WotC Older D&D Books on DMs Guild Now Have A Disclaimer

If you go to any of the older WotC products on the Dungeon Master's Guild, they now have a new disclaimer very similar to that currently found at the start of Looney Tunes cartoons.

We recognize that some of the legacy content available on this website, does not reflect the values of the Dungeon & Dragons franchise today. Some older content may reflect ethnic, racial and gender prejudice that were commonplace in American society at that time. These depictions were wrong then and are wrong today. This content is presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. Dungeons & Dragons teaches that diversity is a strength, and we strive to make our D&D products as welcoming and inclusive as possible. This part of our work will never end.

The wording is very similar to that found at the start of Looney Tunes cartoons.

Edit: Wizards has put out a statement on Twitter (click through to the full thread)

 

[VelvetViolet]

It's the last gasp of the bigots. As with other bigotries, such as miscegenation, gay marriage, etc (in which they used similar arguments), they know they're on the way out and are trying to shout down the inevitable. They're on the losing side of history, and they know it, and they're flailing away trying to stop it. They won't succeed, any more than they did with the afore-mentioned arguments.

What bigotry? Correct me if I am wrong. I got the impression that their argument was "you can't be racist against fictional races, and you're the real racist for equating orcs with black people."

EDIT: Here's a link to relevant article by a psychologist:

No, Orcs Aren't Racist

Why cultural critics keep arguing about the wrong things.

www.psychologytoday.com

 

[Stacie GmrGrl]

As far as OA goes, not every person from Asia has a problem with it. There are some people from Japan who think that Mr. Kwan is wrong in his views.

 

[ChaosOS]

Well thanks for upgrading my post to front page news At least Wizards of the Coast chose a middle of the road statement that everyone will be satisfied with.

 

[VelvetViolet]

As far as OA goes, not every person from Asia has a problem with it. There are some people from Japan who think that Mr. Kwan is wrong in his views.

Likewise, I don't get offended when Japanese authors write pseudo-European fantasy even though I have European ancestry.

 

[Cadence]

What bigotry? Correct me if I am wrong. I got the impression that their argument was "you can't be racist against fictional races, and you're the real racist for equating orcs with black people."

EDIT: Here's a link to relevant article by a psychologist:

No, Orcs Aren't Racist

Why cultural critics keep arguing about the wrong things.

www.psychologytoday.com

This was hashed over a lot in other threads (search for Orcs). One argument is that the descriptions of the orcs almost word for word matches the language used by racists and eugenicists in the late 19th and early 20th century, and once you see it, it's hard to unsee. Which seems bad for a race that can be a PC, or make half-orcs, or just be there to slaughter with no moral qualms. See for example General - Two underlying truths: D&D heritage and inclusivity for links. Replies about orcs should probably go there.

 

[Stacie GmrGrl]

What bigotry? Correct me if I am wrong. I got the impression that their argument was "you can't be racist against fictional races, and you're the real racist for equating orcs with black people."

It makes a certain kind of logical sense. If you treat Orcs as the fictional, make believe fantasy race that they are than any person who is trying to force a narrative that Orcs somehow represent a real, earth race is the one that's pushing the racism into the perception of something that's really... You know... Not real.

Orcs aren't the problem in D&D. Neither is Oriental Adventures.

If there is a problem inherent in D&D, it's the core colonialism aspects of the game. Let's face it, the basic concepts of D&D are founded in playing an adventuring group of "heroes" that go from place to place, kill, murder, steal, pillage, ransack, dethrone, destroy, etc... All for the sake of the adventure. Take their treasures, go back to town, flood the market and destabilize economies, gain power, and repeat. They wipe out entire ecologies. They are not held accountable.

If this sounds familiar to history buffs... Then arguing about Orcs, Drow or OA is a distraction from the real problems of D&D as a game.

D&D itself is the problem.

 

[MGibster]

Sad that people have to die before something like this is implemented. I mean, it's not that everybody has suddenly be going "huch, racism??? in my D&D?" when reading those old modules without something triggering a reaction. Everybody could see the cringe once the first Vistani rolled up in his wagon, being all mysterious and ethnic, yet nobody said "perhaps we should add a disclaimer saying "this product continues a long tradition of stereotyping because that's how ye olde goons like Bram Stoker described it and we felt it was deliciously gothic".

Most of us Americans wouldn't know a Roma if he walked up to us in the middle of the street and high noon and planted a big wet kiss on our lips. There are approximately 1,000,000 people of Romani decent here in the United States, and while that sounds like a lot it's really not considering the population as a whole is about 309,000,000. To complicate matters, when Roma immigrated to the US they were typically classified as the same ethnic group as everyone else they were traveling with. I.e. If the Roma were traveling with Italians the US officials just classified them as Italians, if they were with Greeks they were classified as Greeks, etc., etc.

For a lot of Americans, "Gypsies" were a near mythical people we only heard stories about but had no direct experience with. In recent years, we've had more exposure to Roma in the news and that often elicited two responses: "Oh, my God! Why are Roma treated so poorly in Europe?" and the other is "You mean they're not just fairy tales?"

 

[Dragonhelm]

Oh my.

On the one hand, you have (among others) Frank Zappa, John Denver (!), and Dee Snider (!!) defending the rights of artists.

On the other hand, the officious busybodies who were doing it "for the children."

Same as it ever was.

I will leave with a portion of John "Country Roads" Denver's statement in 1985 at those hearings (and that are contemporaneous with OA!), which is as timely now as it was then-

"I am here to address the issue of a possible rating system in the Recording Industry, labeling records where excesses of explicit sex or graphic violence have occurred and, furthermore, references to drugs and alcohol or the occult are included in the lyrics. These hearings have been called to determine whether or not the Government should intervene to enforce this practice.

Mr. Chairman, this would approach censorship. May I be very clear that I am strongly opposed to censorship of any kind in our society, or anywhere else in the world.

<snip>

Mr. Chairman, the suppression of the people of a society begins, in my mind, with the censorship of the written or spoken word."


Anyway, I hope we can finally go back to making future products better, instead of trying to re-write history to our current standards.

(emphasis mine)

Well said.

Many folks playing the game today are not old enough to remember the PMRC's attempt to censor and label music. Dee Snider's testimony before the senate committee was awesome. You can see the summary version here (note: language).

Diversity and inclusion are noble pursuits, but going down the road of censorship is not how you do it. Freedom of speech means that everybody gets a say, even when that speech is uncomfortable.

Let me ask this. What have been the results of this push to remove Oriental Adventures from DMs Guild? Oriental Adventures 1e is now the #6 hottest-selling classic title, and Oriental Adventures 3e is now the #20 title.

It should be noted, by the way, that James Wyatt is the author of the 3e Oriental Adventures and he is an expert on East Asian cultures. It should also be noted that OA 3e won the 2002 Ennie Award for best campaign setting.

I would also caution throwing out the baby with the bathwater. There are good ideas in those books. Players should also be encouraged to research East Asian culture.

We can't change the past, but we can look upon the past to see how better to navigate the future.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

It's the last gasp of the bigots. As with other bigotries, such as miscegenation, gay marriage, etc (in which they used similar arguments), they know they're on the way out and are trying to shout down the inevitable. They're on the losing side of history, and they know it, and they're flailing away trying to stop it. They won't succeed, any more than they did with the afore-mentioned arguments.

Think of all the crazy ideas that come about when reactionaries sit down in armchairs and try to figure out amongst themselves what generic "liberals" think and want, in between condemnations of same and triumphant proclamations of their own inevitable rectitude.

Now remember that you are equipped with the same standard-issue human brain that they are.

So maybe a little less confidence that understanding of the other can be achieved using this methodology?

 

[Fenris-77]

D&D itself is the problem.

That would only be true if every D&D game looked like the one you describe, but they don't. None of my games do, nor do any of the games of many people I know. We're all playing D&D though. So perhaps lets shelve our over-used colonial studies lens for a moment, shall we? What you're really talking about is the way some people play D&D.