@
Imaro
Ok, we know ehre you are from, but what race are you and how is your race generally characterized in the media? I'm asking because that may be why you hadn't thought of it until now. It's been in my mind (though not always in the forefront) since I was first introduced to drow as a child.
I'm white, and you're 100% right, the Drow issue wont have played in my mind as it did in yours. I accept that. Why it didn't mostly, I believe, and I'm reiterating is that I have always viewed elves as fantastical and the fact that they weren't drawn as African as someone else pointed out never encouraged me to associate them with anything remotely African.
As for the media, it is probably best I don't view my thoughts on that, I'd more than likely get banned for life for doing so.
I don't think people "wish" to take offense and phrasing it that way is kind of silly, either something is or isn't offensive to people. Your phrasing makes it seem like black people went looking for something in D&D to be offended by and that's not the case... on the other hand I could see why introducing the concept of drow could be offensive to blacks, especially coupled with the fact that until recently there were not dark-skinned elves other than drow in D&D... are you saying you can't in any way see how that might be offensive in a major motion picture release?
Firstly, I think as humans we seem to complain or take offense to a lot of things, we do not need race for that to happen. We don't even have to go very far, we bicker continuously over D&D
Not to trivialise what we are talking about, but to reflect on how terrible as a race we are and have butchered and over analysed things just look at what psychologists have mentioned over the smurfs, or noddy and big ears...etc.
So yes a Drow movie could raise a stink.
I absolutely can see where people could take offense, especially in a motion picture, that is why my ideas upthread were not to focus on "black = evil" but rather the struggle with the elfwars and the motivations of the "pre-drow" choosing Lolth, how they became more corrupt, how their society evolved, the split and tensions with the Eilistraee serving drow elves and dangers of the underdark - Illithids. My attempts were to put their dark skin in the background rather than the foreground. Your post thereafter expressed that it could not be done and offense would be taken. I added pity as I would love to see such a story on film.
My phrasing was silly, but let me explain my thought process.
Would you take offense to a Drow movie where the Drow are depicted with black skin? I presumptuously and maybe even incorrectly thought not, but that your comments where it would be offensive was in relation to black people in general and those specifically not familiar with D&D. That is how I saw it. So I wasn't referring to your objections being trivial or that you 'wished' to take offense. My bad if you thought that.
Our hobby has also modernized and evolved over the years to be more inclusive and to offend people less... it's what you do if you want mass market appeal... which is what the original discussion centered around.
True, it has modernised, we don't get random harlot tables anymore or ability maximums for gender/race etc. No issue there.
Well as @
MerricB showed above... the creation of the drow has already been altered from their original design because now every source on them I have been able to look up on the interwebs makes a point about them being "cursed" with dark skin... does that change to the original design bother you? Or has that change become a necessary part of the design for you?
Well I've always thought they were cursed with the dark skin to go along with the dark deity they served. I never really knew anything more than what was written in The Complete Elves Handbook - I have never played/DMed in FR/Greyhawk. I have only read the Maztica novels which introduced the Drow.
And if so, why are you ok with that change to the original creation but not something as simple as making their skin a different color in a movie? Is black skin integral to the concept of drow? If so could you explain why?
I don't want to see an Asian Superman, or Michael Jordan played by a white guy in his biographical movie or Drow looking like the race from the movie Avatar. I do enjoy a different takes on things - for instance the Troy movie where they removed all inference of the gods meddling but paid lip-service to how some deific stories originated. I enjoy some Elseworlds comics too with their "what if" storylines or Marvels attempt to draw in the younger/new generation of spiderman-lovers with Brian Michael Bendis's run on Ultimate Spiderman (I haven't collected after the 1st Spiderman death).
Look I suppose they can change their skin colour, it could still be a great movie, I guess it is more of a personal preference for me.
I want to admire the strength and cruelty of this black elven race with their white flowing hair that inspires dread to surface dwellers, I love the exotic look of them and that they are a matriarchal society and the terrifying deity they serve. Yeah I think they are cool as they are - why would I want to see that changed. Their dark skin is a part of that coolness and that ability to inspire fear with that shocking contrasting white hair. That's where I'm coming. I know that is not what everyone sees I understand that. That is why I think it is a pity.
The trouble is, the mythology that the game is based on, is often very, very entrenched in racial politics. Trying to pretend or whitewash the history of the genre is very blind to the realities of where these stories came from. I mean, good grief, all you have to do is read the "golden age" fiction that much of D&D is based on to see just how racist the underpinnings of much of our hobby is. Whether you're looking at Lovecraft or Howard or even Tolkien, there's a pretty long established train of outright racism and bigotry in our chosen hobby.
Pretending it doesn't exist or, even worse, telling people that their concerns are not important enough to address is culturally and socially tone deaf.
I'm very much aware of that and I'm not pretending it doesn't exist. I suggested options upthread for possible directions a drow movie could take to steer it away from racial backlash, you might have missed that. If I was socially and culturally tone dead as you have implied I wouldn't have bothered at all.
But Hussar I expect to have your support when I make the request for pink Nightmares and yellow Pegasi and Brown Unicorns