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.

 

[Parmandur]

ETA- sometimes people need to pause before writing. That table is just fine because it was an homage to the Scarlet Letter? Just try thinking about that for more than three seconds. It doesn’t pass the laugh test.

I mean, particularly given that "women make up sexual assault allegations all the time" is one of the most actually harmful misogynistic myths extant.

 

[Parmandur]

A bit of apples and oranges in cultural religious sensitivity versus sexism and slavery racial sensitivity.

But here from what I can tell is this is presented as a complete set of OD&D plus drafts and notes but then it entirely cuts out supplement IV of IV. And this is lumped in with the sexism and slavery references in the preface.

This seems explicitly editing the text to remove the offending passages that Remathilis was bringing up as an option WotC did not use on the Gygax sexism stuff.

It stood out to me in reading the preface and how they dealt with the sacred figures issue.

Yeah, "no rela world sacred figures" seems to be hard and fast rule now, and...there ain't much there if you take that out.

They still sell it on DMsGuild, albeit with a content warning.

 

[Mannahnin]

A bit of apples and oranges in cultural religious sensitivity versus sexism and slavery racial sensitivity.

But here from what I can tell is this is presented as a complete set of OD&D plus drafts and notes but then it entirely cuts out supplement IV of IV. And this is lumped in with the sexism and slavery references in the preface.

This seems explicitly editing the text to remove the offending passages that Remathilis was bringing up as an option WotC did not use on the Gygax sexism stuff.

It stood out to me in reading the preface and how they dealt with the sacred figures issue.

They didn't edit the text, though? Entirely omitting the final supplement is not the same as editing it to alter it.

They don't claim that it's a complete set plus drafts and notes. They specifically note the omission.

 

[Justice and Rule]

This is where the main disagreement lies. I don’t particularly think anyone should tell me how something should be viewed.

I want to hit on this. Historians frame things in forewords and such often times because it's necessary to do so. Why is it necessary? Because there are only so many things you can fit into a book and sometimes accompanying information that colors how events or people should be viewed are important, but not important enough to cut other things to make space for it. Saying "I don't want anyone to tell me how it should be viewed" misses that the person writing the book is almost certainly more qualified than you and also likely has supplementary knowledge to the work that they view as important, lest certain things be taken out of context.

 

[FrogReaver]

I really have a hard time seeing the warning presented as telling one how to view material.

The person I quoted is the one that made that claim that I disagreed with here. You might have more success if you directed your comment at them.

 

[Bedrockgames]

yes, republishing something that is way longer than a tweet, the same principle still applies

This well could be a generational thing, but I think many people my age simply don't make this assumption when something is reprinted like this. We just assume older things might have more regressive content, but that the people putting it out there again aren't endorsing every line of text or every frame of a film.

it is though, that seems to be your general issue, you go out of your way to find excuses for the inexcusable

I don't think this is what I do at all.

 

[billd91]

They aren’t retweeting a post. Even then I don’t automatically assume a retweet is an endorsement.

How can a retweet not be a strongly implied endorsement? People retweeting are spreading it further. They're amplifying the signal. That's what you do when you repeat content, barring refuting or commenting on its ideas. And, of course, that's what the foreword is doing - commenting on the content that is NOT endorsed by WotC.

 

[FrogReaver]

I want to hit on this. Historians frame things in forewords and such often times because it's necessary to do so. Why is it necessary? Because there are only so many things you can fit into a book and sometimes accompanying information that colors how events or people should be viewed are important, but not important enough to cut other things to make space for it. Saying "I don't want anyone to tell me how it should be viewed" misses that the person writing the book is almost certainly more qualified than you and also likely has supplementary knowledge to the work that they view as important, lest certain things be taken out of context.

I’m all for them telling me how they think it should be viewed and laying out their case so that I will hopefully agree with them. But that’s not them telling me how something should be viewed.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I understand the point, but it's not quite the same. A gaming supplement, even if it is an old one, isn't necessarily above editing things in and out for different reasons, such as cultural sensitivity. Now if we edited a historical text account to not mention those things were there when it would be important, that'd be worse because the whole point of a historical account is to recognize these facts.

So I get bringing this up, but it's a bit of apples and oranges comparison.

I am generally not a big fan of this. If only because it creates a very false impression of the original content. Obviously venue can matter (I don't expect an R rated film to be unedited on television). But when I buy an old supplement, I am buying it because I want the original text, warts and all. Now if they want to make a revised edition and change things there, that is a different story. But if the idea is you are putting out a book that is supposed to be from 1983, I'd want the whole text so I can see what is there

 

[Umbran]

Sexism was definitely more common then than now and this chart paints a large portion of Americans today as sexists.

Yes. A large portion of Americans today are sexist. In other news, water is wet.

Prevalence in the past may explain how he became sexist, but it is not a valid excuse.

Gary was a human being. He had flaws. In other news, the sky is high up there.

Embracing your fellow human being means embracing them flaws and all.