What We Lose When We Eliminate Controversial Content

[MGibster]

Now, you know, because you've been told MANY, MANY times, that including slavery could be an issue in your product. Not that it will, but, it could be. You're publishing the work. Do you simply ignore the complaints, publishing the work anyway, knowing that this issue is not acutally being dealt with in any meaningful way in your work, but, rather, is simply a prurient detail without any actual impact on the product?

Is the issue slavery or the is it that despite being mentioned in the scenario it won't come up in game play because the characters won't find this out?

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I would just prefer we work toward equality here. Having the knowledge necessary to write about a culture is more important, I think, than who the knowledgeable person is and where they come from.

When it comes to the treatments of marginalized minorities, an equal treatment is often an unfair one to the marginalized group. Which is why equitable solutions are more important than equal ones.

I'd say that someone that is descended from a certain group of people generally should be able to have a say in how their ancestors are portrayed, especially when they were historically marginalized and typical depictions of their ancestors have been riddled with bigoted stereotypes.

 

[Sepulchrave II]

Of course. But if you can't publish games with bad things in them because those bad things happened in the real world too, you're restricting the tools we have available for creativity.

Nobody is stopping you from publishing whatever you like. If the market does not support your product - for whatever reason - it's not the market's problem, it's yours. If you receive lots of criticism of your product, one reason might be that lots of people have taken offense at it.

Yes, lots of bad things have happened in the real world. Should gaming products include torture? Racial persecution? The systematic oppression of women? Mutilations? The marriage of twelve-year old girls to fifty-year old men?

If the answer is no, what makes slavery different?
If the answer is yes, what is the target audience for your product?

It seems to me that this nebulous "we" to which you refer is really about big publishers like WotC and Paizo not including slavery in their products. No-one is stopping you from including it in your games. No-one is stopping you from incorporating material from third-party publishers which describe it. No-one is stopping you from publishing a product which includes it.

How is it even remotely reasonable to expect the industry leader(s) to publish material which defies social and moral expectations, is found offensive by a great many people, will alienate parents, which will draw negative attention to their brand, and will impact their bottom line?

Because history? Do your games always comport with plausible social-historical models in all other areas? Have you eliminated nonhuman sapients, spells, dragons, flying castles and anachronistic weapons and armor?

If not, why not? Why is slavery different?

 

[QuentinGeorge]

When it comes to the treatments of marginalized minorities, an equal treatment is often an unfair one to the marginalized group. Which is why equitable solutions are more important than equal ones.

I'd say that someone that is descended from a certain group of people generally should be able to have a say in how their ancestors are portrayed, especially when they were historically marginalized and typical depictions of their ancestors have been riddled with bigoted stereotypes.

There is very few people alive in the world not “descended from a marginalised group” and I find it troubling that you think we should be using bloodlines as a sort of barometer to who gets to veto what.

 

[Hussar]

Is the issue slavery or the is it that despite being mentioned in the scenario it won't come up in game play because the characters won't find this out?

Does it make a difference?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

There is very few people alive in the world not “descended from a marginalised group”

This is true, but only trivially so. And that makes this:

and I find it troubling that you think we should be using bloodlines as a sort of barometer to who gets to veto what.

lose whatever rhetorical power you think it had.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

lots of bad things have happened in the real world. Should gaming products include torture? Racial persecution? The systematic oppression of women? Mutilations? The marriage of twelve-year old girls to fifty-year old men?

Other than child brides the Star Wars movies have all this and more. I've not heard an outcry that kids shouldn't watch those films. Perhaps the depth to which something is explored is as important as the topic itself.

 

[Kaodi]

Where is the trendline for the narrative around half-orcs going, the existence of which has very often implicitly referenced something extremely bad that could have actually happened to someone at your table? Will they continue to exist due to the de-evilfying of orcs?

 

[MGibster]

Does it make a difference?

Yes. My biggest issue is that it's a pet peeve of mine for adventures to include information the PCs are unlikely to ever come across. Probably something I picked up in the age of the metaplot back in the 1990s. But when it comes to slavery, I hear a lot of different opinions ranging from never use it, go ahead and use it, or it's okay to use it but do it right. In this particular case it doesn't seem to add anything to the scenario so why's it there? That would seem to be the problem. If it foreshadowed events to come in the scenario or if it was knowledge the PCs could use, would this make the inclusion of slavery more acceptable?

 

[Bagpuss]

Er, yes? What I'm not following is the assertion that since fantasy is just made-up, we can put slavery or bigotry or whatever in our fantasy worlds and it doesn't matter. I hope I'm misunderstanding, because "none of this matters, it's all make-believe" is a pretty startling claim coming from people in the TTRPG community. Stories are important and they mean things and that's part of why we play these games, no?

The reverse is actually what's true however.

You aren't putting slavery and bigotry into your fantasy world, since virtually all fantasy is based on our reality, what you are actually doing is taking slavery and bigotry out, and then acting like "none of this matters, it's all make-believe". In groups and out groups are so core to being human removing bigotry is like removing gravity and then pretending it has no effect on your fantasy world.