I don’t usually post in these kinds of threads, but this one seemed to make me think of a response that may be relevant.
I personally never found any of the old TSR stuff problematic at all. Not really any of it, to be honest. Sometimes some phrase or bit of art would kind of stand out in some way....a little too scandalous or whatever....but I dismissed them as one-offs.
None of that stuff was ever really offensive to me.
So, when I started hearing how it was offensive to some, my initial instinct was to dismiss the concerns. But, as I’ve matured, I realize how different our experiences can be. So now, when someone finds something offensive, I tend to listen so that I can learn something instead of assuming that everyone’s experience should match mine.
That being said, in products that come out today, I notice this kind of stuff much more readily. I think we’re all (generally speaking) just more aware of this. I think it’s good that we’ve made some progress in this area and that most topics tend to be approached with thought and care.
I do think that our standards of judgment for modern material versus older material should be a bit different though.
I also think that generally speaking, we’ve become too....resistant, I suppose, to offense. Sometimes, things may be offensive, and that doesn’t always mean they need to be changed or removed. Offense due to laziness or lack of care? Sure, that can be corrected. But lots of creative works are meant to provoke, and that’s naturally going to lend itself to being offensive to some. And I think that’s important.
So....if some of the more problematic elements from the TSR days were somehow presented today, I think it would depend on what it was and why it is being presented in such a way today. Is it just thoughtlessness? Or is there some meaningful discussion to be had, or more importantly, some interesting topic to explore through play?
The former can go. The latter, though? I think we need to preserve that at all costs.
