D&D General Demihumans of Color and the Thermian Argument

[Professor Murder]

Do "elfs, dwarves, ect have an obligation to be racially diverse?"
No. Because they are not real.
Players are real.
DMs are real.
Players and DMs have an obligation to build inclusive environments.
If you don't feel that way, please see my previous statement about the danger of siding with scoundrels.
Thought experiment: If you are set on having a given people, be they elves or dwarves or halflings be ethnically homogeneous, that is your call. Perhaps in your setting, there is only a single elven nation, with a singular culture. All good. Step back and look at your cultural signifiers ascribed to the race. Are they all Euro-pastiche? What does that tell you.

You don't have a moral obligation to the accuracy of your setting. You have a moral obligation to the people at your gaming table. If you craft a setting where you, for example, tell a black player, "You want to play an elf? Great. Just can't be black. Sorry. It would ruin the setting." don't be shocked when others think ill of you.

 

[Steampunkette]

Right! I derped. @Charlaquin is right.

For some reason I mistook the Thermian Argument for a different name of the bubble argument which... yeah.

Thermian Arguments are, invariably, invalid and foolish.

 

[Yaarel]

If we ever meet a truly alien intelligent species

Sometimes I wonder if dolphins and whales are this, an intelligent species that is alien to human ways of thinking. They dont have hands, so they are less ... manipulative. But they are surprisingly intelligent.

 

[Weiley31]

Dwarven luchadors

Tell me more about these Dwarven Luchadors.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

Right now I prefer representing different shades of skin tones over simulationism.

Star trek did not have problems adding dark skinned Vulcans.

While no one paid any attention to that Romulan Ambassador in Star Trek V who was played by an actress of a Chinese background, when Voyager came around, there definitely was controversy from some 'fans' over Tim Russ playing the role of Tuvok.

 

[Lord Shark]

Why do we need an emotional stake in imaginary people?

Because we people of color are sick and tired of seeing nothing but white people in Fantasy. White elves, white gnomes, white halflings, white dwarves, etc. And when you're white, it is whatever. But when you're not white, especially in today's racial climate (specifically in America), it sure makes the entire hobby seem a lot more alienating to see that you aren't represented in the vast majority of the art, and that your skin color never gets to be shared by anything as awesome or cool as elves.

Here's another example that takes race out of the equation. I have run games for deaf players in the past. Frequently, some of them ask, "Can my character be deaf?"

They are not asking this because they want to take a disadvantage for extra points, or because they want me to make in-game communication hard for them (they certainly face that enough in real life). They are asking, "Can my character be like me?"

If you're a white/cis/straight/non-disabled person, the answer to that question is always "yeah, sure." But if you belong to a group that doesn't fit in with that mold, some people want to throw up barriers for whatever reason.

And yes, I let them play deaf characters. If they want to envision the mysterious guy in the tavern corner signing instead of speaking when he offers them a treasure map, what difference does it really make?

 

[Vaalingrade]

Okay so for anyone who says they're not human therefore no diversity is required...

They're still from the same planet as humans, right? With the same sun ball lancing them with radiation all the live-long day or Pelor basting them with garlic butter or whatever standin there is for the sun working like it does? And the same variation of geography and climate?

Then are we saying that everyone but humans is just super-adapted to be white? Up to outdoor and sun loving elves?

I think that once you're doing work to maintain the status quo it's time to examine whether the status quo is worth it. (Hint: it's not.)

 

[Vaalingrade]

While no one paid any attention to that Romulan Ambassador in Star Trek V who was played by an actress of a Chinese background, when Voyager came around, there definitely was controversy from some 'fans' over Tim Russ playing the role of Tuvok.

And those people can be safely and cheerfully ignored.

Not only from a dustbin of history standpoint, but because Tuvok was the best part of that show.

 

[Steampunkette]

And those people can be safely and cheerfully ignored.

Not only from a dustbin of history standpoint, but because Tuvok was the best part of that show.

This is The Doctor erasure and I will not be having it.

Tuvok, the Doctor, and Seven of Nine should've had their own show.

 

[squibbles]

That’s not a Thermian Argument at all, did you even watch the video you linked? A Thermian Argument is one that tries to refute critique of a work of fiction based on the in-fiction lore and logic, ignoring the fact that the fiction was written by real humans who had the option to write it differently. Saying “elves/dwarves/gnomes/etc aren’t human, so they don’t have to have human ethnic features” is a Thermian Argument. It attempts to refute critique of the lack of POC representation in most modern fantasy fiction based on in-fiction lore and logic, ignoring the fact that the fiction is written by real humans who have the option to write it differently.

Ya, you're right, I garbled my point there.

I meant point 1.) as the thermian argument--people making arguments based within the fiction of received pop cultural ideas--versus point 2.) as the ethics/politics--specifically representation--argument.

And using infantilizing speech such as "This seems to me to be kind of silly. Why do we have an emotional stake in peoples that are imaginary?" is just the cherry on top for the dismissive ice-cream sundae.

People crave representation. That's all. Enjoy your settings where you get into ridiculously wild crazy stuff. Lots of people will. But that's massively irrelevant to the actual question of people wanting to play characters who are like themselves.

Mea culpa. That was also poorly stated.

I didn't mean for this to be a dismissive thread.

Please note that the next bit after what you quoted is:

Either elves, symbolically, are just people (who arbitrarily live 1000 years), and there's no particularly compelling reason that they shouldn't look like anything that people look like. Or--alternately--elves are not symbolic of people, in which case they look like a specific thing that is purposively orthogonal to people and has no relevance to contemporary concerns.

And I see the first half of that dichotomy as totally valid and reasonable.