And what have skinwalkers to do with the discussion?
They are an example of an explicitly "do not talk about this if you are an outsider" situation. If I did not give an example, you would almost certainly say that no such thing exists or should exist. By giving it as an example, I have conclusively demonstrated that, yes,
some of the time, it is objectively the case that a more-accurate portrayal
cannot possibly be respectful, and thus the only respectful portrayal must, necessarily, be less than absolutely perfectly "historically accurate."
There are other arguments I can make as well, though given your responses here, I doubt you are receptive to literally anything at all on that front. Your position is accuracy
über alles, so anything which might indicate that accuracy isn't always a virtue must be wrong, axiomatically.
Do you really want to use such cherry picked examples as an argument why harems, where no such taboo exists, shall not be named? And that it is respectful to proactively remove parts of a culture because some westerners decide that they are now taboo?
My point was, again, to show that
perfect accuracy isn't even what other cultures actually value and care about. Respect is. Accuracy is one of the tools to be used in the pursuit of respect. If an increase in accuracy would cause a
decrease in respectful treatment, then it SHOULD be avoided, but only unless and until a
decrease in accuracy would likewise cause a decrease in respectful treatment.
But if I was wrong, above, and you are in fact open to considering the possibility that accuracy might not always be desirable: Again, your position indicates an impossible standard. Perfect accuracy would mean absolutely unadorned descriptions of real historical events, without any expanded or elided elements. That would forbid including fantastical things as actually existing stuff in the world. You clearly don't actually believe that we should exclude the fantastical (since you are open to the idea of literal actual magic existing in something like Al-Qadim). Thus, you are open to
some changes,
some inaccuracies, where they serve a valid purpose. That's the whole of my argument: accuracy is a tool, it should be used wisely, there are
lots and lots and LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of times where a lack of accuracy is a serious problem. But there can also be times where an
excess of accuracy can be a problem. Where it would be wiser, more respectful, more effective, more enjoyable, more
productive to be very slightly less accurate, in order to stay focused on the parts that really matter, in order to present a portrayal that is as effective and respectful as it can be.
I consider harems to be one of the things where, hey, this is a very sensitive subject that is EXTREMELY EXCRUCIATINGLY EASY to handle really, REALLY badly. E.g., as many have noted, harems were often nowhere near as central or as important to these societies, in a way similar to how having a formal court mistress was relevant for, y'know,
the King of France but really pretty much irrelevant to
French culture. Likewise, was slavery a
vital and essential aspect of Al-Andalusian culture, or was it an unfortunate failing that could have been avoided? I'm not burying my head in the sand when I choose to make a society partially inspired by Al-Andalus that doesn't engage in slavery. I am very conscious of the flaws and foibles of the period. Instead, I am
intentionally choosing to celebrate beautiful aspects of that place and period, and likewise
intentionally choosing to cut out something that my players would find deeply upsetting and which would (essentially without fail) become an automatic "alright, we're going to take down the system and destroy it right? Because slavery is wrong, we're going to stop all the slavery, right? Right?" There's literally no world in which "yeah, your whole society is built on the backs of hundreds of thousands of slaves" is going to result in "alright cool, let's have some adventures then." Hence, another aspect of my
intentionally choosing not to use this is that it just wouldn't make an effective setting for my group.
Further: Are these products of our artistic labor supposed to be diamond-perfection anthropological analyses of real-world sociocultural and geopolitical periods? Or are they meant to be pieces of entertainment, which single out things worth paying attention to, and ignore other things that aren't really interesting? Is a film about superheroes automatically trash cinema because it doesn't depict the laws of physics with absolute fidelity? Is a book about what the world might be like if dragons existed inherently bad because dragons violate the square-cube law to hell and back? Is
Star Trek bad because it posits a future where humans who don't have to do any work choose to better themselves and their world rather than most folks falling into hedonistic leisure?
And if these things
aren't academic anthropology papers, if they are instead creative works for creative ends, why on earth should we be beholden to picture-perfect historical accuracy? We're talking about things that emphatically aren't historical! The Tarrakhuna never existed. Al-Rakkah doesn't exist (at least, the one I've described doesn't exist, I believe there are places called "Al-Rakkah," probably spelled differently, out in the Middle East.) Jinnistan is wholly made up. Human beings being ruled over by cruel genie taskmasters is wholly made up. Sultanate city-states with an uneasy detente with their distant cousins, the Nomad Tribes, is completely fictional. Why are all of
these inaccuracies acceptable, but good Lord, if you leave out the slavery and the harems, you've
Ruined Everything Forever!?
I don't see the inclusion of harems as adding anything to the entertainment value of the product. I don't see the inclusion of pervasive and racialized slavery as being interesting or beneficial. Even if they were handled with extreme care and (somehow) managed to avoid any hint of the European demonization of Middle Eastern and North African culture,
what does that actually add to the experience?