Oriental Adventures, was it really that racist?

[Hussar]

I really would NOT be so sure about that! If you SELL me an ePub, the First Sale Doctrine would seem, ON THE FACE OF IT, to still apply. OTOH if you 'license' it to me, there are still serious questions. That is, if the licensing is essentially a sham, if the transaction has all the character of a sale, many courts have held that it "quacks like a duck" and again the same doctrine holds. That is far from universal, and what any given court would rule is difficult to foretell. Still, you can easily argue there's a CONTRACTUAL issue, but not a copyright violation, which is a lot easier to deal with. Also, what are the damages, $29.95? Trebled?! Wow!

Fair enough. I was more talking about the libraries. Resale of epubs is not something I know a great deal about.

My point was that not being available for sale does not mean unavailable.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I have to say that a lot of the purpose of this discussion eludes me. There seems to be a broad consensus that OA is problematic, at least by modern standards, and that Lovecraft was hella racist. I am not really sure that it is super helpful to try to pinpoint in some sort of scientific accuracy exactly how problematic or how much hella racist. These things are nebulous and somewhat subjective, and if we zoom close enough we can always find some minuscule definitional thing to disagree and bicker about. But why would we need to do that?

 

[Alzrius]

These things are nebulous and somewhat subjective, and if we zoom close enough we can always find some minuscule definitional thing to disagree and bicker about. But why would we need to do that?

Because too often, there's a sense that if you don't condemn something in the strongest terms possible, then you're tacitly acting as an apologist for it. That's an extreme position which eschews nuance, scorns compromise, and further inflames division. Bad things are bad, but some bad things are worse than others, and there's value in not losing sight of that. As someone else once said, that's why we have three degrees of burns, four degrees of murder, and six degrees of Kevin Bacon.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I have read them. But it has been a while like I said. And again, I am not defending his views. Again, read what I said. I feel like I am seeing a caricature of the point I was trying to make.

Also just to ground this in some common point, this is the wikipedia entry on H.P. Lovecraft's views on race:



That isn't much different from things I was stating. My point wasn't that he wasn't racist, or that it isn't present in the works. It was that his racism was a specific brand of New England Racism (which was directed at just about anyone who wasn't English), that his views are not always easy to pin down because they shifted over time and he was a troubled man, and that his works are more complicated than just being products of that racism). I can hold in my head the idea that Lovecraft was racist, while also understanding the works have value beyond that, that you can enjoy them despite the racism, and that he is a very complicated human being.

And on the point of miscegenation, yes I find miscegenation appalling (both because I am in an interracial marriage and a product of unions Lovecraft would have considered miscegenation. That doesn't mean I can't also enjoy the horror stories he wrote, or that I can't see them in numerous lights (i.e. not reduce every story to racial issues). I live in New England. I like reading the works of New England horror authors. Again the most recent story I read, which is something of an atypical Lovecraft story but it is the one I remember best at the moment, is Herbert West-Reanimator. There is racism in that story, it is definitely there for sure. But there are other themes. The core idea of the story can easily be told without the racism for example.

Right, I clearly also enjoy the literature. All I'm saying is, there's not much in HPL that isn't touched by his unfortunate views on race. I agree there are other themes, though the core theme of alienation and otherness that his works evoke seems rather tied to the racial beliefs, or they appear to arise at least from a common sense of insecurity. Honestly, the primary impression I get from Lovecraft is that the man was extremely insecure! He was clearly not fully capable of functioning independently in the world. To be blunt he was a very weird and fundamentally alienated person. Probably one of the things that attracted me to his writing is an identification with that element. I'd not disagree that part of the reason he may have expressed it in the terms he did, as racism, is probably rooted in the environment where he grew up. This would also tend to help account for the very commonness of his sentiments. His affectation of a set of opinions which seems to identify him with a local cultural elite works here too, his attitudes align him with (at least in his mind, if not actually) with the upper echelons of Boston society of his time.

Did he evolve? Gosh there are some pretty vile quotes from letters he wrote in at least the late 20's. Perhaps he mellowed out some? I don't know, but his later mythos stories seem as bigoted as the earlier ones, so its hard to say in what way that is. Generously the way you interpret Lovecraft IMHO is that he just saw a monstrous reality EVERYWHERE around him, and attributed its horror to a range of causes, of which racial degeneracy was a very easy one. I mean, he's also got a bad opinion of every remote part of the Earth. Heck, as far as I can tell from biographical reading he really was virtually unable to leave his own residence, certainly not for an extended period of time. It appears he ONCE went to New York City for a fairly short period and then abandoned his wife, permanently, so he could run home. So, perhaps we can be less hard on the guy than on nasty self-serving racists who's views seem largely to have been held because it gave them access to power. Thus, yes, in a way I feel sorry for the guy, but he was still a bigot, and that's still on him.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't think it's "less clear" at all. It also doesn't matter.

We have made huge gains in how we view race, culture, and ethnicity since Lovecraft's time, to be sure. But the idea that his level of racism was common . . . . nah. And even if that were true, that it somehow lessens the harm of it . . . . nah.

But, again, it doesn't matter. I don't live in Lovecraft's time. I live today. I'm going to judge the man and his work by today's standards, because that's when I'm going to read his stories, or stories based on his work, or play games based on the mythos.

Back to Oriental Adventures . . . .

Same with OA. I understand that Zeb Cook was a pretty good guy whose intent was to celebrate and include Asian representation in D&D. The racism in OA was unintentional and carried over systematic racism embedded in our society at the time, rather than Cook's own prejudices. We weren't having the conversations back then about race and culture that we are having today, thanks to social media and the BLM movement.

But I'm still going to judge the book by today's standards, and decide how I'm going to react to it by today's standards. Because that's when I live, today.

EDIT: Added in some "Back to Oriental Adventures" commentary, and also . . . . . Well, I was alive and playing D&D back in '88. How I view the title has changed over time and is different from my 16-year-old self . . . because times have changed, and so have my views.

Its a very good general point. I DO judge these things by today's standards. Not to say I want to go back to 1985 or 1935 and do that, but we are in 2022 now, and that's where people are being exposed to it today. It isn't about vilifying people from the past, especially, but just labeling their works for what they ARE TODAY. In the case of Lovecraft mostly rife with racist views. In the case of OA just kind of awkwardly mired in some negative stereotypes, etc. So, Zeb Cook (whom I believe is still around, though I understand he hasn't really commented and is not particularly active in the RPG world these days) I haven't any reason to say anything against. At worst he seems to have done his best, at least he approached his material with a loving attitude. HPL? Who cares? He's long gone!

 

[Bedrockgames]

Right, I clearly also enjoy the literature. All I'm saying is, there's not much in HPL that isn't touched by his unfortunate views on race. I agree there are other themes, though the core theme of alienation and otherness that his works evoke seems rather tied to the racial beliefs, or they appear to arise at least from a common sense of insecurity. Honestly, the primary impression I get from Lovecraft is that the man was extremely insecure! He was clearly not fully capable of functioning independently in the world. To be blunt he was a very weird and fundamentally alienated person. Probably one of the things that attracted me to his writing is an identification with that element. I'd not disagree that part of the reason he may have expressed it in the terms he did, as racism, is probably rooted in the environment where he grew up. This would also tend to help account for the very commonness of his sentiments. His affectation of a set of opinions which seems to identify him with a local cultural elite works here too, his attitudes align him with (at least in his mind, if not actually) with the upper echelons of Boston society of his time.

Did he evolve? Gosh there are some pretty vile quotes from letters he wrote in at least the late 20's. Perhaps he mellowed out some? I don't know, but his later mythos stories seem as bigoted as the earlier ones, so its hard to say in what way that is. Generously the way you interpret Lovecraft IMHO is that he just saw a monstrous reality EVERYWHERE around him, and attributed its horror to a range of causes, of which racial degeneracy was a very easy one. I mean, he's also got a bad opinion of every remote part of the Earth. Heck, as far as I can tell from biographical reading he really was virtually unable to leave his own residence, certainly not for an extended period of time. It appears he ONCE went to New York City for a fairly short period and then abandoned his wife, permanently, so he could run home. So, perhaps we can be less hard on the guy than on nasty self-serving racists who's views seem largely to have been held because it gave them access to power. Thus, yes, in a way I feel sorry for the guy, but he was still a bigot, and that's still on him.

I agree with most of this. The guy definitely had issues. It is one of the things that makes is writing compelling I think (I am no psychologist, and I certainly can relate to a provincial attitude you might develop living in New England, but his inability to function and to exist in other places, suggests serious mental health issues to me). That kind of mind is probably why he was so good at taking mundane things and making them eerie. Though I do have to wonder, given that he died of intestinal cancer, if the inability to travel away from his home was in any way related to physical health issues. This would be pure speculation on my part but if he had say, untreated celiac disease (which mostly would have gone untreated in those days except for the banana diet), that supposedly increases the risk of cancer in the small intestine. And, it can also do a number on you mentally because your body isn't getting all the nutrients it needs when you aren't treating an illness like that. Again pure speculation, but dying so young from that particular form of cancer makes me wonder if there was an existing condition that not only explains the cancer but some of his peculiarities.

In terms of how much he evolved, I am no expert on that. My impression is he had moments later in life where he may have nudged away from some of his more extreme views. I could be wrong. And he died young, importantly prior to full scale revelations about Nazi Germany and the end of WWII, so it is hard to know how he would have come out on the other end of that (if it would have led to him re-evaluating some of his ideas about race and ethnicity). I've read articles that say he did evolve, I have read articles that say he didn't. I have seen indications of growth but also seen pretty wild statements later in his life.

 

[Hussar]

Something to keep in mind too is that there is a spectrum of reactions from “do nothing” to “burn every single copy of the work and destroy it utterly”.

Obviously disclaimers are closer to the do nothing end of the spectrum. But it’s an ongoing process. Do disclaimers do the job? Well, time will tell. They raise awareness and spur conversation so on some level they are successful.

I would much rather we start at the minimum end than not though. It’s like medicine. It’s much better to start at the weakest end of the choice of medicine and work your way up rather than start at the strongest and work downward.

It appears that disclaimers seem to be doing the trick in this case. It’s minimally invasive while still satisfying most people’s concerns.

Are there still grumbles from the ends? Sure. That’s all part of the conversation. And maybe later we will change things again.

But I’d much rather they start small and work their way up.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It is certainly not the case that the suppression was mostly from state action (aka, government) in the 80s and 90s. Just like today, sporadic attempts to get state action involved would almost always get shot down by the courts.* Instead, it was continual fighting regarding pressuring private actors to suppress speech.

I get what you're saying, but I don't really agree that it's true, except in the sense that it's usually more the threat of government action than actual legislation. That's never not been true though.

Apart from MADD, which was largely unsuccessful in its goals, despite pretences by both MADD and D&D players that they were successful, everything I'm aware of only actually started to get any real traction once the government got involved. Music is a good example - when it was just ageing moaners complaining about "That Heavy Metal!", there was no actual impact in most places (and where there was, it was linked to the culture of the area and not something that could be legislated in either direction). Whereas when the explicit lyrics warnings and so on came in, that very much down to the government getting involved, and the RIAA deciding they'd better do something before the government did. Of course that too was a hilarious backfire (if the RIAA even ever intended it to work!) as what label could possibly be more enticing? The logo even looks awesome, and I do not think that was an accident.

I also don't agree at all that attempts to invoke "free speech" were terribly effective in fighting against any of this stuff. I've seen nearly-zero evidence to support that. I mean, obviously I wasn't there, but none of the documentaries and so on I've watched or stuff I've read seems to suggest that had any real impact. What people listen to is the dollar. If people keep buying heavy metal, mainstream retailers aren't going to pull it.

As an aside, I know we can't discuss "politics", but right now, this very minute, the US has a huge problem with people attempting to prevent discussion of certain issues, and actively trying pull books from libraries and schools (kinda funny given the internet exists, I know), and even to burn those books in some cases. And it's pretty much the same people as MADD, and they're absolutely utilizing governmental/hierarchical power (rather than voting with their feet or their dollars), in this case local governmental and school boards and stuff to do this. If they weren't it wouldn't be an issue. And it's rather different to what people seem so worried about here.

 

[MGibster]

I have to say that a lot of the purpose of this discussion eludes me. There seems to be a broad consensus that OA is problematic, at least by modern standards, and that Lovecraft was hella racist. I am not really sure that it is super helpful to try to pinpoint in some sort of scientific accuracy exactly how problematic or how much hella racist.

I'm not really sure it's all that useful to pinpoint how racist Lovecraft was either. When I disagree that he was particularly racist for his era it isn't to excuse him, but simply to point out that his era is considered by many historians to be the nadir of race relations following the Civil War. As vile as Lovecraft's opinions were, he opinions would have been shared by millions of his contemporaries.

Overall, I think we're still trying to figure out how to come to terms with the problematic nature of the stories that we enjoyed and have continued to influence us. A few years ago, the common refrain was "It's okay to like something that's problematic just so long as you recognize it's problematic," but it appears as though we're moving in a direction where that's no longer true. I say "it appears," because on this message board I've seen people mention that Lovecraft doesn't belong in a school's library, that his work shouldn't appear in any game's bibliography, and of course that OA shouldn't even be sold today. So I guess the purpose of this thread is this: How do we come to terms with the problematic nature of past works?

I wonder if part of the reasons behind these discussions is that past works are more easily accessible today than they were just a few years ago. I went and saw The Monster Squad with my family when it was in theaters in 1987. Around 2018, I saw that it was on Netflix and decided to give it a watch. After 31 years, about the only thing I could really remember was that Wolfman had nards, but while watching it on Netflix, I was surprised when one of the students went off on a homophobic rant about their principle (or teacher). I also made note of Horace, maybe aged 13 in the movie, was toting a shotgun which he used to kill the Fishman. I don't know if you'd find many movies aimed at children where a kid gets ahold of a firearm to defend themselves with these days. And then there was Dracula, who was far more menacing than I remember. Dude straight up tries to murder the kids by throwing a stick of dynamite in their treehouse. Without Netflix, I never would have watched The Monster Squad in 2018. I would have remembered the movie through the hazy lens of 11 year old me versus the much older me who had a different perspective on things. Likewise, I don't know if we'd be having this discussion about OA if it weren't so easily accessible now.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I have to say that a lot of the purpose of this discussion eludes me. There seems to be a broad consensus that OA is problematic, at least by modern standards, and that Lovecraft was hella racist. I am not really sure that it is super helpful to try to pinpoint in some sort of scientific accuracy exactly how problematic or how much hella racist. These things are nebulous and somewhat subjective, and if we zoom close enough we can always find some minuscule definitional thing to disagree and bicker about. But why would we need to do that?

There is an Other, and it must be defeated.