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.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Anyway, yeah. I hate that we're still fighting this fight to get people to even acknowledge that the man was sexist. Imagine being so invested in a person through cult of personality that even the suggestion he had flaws is responded to by bending over backwards and tying oneself into knots is reasonable to excuse literally any behavior they engaged in that wasn't 100% socially acceptable.

I think you are attributing motives that aren't necessarily there. I try to give a fair reading to any person and to any statement attributed to them. I am not saying you have to agree with my assessment, but what I have said on the topic here is just my honest reading of what he said, what I have seen other people say about him, etc. People genuinely can have different responses to the same texts. Also just to shift this to the foreword itself, by the same token, I don't have any particularly negative response to the writers of the foreword. I think they are taking a very common academic approach to reading media, and don't think they are coming from a malicious place. By the standards of a lot of media analysis, the foreword is pretty tame and standard. I just disagree with a lot of that type of analysis (especially when it comes to interpreting things like various -isms in use of language or humor). What I would hope for is a civil back and forth on the topic. So I am not a fan of either telling the critics they will burn in hell, or of people dismissing folks who reject the forewords critique or try to defend Gygax's character. Like I said earlier, no one is going anywhere, we all have to co-exist in the same hobby at the end of the day.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Is that a serious question?

I certainly would ask it earnestly. Do you think Musk's question--the thing that kicked off this thread--is tolerant? Do you think it is a reasonable and appropriate response?

And, as a kicker, do you think that that might set a tone for the conversation?

Who is treating you like an enemy? It kind of feels like an attitude that perpetuates conflict to me.

I mean, Elon Musk explicitly is so. We've already had at least one person red-texted for falling in the same general camp. And there is a clear and concerted push against ever allowing criticism of Gygax to just...stand. That it has to, 100% of the time, always be tempered by lengthy explanations of how he was actually a super good person and a wonderful father and a loving husband and totally helped some early women in the industry (without any comments on what those women themselves said about their employment, as Steampunkette has noted).

It's not hard to feel you're being silenced when someone tells you you're never allowed to actually express a simple negative opinion, but everyone else is always allowed to express their positive opinions. Which they do. Frequently, and without any demand for nuance.

Your position seems a bit... militaristic.

Not touching this with a ten foot pole. I hope you understand why such an accusation is, itself, a form of labelling someone as an enemy.

A bit black and white.

How can it be "a bit" black and white? Either there are shades of grey or there are not. I don't really understand how it is possible to be slightly absolutist.

Devoid of nuance.

So, here's the thing. I've said this a few times, and neither you nor @Bedrockgames has bitten. Why is it you only ask for nuance in threads that involve negative statements about an influential person?

We've had dozens, probably hundreds of threads this year where Gary Gygax has been either the core topic, extremely relevant to the core topic, or coming up as an important but secondary reference while discussing the core topic. Not one single one of those threads, to the best of my knowledge, included even a hint of a whisper of a suggestion of an idea of discussing Gygax's views on women (or any other hot-button issues, for that matter.) At no point, in any of those threads, did anyone currently calling for "nuance" demand that we make room for greater criticism because, for all the good Gygax did, he also did some bad.

So. Why the asymmetry? Why is nuance only required when discussing the bad side? Why is it we not only can have, not only do have, but almost exclusively get threads that talk about the positive? Or at absolute worst, do something like "Was Gary's impact overblown?"/"Did Dave do more than Gary?" etc. Why don't those threads need more nuance, but this thread does?

Why can't we have the rare, occasional thread where we just talk about the bad, and leave the discussion of the good for the dozens of other threads?

You're being a bit coy about what you're actually trying to communicate for some reason, but the whiff of what's coming across is unpleasant frankly.

I cannot speak for them, but I can speak for me.

Demands for "nuance" are one of the most common tactics for preventing others from ever actually discussing criticisms of bad behavior. "Nuance" is an almost magic word that transmutes any criticism into praise, with the negative being banished to the furthest corners, downplayed, diluted, re-framed, etc., until no substantive criticism remains. Notice how every piece of evidence is dismissed as being a joke, or being hyperbole, or conflicting with anecdote or rumor, or being incorrect because it doesn't come from alleged authority figures on the topic ("friends and family"), or having more than one possible interpretation. The net effect is that no criticism is ever allowed. All criticism gets dismissed as "uncharitable" or "hearsay" or "well you don't KNOW that it could ONLY be that, therefore you can never claim that it was."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be against intolerance... unless you're presented with something you disagree with, then your intolerance is justified.

Again, the so-called paradox of intolerance is only when you view the tolerator as somehow violating a right or privilege of the intolerant. That's a very weird way to view it. The tolerator is, in most cases, quite passive--tolerance is about allowing things, or occasionally promoting things, not about forcing things. This goes wrong when the intolerant person does something which causes harm, or contributes to it. It is a generally accepted principle of morality, for (I would argue) essentially all human beings barring personality disorders like ASPD, that people in general are obliged to prevent harm when they are reasonably able to do so.

For example, intentionally killing another human being is usually the crime of murder--but if you were defending your own life or the life of another, and took every reasonable step you could to protect that life short of killing before reluctantly taking that final step, that is an essentially-universally accepted defense. Not because it is somehow now okay to take human lives, but because with these caveats, we recognize that the taking of a life was not criminal. Why is it that nobody talks about the "paradox of murder," that to kill a murderer before they can murder someone else isn't murder? It's exactly the same logic! Somehow (nearly) everyone clearly groks the issue when it's a much more dramatic and serious one, but starts waxing lyrical and philosophic when it is a far, far lesser issue.

An intolerant viewpoint or belief that is not shared, or that is shared but only in private company to others who share it or don't care either way, does no harm and in general contributes to no harm (though there may be cases where it does, I doubt there is any method to address them that would not be more harmful). An intolerant viewpoint or belief that is openly expressed in public both causes and invites harm. The tolerant person is not obligated to just accept harm caused nor harm invited. The whole point of tolerance is to avoid harm caused/invited.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I think you are attributing motives that aren't necessarily there. I try to give a fair reading to any person and to any statement attributed to them.

There is a vast difference between giving a fair reading, and always defaulting to the maximally friendly reading no matter what, regardless of all other evidence or information to the contrary.

Giving a "fair reading" to a defendant does not mean rejecting every single piece of evidence, every single claimant, every single possible option as always being the most favorable to that defendant. It means not presuming their guilt before seeing the evidence.

What I would hope for is a civil back and forth on the topic.

We cannot have a civil back-and-forth when one side continuously re-interprets every piece of evidence as being inadmissable, unacceptable, invalid, or "out of context."

That is one side having already declared what their verdict is--blamelessness--and then ensuring that, no matter what, the burden of proof remains too high to ever be crossed. That is inherently an uncivil discussion.

 

[Steampunkette]

I think you are attributing motives that aren't necessarily there. I try to give a fair reading to any person and to any statement attributed to them. I am not saying you have to agree with my assessment, but what I have said on the topic here is just my honest reading of what he said, what I have seen other people say about him, etc. People genuinely can have different responses to the same texts. Also just to shift this to the foreword itself, by the same token, I don't have any particularly negative response to the writers of the foreword. I think they are taking a very common academic approach to reading media, and don't think they are coming from a malicious place. By the standards of a lot of media analysis, the foreword is pretty tame and standard. I just disagree with a lot of that type of analysis (especially when it comes to interpreting things like various -isms in use of language or humor). What I would hope for is a civil back and forth on the topic. So I am not a fan of either telling the critics they will burn in hell, or of people dismissing folks who reject the forewords critique or try to defend Gygax's character. Like I said earlier, no one is going anywhere, we all have to co-exist in the same hobby at the end of the day.

I deleted that piece of my post within a minute of writing it because it felt too much like a personal attack.

You disregarded everything else in my post in order to tackle the piece that I cut so early that the post doesn't even have the "Post edited" time stamp. Either you're a -very- fast reader who was deeply offended, or the rest of the post held absolutely no interest because it was evidence and information while this one piece, the piece I cut off my post, was useful to present me as uncivil and thus "The Problem" in the discussion.

Clearly, I was right to cut that piece off my post.

 

[Bedrockgames]

So, here's the thing. I've said this a few times, and neither you nor @Bedrockgames has bitten. Why is it you only ask for nuance in threads that involve negative statements about an influential person?

I feel like I tried to address this post elsewhere. I generally want nuance on anything. But I suppose because the negative statements are more damaging and harmful. Part of it is I dislike how the internet impacts peoples reputations in negative ways. If we were part of a group writing a historical biography of Gygax, I would expect nuance (though I think I would also be out of step with a lot of the thinking some of the other writers might have about how to prioritize a person's moral failing and how to find them in their writing). On a forum where we are talking about someone who was still around in my lifetime, and whose relatives and colleagues are still part of the hobby, I take much less of that historian mindset and and more concerned about the state and condition of the hobby itself. But to be clear, I never said people can't be critical. In most of these threads, I've said it isn't the criticisms that I mind. I expect there to be people with negative criticisms of the game, its designers, etc. What troubles me is, the critique itself almost becomes sacred or considered a priori true (and I think the critiques often do lack nuance). You tend to get hammered if you don't agree with this kinds of critiques of games and media. So I can often come across as very contrarian

 

[Bedrockgames]

There is a vast difference between giving a fair reading, and always defaulting to the maximally friendly reading no matter what, regardless of all other evidence or information to the contrary.

Giving a "fair reading" to a defendant does not mean rejecting every single piece of evidence, every single claimant, every single possible option as always being the most favorable to that defendant. It means not presuming their guilt before seeing the evidence.


We cannot have a civil back-and-forth when one side continuously re-interprets every piece of evidence as being inadmissable, unacceptable, invalid, or "out of context."

That is one side having already declared what their verdict is--blamelessness--and then ensuring that, no matter what, the burden of proof remains too high to ever be crossed. That is inherently an uncivil discussion.

I skimmed the post and that stuck out at me. I responded with the intention of going back and seeing if there was anything to say on the rest of the post (keep in mind I don't always respond to eery point, that doesn't mean I am ignoring them....sometimes i just don't have a response right away to something a person says)

 

[Bedrockgames]

I deleted that piece of my post within a minute of writing it because it felt too much like a personal attack.

You disregarded everything else in my post in order to tackle the piece that I cut so early that the post doesn't even have the "Post edited" time stamp. Either you're a -very- fast reader who was deeply offended, or the rest of the post held absolutely no interest because it was evidence and information while this one piece, the piece I cut off my post, was useful to present me as uncivil and thus "The Problem" in the discussion.

Clearly, I was right to cut that piece off my post.

Having re-read that section. I think we have gone back and forth on these points already. You clearly state your position in an organized way, but I don't think it is helpful for me to weigh in again on those thoughts (which again doesn't mean I am ignoring your post, I just think it is fine to leave you with the last word on that part of the argument)

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I say this because I don't think there is any way that a Biblical story from many thousands of years ago has an echo into today's world.

Still don't see it, but I will take your word for it!

If they won't say it, I will:

You realize that for approximately 35% of humanity currently recognizes the Bible (in one form or another) as their holy text. That's not a question, it's a presumption, because I genuinely do not believe you couldn't be aware that Christianity is one of the most widely-held religions on Earth.

You further realize--again, I presume--that that 35% of humanity considers the Bible (in one form or another) an extraordinarily important, necessary, and indeed sacred document, which contains both a diverse array of profound wisdom, and extremely important guidance for life, in both moral judgment and pragmatic judgment. They of course vary on exactly how important it is, but the vast majority of them consider it one of the most important documents ever written.

So, to claim that there could not, even in theory, be something applicable about a section of the Bible, to anyone ever in the present day, is pretty blatantly dismissing fundamental religious beliefs of approximately 35% of humanity. (Arguably more, if you consider that the Qur'an recognizes many of the Judeo-Christian prophets, including Jesus albeit not as Messiah, they just see the Qur'an as the superseding enlightenment, if you'll pardon the incredibly lame law pun.) "I don't see how your holy text could be even remotely applicable to modern-day people" is not exactly a positive or friendly stance to take.

 

[Bedrockgames]

There is a vast difference between giving a fair reading, and always defaulting to the maximally friendly reading no matter what, regardless of all other evidence or information to the contrary.

Giving a "fair reading" to a defendant does not mean rejecting every single piece of evidence, every single claimant, every single possible option as always being the most favorable to that defendant. It means not presuming their guilt before seeing the evidence.

First off, I don't see this as a trial of Gygax. The man isn't on trial for anything, and I never view examining a person's statement as if I am a member of a jury trying to assign guilt. I see the point of examining the quotes as understanding what he meant and who he was as a person. Second, I have said I found some of his posts to be a bit sexist. Others I have found to be more in the realm of hyperbole or humor. I'm also accounting for other aspects of the guy when I interpret this stuff. I generally do take a more charitable view of people when I am trying to understand them, because I think that can often give much more clear insight into who people are (and it is probably also a product of how I view people in general). But this is simply the way I engage with primary source material. I want to understand where the person was coming from. In a lot of the statements in questions, there seems to be frustrating and emotion behind many of the sentiments. Now you absolutely don't have to agree, but this is my honest assessment

We cannot have a civil back-and-forth when one side continuously re-interprets every piece of evidence as being inadmissable, unacceptable, invalid, or "out of context."

We simply have a disagreement over what some of these quotes are saying and over the conclusions drawn in the foreword. There is no reason for us to be uncivil over that. I feel like I have been cordial with you and given you genuine, honest responses. Would you really prefer that I shift into an uncivil tone and respond more aggressively? (to me that sounds like a miserable way to interact with a poster who hasn't done anything wrong to me)

That is one side having already declared what their verdict is--blamelessness--and then ensuring that, no matter what, the burden of proof remains too high to ever be crossed. That is inherently an uncivil discussion.

Again we just disagree. And to my earlier point, I have said several times I tend to agree with Heidi Gygax's assessment, which isn't to say the man is pure or blameless (I think there are places where you see sexism, I think that sexism is easy to understand in the context of when he was born and the conditions of his life, and I believe there is a more complex picture to paint of him than to fixate on his more thorny exchanges). Sometimes we just have to agree to disagree. You can't insist people agree with you and then when they don't say they are being uncivil

 

[Vaalingrade]

I was told people don’t just pigeon hole Gary as a sexist and yet his sexism has taken up the vast majority of this thread about Elon Musk.

You mean this thread about Elon Musk trying to smokescreen the sexism in the early drafts of D&D?