D&D 5E D&D Races: Evolution, Fantasy Stereotypes & Escapism

[Hussar]

IMO. True acknolwedgment has much bigger stakes. It sounds simple but it's intertwined with so much else. It's like starting out as a child and learning how to interact with the world all over again.

1. How do I determine if something is racist/sexist/homophobic/etc?
2. What actions are acceptable/required if it is?
3. What actions are acceptable/required if it isn't but someone claims it is?
4. What actions are acceptable/required if it is but someone claims it isn't?
5. Are the acceptable/required actions changed depending on the race of person making the claim compared to my race?
6. If I do or say something wrong on this (even accidently), what are the consequences?

If you really want acknowledgment about the racist/sexist/homophobic then help people figure out the answers to these questions.

Well, and I know this probably isn't a great answer, the answer to most of that is, "it depends." And that really sucks. Sure, it's a minefield and it doubly sucks for those who aren't doing anything even remotely malicious but are getting swept up in the backdraft as it were. And, on the surface, these are all perfectly reasonable questions. But like a lot of fairly simple questions, the answer is a lot more complicated.

I mean, take the first one - How do I know? Well, the truth is, you can't probably. Not until someone else tells you. You don't know what you don't know, and if no one tells you that something is wrong, then, why would you think it was?

At the end of the day, all you or I or anyone else can do is just listen and accept, even when you don't really think that it's a problem. Better to err on the side of caution than assume bad faith.


---- edit to add

Poop. I did mean to put this in first but stupid brain got it out of order. Bad brain. Must punish you with more alcohol.

I do apologize for the tone. I am really bad at that and I know I am. You are obviously really trying to understand and I'm a douche. Thank you for taking the message as it was meant.

 

[FrogReaver]

Well, and I know this probably isn't a great answer, the answer to most of that is, "it depends." And that really sucks. Sure, it's a minefield and it doubly sucks for those who aren't doing anything even remotely malicious but are getting swept up in the backdraft as it were. And, on the surface, these are all perfectly reasonable questions. But like a lot of fairly simple questions, the answer is a lot more complicated.

It's fine. I don't mind complicated answers. I don't like answers that are really non-answers though (not saying yours is)

I also think it could be useful to recognize that the definition of racism has changed over the years - what it meant in 1990 isn't what it meant in 2010, isn't what it meant in 2020. It's broadened to include more things. So I think a large degree of what we see is people that are using 'outdated' definitions of racism (or I'll call them different ones to be kinder). At that point it's more of a semantic issue than one of actual ideas.

I mean, take the first one - How do I know? Well, the truth is, you can't probably. Not until someone else tells you. You don't know what you don't know, and if no one tells you that something is wrong, then, why would you think it was?

IMO, there's a difference between racism and personally wronging someone. I think one can't know everytime someone is personally offended or hurt or wronged by something you've done without them telling you, but I've never viewed racism as just a personal wrong. IMO it's something that's wrong in itself - much like theft, murder, assault, etc. Maybe I'm not caught up on the most new and improved definition of it?

At the end of the day, all you or I or anyone else can do is just listen and accept, even when you don't really think that it's a problem. Better to err on the side of caution than assume bad faith.

I don't agree with this principle. Yes, we should listen. We should try to understand. We should take it seriously. But we don't have to accept it as true just because someone makes a claim. Not all claims are true, and not necessarily anything to do with bad faith. Some are untrue due to bad premises and some due to faulty logic.

• Bad premises - the color red is racist. You should acknowledge this and stop wearing the color red. (Premise here is false).
• Bad logic - I saw Joe call the cops on a black kid trying to steal but let a white kid go home with a warning. Therefore, Joe is racist. (Correct Premise, but the conclusion doesn't necessarily follow from the premise.)

---- edit to add

Poop. I did mean to put this in first but stupid brain got it out of order. Bad brain. Must punish you with more alcohol.

I do apologize for the tone. I am really bad at that and I know I am. You are obviously really trying to understand and I'm a douche. Thank you for taking the message as it was meant.

Thanks, and at least you recognize and are working on it.

 

[Hussar]

I don't agree with this principle. Yes, we should listen. We should try to understand. We should take it seriously. But we don't have to accept it as true just because someone makes a claim. Not all claims are true, and not necessarily anything to do with bad faith. Some are untrue due to bad premises and some due to faulty logic.

I guess, for me, the problem is, how often are claims being made that are due to bad premises or faulty logic? Is it massively prevalent, or something that happens a few times? I don't know, but, my gut tells me that it's generally not all that prevalent. Typically people aren't getting worked up over nothing and most of the times, we can at least see the chain of logic (even if we don't agree with it personally).

So, to me, trying to police the few times where it might be faulty just results in road blocking all the times when the reasons are fine. Heck, look at the Oriental Adventures discussion going on right now. Whether you agree or not with whether OA is culturally insensitive or not, it's pretty clear that there is a reason to call it out as culturally insensitive. Or, rather, there are a number of reasons.

I find that with these discussions, so much time is spent just trying to "prove" that there is a problem to a sufficient degree to people who, frankly, don't appear to want to be convinced regardless of any evidence presented, that it just makes it so difficult to have a reasonable conversation without getting incredibly frustrated.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I guess, for me, the problem is, how often are claims being made that are due to bad premises or faulty logic? Is it massively prevalent, or something that happens a few times? I don't know, but, my gut tells me that it's generally not all that prevalent. Typically people aren't getting worked up over nothing and most of the times, we can at least see the chain of logic (even if we don't agree with it personally).

So, to me, trying to police the few times where it might be faulty just results in road blocking all the times when the reasons are fine. Heck, look at the Oriental Adventures discussion going on right now. Whether you agree or not with whether OA is culturally insensitive or not, it's pretty clear that there is a reason to call it out as culturally insensitive. Or, rather, there are a number of reasons.

I find that with these discussions, so much time is spent just trying to "prove" that there is a problem to a sufficient degree to people who, frankly, don't appear to want to be convinced regardless of any evidence presented, that it just makes it so difficult to have a reasonable conversation without getting incredibly frustrated.

I've been avoiding this thread (one dumpster fire at a time is all I can deal with) but you just nailed it.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

No offense, but how is anything Hexmage or OOfta or Imaculata said in those quotes proving your claim?

The claim is inherent evil + language used that connotes past atrocities = bad.

If that were actually the claim I had presented and intended to defend, then yes, you would be correct. It's not, and I really don't understand how you got that. Yes, that's a claim that has been made in this thread, but the specific point I was making--and which we had been discussing prior--was that many real, actual players actually do use orcs as no-thought KoS targets, to the point that that's essential to what "an orc" is as far as they're concerned.

In sequence as quoted:
Immaculata, speaking more broadly rather than necessarily of their own game, said, "Orcs are the stormtroopers of the D&D universe. They are evil, and only there to be chopped into pieces by the heroes, without us feeling to much over it." That's...literally exactly what I was telling you that people do. That people really, truly do just see orcs as Inherently Acceptable Targets, without even a fig-leaf justification.

Hexmage's core point is, as you said, that alignment is more critical to "what D&D is" than orcs. But, beneath that point, there is another: to make an orc not inherently evil is to weaken alignment, so if we must choose between non-evil orcs and no orcs, no orcs is preferable. Being inherently evil is implicitly essential to what an orc is; to remove their inherent evil is to weaken alignment; alignment is more important than orcs; therefore, if one must go, it should be orcs.

And Oofta is openly stating exactly what I spoke of: "I don't have a problem with evil monsters no matter what form they take or what fluff is given." How is that not an explicit "it doesn't matter how sapient or human-like a monstrous race is, if they're pure evil, they're pure evil, and that's fine."?

If you don't want to help, and just want to espouse that people should never use just evil orcs - then say it. Say, "No one should be allowed to have orcs that are just evil - even if the language is fixed."

Either way - be clear.

I mean, I do hold that opinion--or, rather, since you asked for clarity, "No one should intentionally have human-like sapient beings that are inherently aligned, whether good, evil, or something else"--but that's not the point I was making here. I was, very specifically, arguing against your point that almost nobody uses orcs et al. as "no need to think, just kill 'em" monsters. These quotes seem perfectly cromulent for demonstrating that point: that plenty of completely real people really do have sapient-looking beings that are Just Pure Evil, and thus there's never any reason to feel bad about killing them.

 

[Malmuria]

I've always been willing to provide an argument and listen to reactions. What I find sometimes is on some issues people are dismissive or get defensive. At the same time, one should realize that lived experience involves reactions and emotions that don't always resolve neatly into analytical arguments. Is this person staring at me like that because of my race, or because of some other reason? Is this person being rude to me and only to me because I'm the only person of color here? Etc. So being asked to constantly justify yourself in that way is exhausting, particularly for young people who might not have the exact vocabulary to explain.

 

[Bohandas]

How do I determine if something is racist/sexist/homophobic/etc?

This is really two questions
1.) Is it intended to single out people of* a certain ethnicity/sex/sexual orientation/etc to be treated differently?
and/or
2.) Does it depict people of* a specific ethnicity/sex/sexual orientation as all behaving in the same way or all having the same unusual traits**

If the answer to both is no than the answer to the overall question is no

*Or, more rarely, does it single out everyone NOT in a specific group
**excluding traits that are define membership in the group, such as attraction to the same sex for gay people

5. Are the acceptable/required actions changed depending on the race of person making the claim compared to my race?

No, that's racist. See question 1, above.

I guess, for me, the problem is, how often are claims being made that are due to bad premises or faulty logic? Is it massively prevalent, or something that happens a few times?

My personal belief is that bad premises and faulty logic are ubiquitous and all-pervasive on all sides of all of politics.

 

[Hussar]

My personal belief is that bad premises and faulty logic are ubiquitous and all-pervasive on all sides of all of politics.

Again, totally. I don't know about all-pervasive, but, certainly does make an appearance in all sides.

Now, as far as how to tell if something is racist or not, let me share an example from class today.

I was teaching fifth grade English in Japan. The reader for today's lesson was talking about sharks. Fine, cool. It's a good reader. But, it talks about how a whale shark is as large as a school bus. But, there's a problem here. Japanese (and Korean and many other countries too) have zero idea what a school bus is. They don't have them here. Everyone lives within walking distance of their school or takes public transportation if they don't.

So, is that racist or not? Is it culturally insensitive? Well, it's expecting the students to have knowledge of American schools. And, it causes confusion in my class as I then have to explain what a school bus is, then explain how big it is, then answer questions about why we have school buses and don't just walk to school. And isn't that weird? So on and so forth.

Instead the writers could just say that a whale shark is really big. Or, it's as big as a delivery truck if they insist on using a comparison. There are a hundred different things they could say that aren't tied to specific cultures.

Is it racist? No, let's be honest here. No one is possibly going to be offended by this. But, it is a kind of cultural imperialism. It's the sort of thing that ESL text writers have to be aware of because lack of awareness makes communication more difficult.

The same sort of thing is being talked about here. No one is saying that we can't have orcs or drow or Oriental Adventures or samurai or any other thing like that. There's nothing inherently wrong with any of these ideas. It's just that we need to be mindful of how these concepts are being presented so that they don't have negative consequences.

 

[Bohandas]

The truth is always relevant to some degree or other.
But brute physical facts are not the whole of what "the truth" is. If they were, a forum for discussing the conduct of a game whereby one conjures fictitious elves and bus-sized flying reptilian flamethowers would not exist, mostly because said game would not exist.
Some truths--indeed, a good number of the very important ones, I'd argue--both precede brute physical facts and will endure long after any particular set of brute physical facts has had its brute physicality ground to dust and entropy.
And so these three remain: Faith, Hope, and Love. And the greatest of these is Love.

Vanity of vanities, all is vanity

 

[Scott Christian]

If that were actually the claim I had presented and intended to defend, then yes, you would be correct. It's not, and I really don't understand how you got that. Yes, that's a claim that has been made in this thread, but the specific point I was making--and which we had been discussing prior--was that many real, actual players actually do use orcs as no-thought KoS targets, to the point that that's essential to what "an orc" is as far as they're concerned.

I mean, I do hold that opinion--or, rather, since you asked for clarity, "No one should intentionally have human-like sapient beings that are inherently aligned, whether good, evil, or something else"--but that's not the point I was making here. I was, very specifically, arguing against your point that almost nobody uses orcs et al. as "no need to think, just kill 'em" monsters. These quotes seem perfectly cromulent for demonstrating that point: that plenty of completely real people really do have sapient-looking beings that are Just Pure Evil, and thus there's never any reason to feel bad about killing them.

Good to know this is your stance, even if you leave a ton of wiggle room in your stance. I have no idea why you do, perhaps a debate tactic, but it is frustrating. Try using the terms the actual game we are discussing uses. Your semantic line is exactly what I am talking about - and have mentioned many times on this very thread.
D&D does not use the term "human-like sapient beings." It uses race. Use the term they give you. By switching the term, you loosen your claim and now have wiggle room to move. I feel it is probably some debate tactic you have picked up, but all it does it perpetuate arguments. You also have to add in "intentionally." Now that leaves room for you to say: "For this person it was okay, for this person it wasn't." And then the disclaimer at the end, "or something else." I mean, can you leave any more room to shift your decisions on the fly if someone points out some flaw in your argument. Again, this type of semantic malarky just perpetuates arguments - it does nothing to solve them.

Maybe an example is needed. Watch, here is mine: "In D&D, the DM gets to decide a race's alignment, the player decides their PC's."

See how absolutely clear that is. Now, if someone disagrees, we can specifically discuss why the DM gets to decide, why the player gets to decide, or why letting the DM decide is wrong, or why letting the player decide is wrong. And they can start out by saying: "In D&D, DMs should not have the ability to decide a race's alignment."

In sequence as quoted:
Immaculata, speaking more broadly rather than necessarily of their own game, said, "Orcs are the stormtroopers of the D&D universe. They are evil, and only there to be chopped into pieces by the heroes, without us feeling to much over it." That's...literally exactly what I was telling you that people do. That people really, truly do just see orcs as Inherently Acceptable Targets, without even a fig-leaf justification.

Hexmage's core point is, as you said, that alignment is more critical to "what D&D is" than orcs. But, beneath that point, there is another: to make an orc not inherently evil is to weaken alignment, so if we must choose between non-evil orcs and no orcs, no orcs is preferable. Being inherently evil is implicitly essential to what an orc is; to remove their inherent evil is to weaken alignment; alignment is more important than orcs; therefore, if one must go, it should be orcs.

And Oofta is openly stating exactly what I spoke of: "I don't have a problem with evil monsters no matter what form they take or what fluff is given." How is that not an explicit "it doesn't matter how sapient or human-like a monstrous race is, if they're pure evil, they're pure evil, and that's fine."?

So again, I will restate my claim. It is clear and concise. I have now stated it two or three times.

Again, I challenge you to find a player that kills orcs on sight without a lore motive or a character motive. It doesn't exist. This is why I said the statement is a misrepresentation.

Lore. Character Motive. That is why orcs are KoS. And that is what I said does not happen: tables killing orcs without a character or lore motive.

Once I said this, someone (maybe you) pointed out some DMs went through an enormous amount of work just to build lore that made the orcs evil so they could kill them. Yet, that doesn't disprove my claim in the least. It just says there is lore that makes them evil.

Again, if you disagree with this, that is fine. It is not how I have run or played in my campaigns since 2nd edition. Heck, we played Middle Earth Role Playing and had an orc in our party. Specifically, a Uruk-Hai. That was 30 years ago!