D&D (2024) What new jargon do you want to replace "Race"?

[Bill Zebub]

And if anything should be a kill on sight target, it should be a hag. (Which, I will point out, some look like people and are all evil.)

Boy bands are a close contender.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I won't look at NUTSR because I don't support people who are racist.

Just tropes that are racist.

But cursed by evil god is not a trope that equates to racism.

Except it is.

The whole point of calling a whole people racist in or out of stories is to make it morally acceptable within the framework of that 'evil' to do whatever you want to the people you've categorized as evil.

Now I get that you might like that trope and it might be a hard pill to swallow that something you like is, unbeknownest to you, racist, because you obviously are not racist, but by ignoring everyone pointing out the problem and rushing in to defend it, you are contributing to the problem.

Just examine the trope and its usage. Why would a writer create a group that is then labeled to be evil regardless of the excuse)? It's either to be fodder the audience isn't bothered by the hero harming, or to redeem them by having them turn against who they are and how they were born. Neither is a good look because it's not an okay thing to glorify anymore.

I'm sorry if you were a big fan of using it, but history marches on.

 

[Yaarel]

I feel like focusing on "free will" is a rabbit trail. The issue is fantasy races/species propagating real-world stereotypes and caricatures, whether or not fictional people have free will, if anyone can even define that, is besides the point.

In gaming context, "free will" refers to the ethical capacity to understand and choose any alignment.

To suggest some human ethnicities lack this capacity is inherently problematic.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

In the above example (the planar example) it is not all of a species. It is the species that exists on that plane. Since D&D is a menagerie of planes, then there are bound to be others of the species that are not cursed.

To reiterate, unfortunately, much like the racist trope is "our god cursed that other group to be evil" is different from "their own god made them so", it is "too close" to work. You mentionned that WotC will be confronted with the same problem down the road should they change a little thing only and I think you're right. Look at Paizo. They outright removed the existence of slavery overnight from their setting. They, correctly, analyzed that the topic is too touchy to be mentionned in a current product, so they obviously made the best choice (also, I invoke Beaumarchais on this), preferring to drop it than try to use it responsibly. I supposed the ship has also sailed where you could have "evil X" where X is not a gelatinous cube or a giant insect, something definitevely alien, in a published product targetted to mainstream audience.

I will state this again - no one here is saying that. It is a made-up argument. Most of the time, even when my group does encounter an evil species that is sentient, they don't kill it on sight. They haggled with an evil hag one session. And if anything should be a kill on sight target, it should be a hag. (Which, I will point out, some look like people and are all evil.)

True, but "always evil" also means irremediately evil. So, yes, they can be killed, not necessarily on sight as the made-up argument goes, (nothing precludes making with a bad guy for the greater good, as in your hag example) but if the need arise, for example because they are antagonists with a credible motivation designed to make the story interesting. While a human bandit, who is not "always evil" but acting evil, should be tried and be punished in a way that helps him reintegrate society as a better person, especially if he has he credible motivations, which might be giving exoneratory or extenuating circumstances. Killing people without trial, outside of self-defense, because they commit misdemeanors is evil-aligned and many players don't want to have to deal with morality (and just punch Nazis, who were "old-school archetype of unredeemably evil people"). So always evil have their use in fiction, for groups who eschew unnecessary killilng or vigilante killing as part of their role as agent of Good.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Just tropes that are racist.

Except it is.

The whole point of calling a whole people racist in or out of stories is to make it morally acceptable within the framework of that 'evil' to do whatever you want to the people you've categorized as evil.

Now I get that you might like that trope and it might be a hard pill to swallow that something you like is, unbeknownest to you, racist, because you obviously are not racist, but by ignoring everyone pointing out the problem and rushing in to defend it, you are contributing to the problem.

Just examine the trope and its usage. Why would a writer create a group that is then labeled to be evil regardless of the excuse)? It's either to be fodder the audience isn't bothered by the hero harming, or to redeem them by having them turn against who they are and how they were born. Neither is a good look because it's not an okay thing to glorify anymore.

I'm sorry if you were a big fan of using it, but history marches on.

People are reading way too much into a person's personal morality and ethics based on views of tropes. I can definitely see how you might find this trope racist, and I think someone using this trope to advance racist views in the real world would certainly be racist and morally bad, but I don't think a person feeling like the trope isn't the problem you think it is (or feeling it can work handled in certain ways) makes them racist (nor does it mean they like racist tropes). We used to be able to discuss media and disagree over analysis and meaning. Some people would see a particular trope as bad or good. And I do think it is fair for a company like WOTC, to err on the side of cautious because it has a large audience and a misunderstanding over a trope, could really harm their brand. But it is also enormously stifling for the arts and for gaming as a hobby when have let overly rigid attitudes about this stuff become almost like law. I don't know Scott Christian as a person and I only know some of his posts, but I wouldn't use his position in this discussion to formulate an opinion about him in the real world (beyond what kind of media he likes and whether I think his tastes are good or bad) and same for you. I don't think these things have been as objectively settled, nor do I believe they ever will be.

I personally don't like using evil orcs. Not on moral grounds. I just find evil orc worlds dull (I even find LOTR's a bit dull for this reason, despite otherwise enjoying the trilogy). But I get why some people might, in the context of a game, want a race of monsters they can mindlessly swing swords at for an evening to blow off steam. I don't think it comes from a dark place. It is probably cathartic. Anyone who has played a shoot em up can probably see why 'evil monster that needs to be killed' can work as a concept. It doesn't have to be nefarious.

 

[codo]

To reiterate, unfortunately, much like the racist trope is "our god cursed that other group to be evil" is different from "their own god made them so", it is "too close" to work. You mentionned that WotC will be confronted with the same problem down the road should they change a little thing only and I think you're right. Look at Paizo. They outright removed the existence of slavery overnight from their setting. They, correctly, analyzed that the topic is too touchy to be mentionned in a current product, so they obviously made the best choice (also, I invoke Beaumarchais on this), preferring to drop it than try to use it responsibly. I supposed the ship has also sailed where you could have "evil X" where X is not a gelatinous cube or a giant insect, something definitevely alien, in a published product targetted to mainstream audience.




True, but "always evil" also means irremediately evil. So, yes, they can be killed, not necessarily on sight (nothing precludes making with a bad guy for the greater good, as in your hag example) but if the need arise. While a human bandit, who is not "always evil" but acting evil, should be tried and be punished in a way that helps him reintegrate society as a better person. Killing people without trial, outside of self-defense, because they commit misdemeanors is evil-aligned and many players don't want to have to deal with morality (and just punch Nazis, who were "old-school archetype of always evil people"). So always evil have their use in fiction, for group who eschew killilng as part of their role as agent of Good.

I understand the impulse to want a nice clean, compartmentalized world. Where everything fits neatly into the compartments of good guy or bad guy. A world where you never need to make any difficult moral decisions. A world where you are free to loot and murder your way across the world without ever having to question the morality of what you are doing. One of the main reasons I can understand the desire for that kind of game is that I am a middle class, straight, middle aged white guy. I also understand the incredible amount of privilege in that position.

The game world I described is almost a textbook definition of Colonialism. What seems like a fun, mindless adventure when you are on the top rung of society looks a bit different from the bottom. People from a culture where they have a long history or foreigners coming to loot and murder there way across your county, might see it as a bit more than harmless fun.

 

[Bill Zebub]

It is not necessary for the official description of any monster to promote racist tropes in order for those who want inherently evil races to use them. Do people really think that just because WotC changes their description of orcs and drow, DMs all over the world are going to change how they DM?

These changes don’t stifle art in general or this hobby specifically. At all. They just leave it up to individual tables, while removing unnecessary and insensitive language from official descriptions.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

I understand the impulse to want a nice clean, compartmentalized world. Where everything fits neatly into the compartments of good guy or bad guy. A world where you never need to make any difficult moral decisions. A world where you are free to loot and murder your way across the world without ever having to question the morality of what you are doing. One of the main reasons I can understand the desire for that kind of game is that I am a middle class, straight, middle aged white guy. I also understand the incredible amount of privilege in that position.

The game world I described is almost a textbook definition of Colonialism. What seems like a fun, mindless adventure when you are on the top rung of society looks a bit different from the bottom. People from a culture where they have a long history or foreigners coming to loot and murder there way across your county, might see it as a bit more than harmless fun.

I am glad for you to have a group where meeting an opponent always involve making difficult ethical decision and accepting that they have become the evil they profess to fight just by running a published adventure as written, which most often provide credible enemy motivation but assumes fights will end with killing and not dealing with prisoners and what to do with them (and if they do bring them back to a town, question the morality of the local judicial system which might not be exactly giving them a fair trial). I think however that it is not a situation that fits the target audience of D&D so far, judging by published adventures. Reading this board, I was concinved that my group is probably among the most violence-eschewing groups, but even them, sometimes, would like to be able to have a lighter game (like a standard D&D adventure). But I totally agree that your group might be doing that even less.

 

[Incenjucar]

You can have the equivalent of the Fire Nation, where most of a culture has been brainwashed into supporting the evil overlords without having it be an inborn condition that can never change. Celestials fall and fiends rise, canonically and throughout actual mythology.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

For D&D to "work" it is best just accept that it is a brutal sword and sorcery world without well functioning enlightened judicial system, so somewhat decent people might actually choose to commit vigilante violence.