Elon Musk Calls for Wizards of the Coast to "Burn in Hell" Over Making of Original D&D Passages

Elon Musk, the owner of the app formerly known as Twitter, is calling on Wizards of the Coast and its parent company Hasbro to "burn in hell" for the publication of Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons. On November 21st, former gaming executive turned culture warrior Mark Hern posted several passages from Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons on Twitter, criticizing the book for providing context about some of the misogyny and cultural insensitivity found in early rulebooks. These passages were pulled from the foreword written by Jason Tondro, a senior designer for the D&D team who also worked extensively on the book. Hern stated that these passages, along with the release of the new 2024 Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide for D&D's "40th anniversary" (it is actually D&D's 50th anniversary) both "erased and slandered" Gary Gygax and other creators of Dungeons & Dragons.

In response, Musk wrote "Nobody, and I mean nobody, gets to trash E. Gary Gygax and the geniuses who created Dungeons & Dragons. What the [naughty word] is wrong with Hasbro and WoTC?? May they burn in hell." Musk had played Dungeons & Dragons at some point in his youth, but it's unclear when the last time he ever played the game.

Nobody, and I mean nobody, gets to trash E. Gary Gygax and the geniuses who created Dungeons & Dragons. What the [xxxx] is wrong with Hasbro and WoTC?? May they burn in hell.

- Elon Musk​

Notably, Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons contains countless correspondences and letters written by both Gygax and Dave Arneson, including annotated copies of early D&D rulesets. Most early D&D rules supplements as well as early Dragon magazines are also found in the book. It seems odd to contain one of the most extensive compliations of Gygax's work an "erasure," but it's unclear whether Hern or Musk actually read the book given the incorrect information about the anniversary.

Additionally, Gygax and Arneson are both credited in the 2024 Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide. The exact credit reads: "Building on the original game created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson and then developed by many others over the past 50 years." Wizards of the Coast also regularly collaborates with Gygax's youngest son Luke and is a participant at Gary Con, a convention held in Gygax's honor. The opening paragraph of the 2024 Player's Handbook is written by Jeremy Crawford and specifically lauds both Gygax and Arneson for making Dungeons & Dragons and contains an anecdote about Crawford meeting Gygax.

Musk has increasingly leaned into culture war controversies in recent years, usually amplifying misinformation to suit his own political agenda.

 

[SlyFlourish]

The part that the Musk fans are missing:
It's not about "shaming" Gary Gygax for being a bigot.
It's about acknowledging the bigotry in our hobby, so that we can do better going forward.

Do they not want to do better going forward?

Can I quote you on my show tomorrow?

 

[Bedrockgames]

Yes, my grandmother was born in 1928, my grandfather 1898, they were racists, there's no questioning it, they were also sexist, and homophobic, they might have been transphobic too, likely so, I just didn't come out soon enough to find out.

Does this make them monsters? in some ways yes. Does this make them unlovable? No, do I love my grandmother despite the fact I'm CERTAIN she would have rejected me when I come out? Yes.

Just because someone is older isn't an excuse. There are things I'm wrong about I'm sure, I don't know what they are yet, when I'm in my 60's I'll say something really horrible I"m sure of it. and It makes me a bad person for believing it now.

My point is just when a point of view is the norm for a time when someone grew up, that should shape your expectations a bit. My grandparents were born in the 10s and 20s. They had views on men and women that were old fashioned. Did it make them monsters? Not in my view. I don't think it made them misogynistic either. Their views on race were generally ahead of their times (but that I think largely came down to their personal experiences and backgrounds). I do think it is important to be understanding of the context of the times your elders grew up in. Doesn't excuse everything but it does excuse some things in my view. You can't expect a person born in the 30s to have the same worldview on these issues as someone born in the early 2000s

 

[EthanSental]

The book is on sale on Amazon today for $50…probably picking it up and reading it for myself. Our group probably wont play it cause it doesn’t appeal to our gaming style, which has evolved since we started in the late 80s.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Tondro and Peterson didn't call him a monster.

I never said they did. All I said about them was people can disagree with some or all of their critics. There is going to be differences of opinion over what content is and isn't problematic. I also said there is a tacit critique of his character in the text (because of the conscious misogyny comment)

 

[EzekielRaiden]

This is the kind of quote I would be inclined to be more skeptical of than some of the others. I commented on this one the last time it came up but I see a number of obvious, equally valid possible interpretations:

1) one he was a proud sexist
2) he was frustrated and said it in a moment of outrage
3) he was engaging in some form of hyperbole
4) he said it to provoke a reaction rather than express a genuine belief

I think people reading it as 1 is fair. But I also think the alternative are also fair readings.

My problem with 2 is that it doesn't square with the context. This was not "he was at a con, someone challenged him, and he went off." (Though even if he had, going off like that is still a Pretty Bad Look.) This was from either an interview or a self-submitted article (I had thought it was an interview, but it seems it was self-submitted content.) It would be...more than a little foolish to type out such a thing in a moment of outrage, and also put it in an envelope, address and stamp it, and send it off, all before cooling off and rethinking what he had said.

3 is a pretty serious problem because you can dismiss quite literally anything anyone ever says as "oh it was just hyperbole; they were joking." So I'm....really not willing to grant this unless we have very good reason to do so. Given Heidi's own statements saying that, yes, Gygax was sexist (with various explanations such as, paraphrasing, "he was raised that way" and "his dad was born in the 19th century" etc., and various "but he was also a good person!" excuses/dodges), it's pretty hard to accept 3 as a valid alternative.

As for 4? Here's the full text, from the actual EUROPA page.

What, exactly, is the reaction Gygax intended to incite, by saying such things as "Damn right I am a sexist." after saying that he could have added more women in the "'Raping and Pillaging' section" or that he could have included an additional "'Medieval Harems, Slave Girls, and Going Viking'" appendix? What reaction was he hoping for when he said, "[Women] can jolly well stay away from war-gaming in droves for all I care."?

Because I do not see how these words can be understood in any other way than that Gygax genuinely believed that women were uniquely and dramatically corrosive to wargaming and (male) wargamers; that the place for female characters in D&D was in the listed sexualized, victimized, vilified, and/or enslaved sections (actual or hypothetical); and that he himself was proudly sexist with regard to these things.

 

[Moon_Goddess]

My point is just when a point of view is the norm for a time when someone grew up, that should shape your expectations a bit. My grandparents were born in the 10s and 20s. They had views on men and women that were old fashioned. Did it make them monsters? Not in my view. I don't think it made them misogynistic either. Their views on race were generally ahead of their times (but that I think largely came down to their personal experiences and backgrounds). I do think it is important to be understanding of the context of the times your elders grew up in. Doesn't excuse everything but it does excuse some things in my view. You can't expect a person born in the 30s to have the same worldview on these issues as someone born in the early 2000s

I was born in the 1970's What things should I be excused on that you wouldn't excuse of someone born in the 2000's? 2010's? Now?

 

[CleverNickName]

Can I quote you on my show tomorrow?

Absolutely.

 

[Steampunkette]

I think some people are suggesting something like that. Not everyone. But the post I was responding to didn't just call him a sexist, it suggested he was deeply sexist, as well as racist and an anti-semite. Those are pretty charged labels.

Because people don't like being called sexists or racists or antisemites.

Not because they don't want to BE sexists or racists or antisemites. They just don't want to be confronted with it. Which is why our culture is one that constantly, gleefully, eagerly makes excuses for people being bigots.

"He was a product of his time" is the perfect example that you keep jumping back to. It's not a full throated "He wasn't sexist" defense. It's a "Well we have to adjust what we consider to be sexist for that time period and general social development and current power dynamics of the early 2000s..."

And it provides -just- enough plausible deniability for some people to discredit the rest.

But Gary Gygax was a sexist. Doesn't matter if you try to wind the clock back and pretend like it's the 1960s, he was a sexist. He was called out by other people of his own age in his own time and acknowledged he was a sexist.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Yes, it absolutely does. It explicitly rejects the possibility that someone can judge what someone did or said based on books (written by or about them, it doesn't specify) or interviews. That's a value judgment: "Your opinion does not, and cannot, matter if it is only based on these things."

Which, where I come from, would be called a load of horse...pucky.

Honestly, I think you're wrong. It feels to me like you read a statement that you disagree with, then immediately assigned characteristics to it, based on some primal aspects of your experiences. From past conversations with you, I feel that this is not your nature.

I straight up feel that you misread this situation. I don't know anything about the person you disagreed with, but all I saw was an opinion being put forward that warranted some back and forth, but you went in guns a blazing instead. Just my opinion... feel free to ignore it. I read what you read though, and saw the opportunity for discussion rather than putting my shield up is all I'm saying.

 

[Bedrockgames]

My problem with 2 is that it doesn't square with the context. This was not "he was at a con, someone challenged him, and he went off." (Though even if he had, going off like that is still a Pretty Bad Look.) This was from either an interview or a self-submitted article (I had thought it was an interview, but it seems it was self-submitted content.) It would be...more than a little foolish to type out such a thing in a moment of outrage, and also put it in an envelope, address and stamp it, and send it off, all before cooling off and rethinking what he had said.

3 is a pretty serious problem because you can dismiss quite literally anything anyone ever says as "oh it was just hyperbole; they were joking." So I'm....really not willing to grant this unless we have very good reason to do so. Given Heidi's own statements saying that, yes, Gygax was sexist (with various explanations such as, paraphrasing, "he was raised that way" and "his dad was born in the 19th century" etc., and various "but he was also a good person!" excuses/dodges), it's pretty hard to accept 3 as a valid alternative.

As for 4? Here's the full text, from the actual EUROPA page.

What, exactly, is the reaction Gygax intended to incite, by saying such things as "Damn right I am a sexist." after saying that he could have added more women in the "'Raping and Pillaging' section" or that he could have included an additional "'Medieval Harems, Slave Girls, and Going Viking'" appendix? What reaction was he hoping for when he said, "[Women] can jolly well stay away from war-gaming in droves for all I care."?

Because I do not see how these words can be understood in any other way than that Gygax genuinely believed that women were uniquely and dramatically corrosive to wargaming and (male) wargamers; that the place for female characters in D&D was in the listed sexualized, victimized, vilified, and/or enslaved sections (actual or hypothetical); and that he himself was proudly sexist with regard to these things.

My honest assessment of it, is it is most likely 2, because he had been receiving this criticism of his writing and blew up about it. People blow up all the time in angry letters and interviews. We see people blow up in forum threads like this all the time. It certainly strikes me as a highly provocative way of stating it. I am not saying none of this reflected his real beliefs, I am saying I think most of it was probably stuff he said in anger or to provoke a reaction because he was fed up with the criticism. Possible I am wrong for sure. I tend to take more charitable and forgiving views of people. And I often attribute highly inflammatory statements to rage rather than deeply held worldviews