D&D General Dungeons & Dragons & Death Row

[Snarf Zagyg]

I recently stumbled across a great piece by The Marshall Project (by Keri Blakinger) about playing Dungeons & Dragons in prison, and more specifically, on Death Row.

How D&D Became Therapy for Some Men on Texas’ Death Row

For men awaiting execution in Texas, illicit games of Dungeons & Dragons became a lifeline.

www.themarshallproject.org

It is well-written and details both the D&D culture inside of prison, as well as the difficulties in keeping a game running. It also has some pictures of amazingly detailed maps that are used.

Obviously, given the subject matter, it can be a difficult read. In addition, it's probably necessary given the underlying issues that we don't discuss politics on Enworld.

 

[Nikosandros]

Yes, it is a great read. I was moved by it. I had seen it shared on another forum a few days ago and I forwarded it to all of my players. I'm not sure if I will be able to comment without violating board rules, so - at least for now - I'll just follow the discussion.

 

[aco175]

Good read. I remember the old Dragon Magazine had some stuff- Prison Mail I believe.

 

[ilgatto]

Yes, it is a great read. I was moved by it. (...)

This.

Wow...

 

[Reynard]

This is a beautiful, heartbreaking story about the humanity of those we throw away.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Yes, it is a great read. I was moved by it. I had seen it shared on another forum a few days ago and I forwarded it to all of my players. I'm not sure if I will be able to comment without violating board rules, so - at least for now - I'll just follow the discussion.

Yeah. I read it when it first came out. I actually sat on it for several days. Part of me was hoping someone else would link to it. Part of me was questioning if I should post it here, because despite the clearly relevant subject matter, I was worried that it might attract ... unwelcome ... discussion (especially per the forum rules).

That said, it is difficult to discuss the deeper issues without violating forum rules, which is why I think it hasn't led to much conversation. I do think that it does speak to an essential humanity, and how people will try to hold on to some shred of it in even the most dire circumstances.

 

[el-remmen]

I was in the same boat. I wanted to share it here but also didn't want to share it here, if you get my meaning. I will say by the end it had me sobbing.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Read it a few days ago, wonderfully terrible. Very moving. Thank you for sharing it with a wider audience.

 

[TheSword]

“The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones.”

Very moving that a small piece of good was recognized and will live on afterwards and be remembered..

 

[Mannahnin]

I bear witness.

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which “Escape” is now so often used: a tone for which the uses of the word outside literary criticism give no warrant at all. In what the misusers are fond of calling Real Life, Escape is evidently as a rule very practical, and may even be heroic. In real life it is difficult to blame it, unless it fails; in criticism it would seem to be the worse the better it succeeds. Evidently we are faced by a misuse of words, and also by a confusion of thought. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if, when he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls? The world outside has not become less real because the prisoner cannot see it. In using escape in this way the critics have chosen the wrong word, and, what is more, they are confusing, not always by sincere error, the Escape of the Prisoner with the Flight of the Deserter.

Just so a Party-spokesman might have labelled departure from the misery of the Führer’s or any other Reich and even criticism of it as treachery. In the same way these critics, to make confusion worse, and so to bring into contempt their opponents, stick their label of scorn not only on to Desertion, but on to real Escape, and what are often its companions, Disgust, Anger, Condemnation, and Revolt. Not only do they confound the escape of the prisoner with the flight of the deserter; but they would seem to prefer the acquiescence of the “quisling” to the resistance of the patriot. To such thinking you have only to say “the land you loved is doomed” to excuse any treachery, indeed to glorify it. [Escape in: On Fairy-Stories, J.R.R. Tolkien.]