D&D General "Red Orc" American Indians and "Yellow Orc" Mongolians in D&D

[billd91]

Where are you getting this from? As Thomas said, authors treating them as "childlike" is just ignorance telling on itself. Are you confusing them with Kender? With Kender, those are explicitly childlike and playful and so on. Halflings are not. They're based on English country folk (or rather Tolkien's perception of them).

I did get the word order wrong - Thorin calls Bilbo "child of the kindly West" in the Hobbit.
But even with that word order wrong, they're still sheltered by others willingly taking up worse burdens for them in their protection - Aragorn makes that pretty clear. So, I can still see how someone might take a comparison with hobbits, or halflings as filtered through D&D, in a less charitable light than Tolkien or you - and that's even though they're one of my favorite races in D&D.

And that's part of the problem with this whole topic - you can't tell someone else the comparison is harmless to them - whether it's comparison to a halfling, a hobbit, or English country folk. That's for them to decide. And they may or may not be reasonable about it, whatever reasonable means in this context.

 

[Umbran]

No. That's not it at all.

At no point did I say that people were prohibited from agitating for the things they want removed. Putting it that way (which ignores what I wrote) makes this complex issue seem simple- which it isn't.

I didn't put it that way. I didn't mention prohibition. I don't know where you got that from! If I'm not reading your arguments clearly, maybe you aren't reading mine so well either?

... But I will argue against it, simply because I very much do not want our world lessened by the continued removal of products from the past.

And that's fine. I find nothing objectionable in that position. However, I also find nothing objectionable with the position that not everything in the world always has to be commercially available (if only from the practical standpoint that until recently we couldn't, and we seem to have gotten along just fine with any number of intellectual bits falling into the dustbin of history, so clearly the losses aren't all that tragic), and that we can afford to let some things go, and be none the worse for it. I'm cool with both of these ideas.

You are welcome to disagree with that- but if you're replying to me, at least try and get my arguments right.

I'm not disagreeing with it. I am trying to say that, to first approximation, there's no real ethical difference between someone arguing that GAZ10 (or Song of the South, or whatever other piece of content) shouldn't be around, and you arguing against them. And that speaks to the complexity of the issue - whatever ethical differences there are between these two are buried in what harm is being done - and that is incredibly complex, indirect, and difficult to unravel. Indeed, this is so difficult to manage equitably that we prohibit our government from entering the field!

So, in the end my position is the same as yours - this issue is complex, and certainty is not readily available.

 

[Umbran]

you're showing that your own ignorant projection of what Halflings are is more important to you than the facts

You seem to be making this personal - about the person of the author. Please don't do that.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I did get the word order wrong - Thorin calls Bilbo "child of the kindly West" in the Hobbit.
But even with that word order wrong, they're still sheltered by others willingly taking up worse burdens for them in their protection - Aragorn makes that pretty clear. So, I can still see how someone might take a comparison with hobbits, or halflings as filtered through D&D, in a less charitable light than Tolkien or you - and that's even though they're one of my favorite races in D&D.

...

I know that you know perfectly well that's not what child means in that context. It means "born to", not literally "child". It's possible there was a hint of poetry there but when someone calls my mum a "child of the '60s" they don't literally mean she's a child, do they? So I'm not sure where you're going there.

As for the rest of it, I just don't buy a word of it, a hobbit bears the heaviest burden of all. None is heavier or worse. To call them "children" is to profoundly misunderstand LotR.

I would add that if we follow @Yaarel's "I'm offended by halflings" standard, we absolutely cannot under any circumstances use any real-world cultures or anything that might be mistaken for them. Which is like the opposite of what he's been suggesting he wants to do, and I believe both of you said you were unable to not use real-world cultures (or just him?). Which puts him in a Catch-22 of his own making.

 

[Thomas Shey]

In this sort of case, it would be important for the writer to emphasize why they decided to have not!Croatian dogfolk. For instance, the writer could play up those virtues of loyalty, determination, and cooperation, and the artist could illustrate them as looking alert, friendly, protective, fierce, etc. This would push a positive view and narrative. It wouldn't stop people from saying that dogs are a bad choice for whatever reason, but those reasons wouldn't be supported by the book.

Then you have the Gaz10 way, where the dogfolk would be actively written as dirty, mangey, poop-eaters who lick their own genitals, and the art would depict them as drooling, flea-ridden messes. In that case, the negative view and narrative would be supported by the book.

Of course, you'd also have to do this with the culture half of the people and de-emphasize or not include nasty stereotypes about actual Croatians in the write-up--or at least specify that they are stereotypes and not the truth.

Now, it would likely be harder to do this with orcs or some other previously always-evil race because of the decades of baggage associated with orcs. It might be less hard to do it with elves or a previously always-good race, because I think most people are more willing to accept a good people turned evil than vice versa.

Sure. I'm just noting this problem doesn't go away just with the big-blunt-object cases like Gaz10. And people would argue that the bad reasons the CroatDogMen were an insult was in the book, and probably could find something to point at to support their position simply because there's probably going to be some negative trait in them or their culture to be found (because otherwise they're a utopian super-race). That's why I say its a battle you fundamentally can't win, and beyond a certain point shouldn't even attempt to fight.

(Because of course the complicating issue is that most cultures do have some tendencies that are downsides, often ones even part of their own culture looks at and goes "What the hell, guys?" But its only marginally okay to talk about it from within your culture, and anyone outside it talking about it is Not Okay).

 

[Thomas Shey]

If you can't afford something, and you're not smart enough or good enough at making deals/negotiating to get it for free, but you don't actually have to do it (unlike, say, eating), maybe don't do it? Novel concept I'm sure. We have the internet now. I'm pretty sure if you are clear that you have no money, but would like advice, going to the right parts of the internet will get you some advice from the right people.

It'll get you advice from somebody, but the "right" people? I think that's perhaps optimistic. It'll get you advice from the people willing to respond who may have a good and proper take or may have some axe to grind or another.

 

[MGibster]

I'm somewhat sceptical because there's no guarantee that two different people from the same minority group will actively agree about content. I've read accounts of journalists getting into trouble for articles and people blasting them for not using sensitivity readers when they insist that they did use sensitivity readers.

It's difficult because none of us belong to a monolithic group. We all have our own experiences and opinions and might find something innocuous while another person in the same group finds it offensive. For the life of me, I can't imagine many Scotsman are going to be upset that they're rat men in Flintloque, a game where the English are Orcs and the Finns are Trolls, but I'm sure some of them would be unhappy. Likewise, I'm floored that anyone would consider it offensive to portray the Finns as halflings, but it's not my place to tell people what they should or shouldn't find offensive.

But I don't always care that someone finds something offensive. Starting in 2007, each year for Banned Books Week here in the United States, I select a book from their lists of banned or challenged books and the first one I selected was How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell. I selected it for two reasons: The first was because it was the first book I can remember reading for pleasure back when I was in fourth grade. And the second reason was because it had been adapted to a motion picture in 2006. As I read the book, I had a very difficult time trying to figure out how anyone could find it offensive as I thought it was completely innocuous but it was one of the more frequently challenged books. Many parents felt as though the story encouraged anti-social behavior (eating worms) and promoted gambling. The plot did revolve around a bet to eat a certain amount of worms and the prize was $50. These days I wonder if it might be challenged for fat shaming. The main character did express a desire to drop his winter fat as the school year ended and summer began.

I might start adding challenged RPG products to my reading list in 2022. You can bet that this September when Banned Books Week comes back I'm going to think about GAZ10 and I might even purchase it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It'll get you advice from somebody, but the "right" people? I think that's perhaps optimistic. It'll get you advice from the people willing to respond who may have a good and proper take or may have some axe to grind or another.

Advice is advice.

You're a grown-up. You use your judgement and decide what to do with and whether it's any good. If you're taking a risk, you're taking a risk. You're likely taking a much bigger risk with zero advice, because then you can't even say "But I talked to the people I gave credits to in my book!" (which will get people to judge you more kindly even if you were mislead).

And the sort of people who are very certain they "know better" than to need any advice are exactly the people who need it most.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

But I don't always care that someone finds something offensive.

It's not about one person and never has been, that's the thing, that's the point I was trying to illustrate re: Halflings.

Yes, one person may have a strange opinion of halflings, but if it's not commonly-held, it doesn't really matter. But that cuts both ways, if you get one person from a group to say X is fine, you might want to do a bit more due diligence.

And it's also worth noting that most of the time, it doesn't matter - it's only with indigenous or otherwise-abused minority cultures it's likely that you're going to have to think hard about (that an importing literally sacred stuff that's highly specific, not metaphorically sacred stuff).

 

[billd91]

I would add that if we follow @Yaarel's "I'm offended by halflings" standard, we absolutely cannot under any circumstances use any real-world cultures or anything that might be mistaken for them. Which is like the opposite of what he's been suggesting he wants to do, and I believe both of you said you were unable to not use real-world cultures (or just him?). Which puts him in a Catch-22 of his own making.

Welcome to the downside of today's political zeitgeist. You can use real world cultures if you take sufficient care, but it's a series of someone elses who determine if you've taken sufficient care. And they may not agree.
Good luck.