D&D General Just sweeping dirty dishes under the rug: D&D, Sexism, and the '70s

[mamba]

I think a climate where creatives are cautious isn't good for art in general.

and I think this is entirely dependent on what they are cautious about

 

[Clint_L]

The creativity of artists, designers, writers, etc. I think a lot of designers and creatives are censoring themselves and avoiding interesting things. Heck you don't even need to be involved in the writing and design end, I am sure many people posting on forums like this one feel they are censoring themselves in conversations.

Good! People should learn to self-censor! Not every thought that pops into one's head is worth sharing! Thumper's mama taught us that "if you can't say somethin' nice, don't say nothin' at all." That's a little extreme, IMO, but certainly we should be mindful before we speak.

This is a basic concept that we teach students: challenge yourself. Examine your own biases and preconceptions. Be open to the possibility of being wrong. Try to really listen to a different perspective.

Lots of students fail at this. They love to be self-righteous. But they come by that honestly. We all could talk less and listen more. But my particular demographic has never had to worry about that too much, and now some of us act like being asked to be considerate of different contexts and perspectives is some horrible burden on our freedoms, when it has been a fact of life for most of humanity for most of history.

I get that you are coming at this from a perspective of maximal freedom being intrinsically good, and I am inclined to agree with that general principal. But there have to be limits, and not just against shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre. As Simone de Beauvoir argued, "my freedoms end where yours begin."

 

[Bedrockgames]

This is a basic concept that we teach students: challenge yourself. Examine your own biases and preconceptions. Be open to the possibility of being wrong. Try to really listen to a different perspective.

Sometimes teachers and institutions have to examine their own biases as well. Much of what is being censored is being done so around ideas developed in fields like media and lit studies. And this is part of the issue. We are creating a set of polite norms that are based on having degrees. So it becomes elite sensibilities. People who aren’t trained in that, and have no bad intentions, get rebuke by people who have. I am all for self examination but when it starts to take on an almost religious intensity, I am not in board

 

[mamba]

Because all that stuff would still exist in the world. All the evil and the oppression and the violence and the hatred... And the players would be fighting against it, tooth and nail

so like it always was, at least for me

 

[Dire Bare]

WotC are just uninterested in taking that step because it's a big chunk of what killed TSR. Not the setting's contents, mind you. The setting existing at all.

Kinda.

It's not that TSR published too many settings, it's that they published too many product lines.

A one-and-done Dark Sun book published today would be fine, but a product line spanning multiple products over multiple years . . . THAT'S what contributed to TSR's demise.

And with their other settings, that's what WotC has been doing. We've gotten revamps of Ravenloft, Forgotten Realms, and Dragonlance. We've got multiple MtG settings, and a couple of Exandria books. WotC isn't skimping on settings. But most of those settings are getting one or two books max, not full-on product lines like TSR did back in the day.

WotC's avoidance of Dark Sun is simply what folks have mentioned . . . it's a tough nut to crack due to the content and the psionics, and so WotC hasn't attempted it yet. Will they in the future? Maybe, it's possible, but don't hold your breath.

I do agree with you that Dark Sun could be presented true to it's original "canon", but in a mature and modern style making it clear that the evil things in the setting are in fact evil.

 

[Steampunkette]

so like it always was, at least for me

Kinda.

It's not that TSR published too many settings, it's that they published too many product lines.

A one-and-done Dark Sun book published today would be fine, but a product line spanning multiple products over multiple years . . . THAT'S what contributed to TSR's demise.

And with their other settings, that's what WotC has been doing. We've gotten revamps of Ravenloft, Forgotten Realms, and Dragonlance. We've got multiple MtG settings, and a couple of Exandria books. WotC isn't skimping on settings. But most of those settings are getting one or two books max, not full-on product lines like TSR did back in the day.

WotC's avoidance of Dark Sun is simply what folks have mentioned . . . it's a tough nut to crack due to the content and the psionics, and so WotC hasn't attempted it yet. Will they in the future? Maybe, it's possible, but don't hold your breath.

I do agree with you that Dark Sun could be presented true to it's original "canon", but in a mature and modern style making it clear that the evil things in the setting are in fact evil.

Gonna spin off a Dark Sun Hopepunk thread from this topic just so we don't derail this topic too hard, going forward!

 

[MGibster]

Oh, and it doesn't help Dark Sun's case that psionics is an important part of the setting and that they still haven't gotten their act together on proper psionics rules, instead hiding them in other classes.

I kind of suspect this might be the most important reason Dark Sun hasn't made a comeback.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think we are manifestly and clearly more considerate and less cruel than we were, for example, when GAZ10 The Orcs of Thar was published, chock-full of insulting stereotypes about and jokes at the expense of, Native Americans. I don't think there's anything cruel about pointing out that things can be harmful even if they're "just a joke, man" and the writer insists that they didn't mean to be hateful.

I think you can criticize something and also understand there are going to be differences of opinion surrounding intent and harm. And you can do that without dragging people through the mud because they disagree with you. Not saying you have engaged in this behavior. But those threads on this topic on social media have been filled with dragging people through the mud and labeling people horrendous things because they saw something different in a work of art than other people. There is tremendous public pressure to conform and it often takes very nasty terms. And I am not defending that book in particular as it is one I dont' have the same level of familiarity with as some others. But anytime this stuff emerges, the problem isn't that people are being critical, it is how they treat folks who simply don't agree with them about it

 

[Mannahnin]

I think you can criticize something and also understand there are going to be differences of opinion surrounding intent and harm. And you can do that without dragging people through the mud because they disagree with you. Not saying you have engaged in this behavior. But those threads on this topic on social media have been filled with dragging people through the mud and labeling people horrendous things because they saw something different in a work of art than other people. There is tremendous public pressure to conform and it often takes very nasty terms. And I am not defending that book in particular as it is one I dont' have the same level of familiarity with as some others. But anytime this stuff emerges, the problem isn't that people are being critical, it is how they treat folks who simply don't agree with them about it

It's difficult to ascertain whether that's true when people refuse to engage with concrete facts to make clear what the actual disagreement is.

We have lots of dark and edgy and grimdark settings and games. I suspect we have more of them now than ever.

The last time I can recall seeing someone get dogpiled for the content of a game was when nuTSR employed an outspoken white supremacist to write their version of Star Frontiers, and he put stuff like "nordics" being statistically superior to black people (whose intelligence was capped) in the game, and a benevolent space (con)federation whose laws and constitution made clear that it was a crime to interfere with worlds where slavery was legal.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Lots of students fail at this. They love to be self-righteous. But they come by that honestly. We all could talk less and listen more. But my particular demographic has never had to worry about that too much, and now some of us act like being asked to be considerate of different contexts and perspectives is some horrible burden on our freedoms, when it has been a fact of life for most of humanity for most of history.

I just don’t agree that this is what is happening. One reason you are seeing a shift away from these forms of self censorship is everyone has been forced to be exceedingly cautious in their speech and writing, and saying something in a way that a few people misread can get you castigated as having said the worst possible thing itself. I think people across the board, regardless of their demographic are tired of this, in fact it mostly seems to fall along class and social lines, not demographic ones around race. I think what you are advocating is for the sensibilities of people with advanced degrees. Someone who makes over 100k likely nods to what you are saying, whatever their race. Someone who is having more difficulty getting by, I think on average is more likely to shake their head at it