situation. In this case, the problematic fiction is not changing minds, it is affirming stereotypes that already exist within people's minds. The overwhelming data shows that type of affirmation does have massive negative effects on marginalized individuals, either causing them distress or actively turning them away from the game.
And that is why these kinds of changes are needed--Wizards should not try to affirm negativity, given the well-documented effects such affirmation can cause.
Every person of color in our society has experienced racial trauma to some degree or other and I would argue that white people also suffer, in that the privilege of being insulated from this comes at an opportunity cost in empathy and compassion. I'm not going to say this is a blanket universal, but I don't think it needs to be in order to say that whatever your "issue" is ... stow it. I really don't feel like you're bringing anything productive to the conversation, it feels like you just keep making comments sniping at points and aren't here to further anyone's ideas or make a stand about anything. Do you really honestly think that the recent changes represent the kind of fear mongering and xenophobia that we saw with the Satanic Panic?
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
For those who have never seen it and want a glimpse into that mindset, the hilariously ridiculous Mazes and Monsters (starring a baby Tom Hanks!) is on Tubi, the free streaming service
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)