Mana, Shamans, and the Cultural Misappropriation behind Fantasy Terms

[doctorbadwolf]

You have lost all credibility with me. Lets go back to using traditional RPG/fantasy fiction being thoughtcrimes.

There are other books.

This “thoughtcrimes” crap is melodramatic nonsense.

 

[Umbran]

It's a theory. I've never seen any real support for it, and there is a vast amount of history and current events that disproves it.

Broadly speaking, lower levels of violence worldwide, with a growing population, suggests less violence per capita. Current events, in a relative sense, are small numbers of incidents.

History texts talk about how much violence there is in absolute terms, but often miss the fact that the world population has increased dramatically. In WWII, the world population was something like 2.3 billion. Today, it is more like 7 billion.

 

[Jd Smith1]

I am afraid the science will still be true whether or not you believe in it.

I don't believe you understand the difference between 'science' and 'theory'.

You're making a statistical-based claim. As as Disraeli noted, there are three types of falsehood: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

And using a Net forum as an example of a statistic-based claim? Wow. Just plain wow.

Anyway, time to cut the silliness level a tad.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

My older half brother, who has Nez Perce ancestry and engages in many old traditions, would probably call you a bigot to automatically associate his traditions as a bad thing simply because they are “primitive”. It’s you who is perpetuating negative stereotypes when you make those associations.

You have got to be joking.

This is as bad as people calling anyone who sees the racism in the Volos Orc description “the real racist”. You’re using literally the same logic.

The fact that you also keep attacking the strawman that “shaman as a word is bad because it comes from another culture”, which isn’t an argument literally anyone has made, is really confusing me.

This is the sort of behavior I normally see you opposing in threads, not engaging in yourself.

Edit to be crystal clear: Pointing out that a racist association has been made in the books previously is not the same thing as making that association. If I say, “the Volos guide description of orcs uses the same rhetoric as racist descriptions of Black and Indigenous peoples used to dehumanize them and justify genocide”, I have not made an association where orcs = Black and Indigenous people.

Likewise, stating that the books tend to only use “shaman” to refer to the spiritual leaders of savage people’s who tend to be antagonists in the game’s stories is objectively and explicitly not “associating [those] traditions as bad simply because they’re primitive”.

 

[Sacrosanct]

You have got to be joking.

This is as bad as people calling anyone who sees the racism in the Volos Orc description “the real racist”. You’re using literally the same logic.

no, no I’m not. Orcs are pretend. If you as a white person keep getting offended on behalf of a group and they are like, “nah, we’re good”, then maybe you need to reflect on yourself. Cuz guess what? Telling groups that they should be offended is just as bad, because you’re still a white person telling a minority how to act.

The fact that you also keep attacking the strawman that “shaman as a word is bad because it comes from another culture”, which isn’t an argument literally anyone has made, is really confusing me.

This is the sort of behavior I normally see you opposing in threads, not engaging in yourself.

Dude, literally the first post in the thread is making that argument. How is it a strawman when literally the entire basis of this thread is built around that argument.

“I’m not saying we should ban shaman, but you should know how bad it is and how it was appropriated.”

 

[Umbran]

The fact that you also keep attacking the strawman that “shaman as a word is bad because it comes from another culture”, which isn’t an argument literally anyone has made, is really confusing me.

On the internet, folks often argue against what they want to argue against, whether you said it or not.

This is the sort of behavior I normally see you opposing in threads, not engaging in yourself.

Can we avoid making this personal? 'Cause doing so will not help with the point above.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

no, no I’m not. Orcs are pretend. If you as a white person keep getting offended on behalf of a group and they are like, “nah, we’re good”, then maybe you need to reflect on yourself. Cuz guess what? Telling groups that they should be offended is just as bad, because you’re still a white person telling a minority how to act.



Dude, literally the first post in the thread is making that argument. How is it a strawman when literally the entire basis of this thread is built around that argument.

“I’m not saying we should ban shaman, but you should know how bad it is and how it was appropriated.”

Good grief. No, that isn’t the argument in the OP.

And if you think that people with actual Shamanic traditions aren’t unhappy with fantasy media “shamans”, well, you’re wrong.

“Orcs are pretend” is perhaps the weakest argument anyone ever makes in these threads. You damn well know better than to think that fictional things don’t matter.

“Making it personal” or not, I can’t help but be severely disappointed that you are making these arguments. You might as well be yelling about “snowflakes” and acronyms banned from use on these forums.

 

[Umbran]

so yeah, we should call out bigotry when we see it. Like I just did to you. But if a white person calls out bigotry and the people who are the topic of it don’t see it, it’s a good bet it’s manufactured outrage. Stop trying to be such a white knight and look at how your own assumptions are making it worse and how they are the attitudes that spread stereotypes.

Mod Note:

Making it waaaay too personal there. It is time for you to take a break from this thread.

 

[Umbran]

You have lost all credibility with me. Lets go back to using traditional RPG/fantasy fiction being thoughtcrimes.

Mod Note:

So, if you respect folks in the thread this little, it is time for you to take a break too. Please treat folks with respect, or just leave them be in the future.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Also, as someone whose hobby is bushcrafting, if you automatically assume and use primitive to = bad, that’s on you, and illustrates your bigotry. My older half brother, who has Nez Perce ancestry and engages in many old traditions, would probably call you a bigot to automatically associate his traditions as a bad thing simply because they are “primitive”. It’s you who is perpetuating negative stereotypes when you make those associations.

5e uses the word "primitive" six times in the core rules. Five usages are negative, one is neutral. Emphasis mine.

PHB:
"In these yellowed pages were tales of bold heroes, strange and fierce animals, mighty primitive gods, and a magic that was part and fabric of that distant land."* (This is the neutral one.)
"[T]he Dark Six are the primitive, bloody, and cruel gods who offer a dissenting voice."

MM:
"Primitive. Hill giants" congregate in "steadings built of rough timber or in clusters of well-defended mud-and-wattle huts... Their weapons are uprooted trees and rocks pulled from the earth". They wear "crude animal skins... poorly stitched together with hair and leather thongs."
"Whether these tall, gaunt creatures [the ancestors of githyanki and githzerai] were peaceful or savage, cultured or primitive before the mind flayers enslaved and changed them, none can say."
"Lizardfolk are primitive reptilian humanoids that lurk in the swamps and jungles of the world."
"Primitive Wanderers. Ogres clothe themselves in animal pelts and uproot trees for use as crude tools and weapons."

Hill giants have INT 5 and are chaotic evil. They are "raging bullies", "selfish, dimwitted brutes" whose "laziness and dullness would long ago have spelled their end if not for their formidable size and strength".
Lizardfolk have INT 7. They eat other humanoids and also sacrifice them to their god.
Ogres have INT 5 and are chaotic evil. They possess "Legendary Stupidity. Few ogres can count to ten, even with their fingers in front of them." They are "lazy of mind", "greedy" (in the sense of avaricious), "gluttons", and have "furious tempers".

EDIT: *This is a quotation from Elaine Cunningham's Forgotten Realms novel, Daughter of the Drow, which may explain the different usage.