Big Changes At White Wolf Following Controversy

Following an online backlash regarding the content of their recent publications, White Wolf Publishing has just announced some big changes, including the suspension of the Vampire 5th Edition Camarilla and Anarch books, and a restructuring of management.

White Wolf's Shams Jorjani made the following announcement about an hour ago:

"Hello everyone,

My name is Shams Jorjani, VP of Business Development at Paradox Interactive and interim manager at White Wolf Publishing. I wanted to inform you of some changes that will be implemented at White Wolf, starting immediately.

Sales and printing of the V5 Camarilla and Anarch books will be temporarily suspended. The section on Chechnya will be removed in both the print and PDF versions of the Camarilla book. We anticipate that this will require about three weeks. This means shipping will be delayed; if you have pre-ordered a copy of Camarilla or Anarchs, further information will follow via e-mail.

In practical terms, White Wolf will no longer function as a separate entity. The White Wolf team will be restructured and integrated directly into Paradox Interactive, and I will be temporarily managing things during this process. We are recruiting new leadership to guide White Wolf both creatively and commercially into the future, a process that has been ongoing since September.

Going forward, White Wolf will focus on brand management. This means White Wolf will develop the guiding principles for its vision of the World of Darkness, and give licensees the tools they need to create new, excellent products in this story world. White Wolf will no longer develop and publish these products internally. This has always been the intended goal for White Wolf as a company, and it is now time to enact it.

The World of Darkness has always been about horror, and horror is about exploring the darkest parts of our society, our culture, and ourselves. Horror should not be afraid to explore difficult or sensitive topics, but it should never do so without understanding who those topics are about and what it means to them. Real evil does exist in the world, and we can’t ever excuse its real perpetrators or cheapen the suffering of its real victims.

In the Chechnya chapter of the V5 Camarilla book, we lost sight of this. The result was a chapter that dealt with a real-world, ongoing tragedy in a crude and disrespectful way. We should have identified this either during the creative process or in editing. This did not happen, and for this we apologize.

We ask for your patience while we implement these changes. In the meantime, let’s keep talking. I’m available for any and all thoughts, comments and feedback, on shams.jorjani@paradoxinteractive.com."

White Wolf is currently own by Paradox Interactive, who acquired the World of Darkness rights in 2015 from previous owner CCP (who you might know from Eve Online) whose plans for a WoD MMO failed to bear fruit.

The recent Camarilla and Anarch books have met widespread criticism. The former, Camarilla, includes a section which appears to trivialise current real-life events in Chechnya, where the LGBTQ community is being persecuted, tortured, and murdered and uses that current tragedy as a backdrop for the setting. This comes after the company was forced to deny links to neo-Nazi ideology. White Wolf recently announced that "White Wolf is currently undergoing some significant transitions up to and including a change in leadership. The team needs a short time to understand what this means, so we ask for your patience as we figure out our next steps" and this appears to be the result of that decision.

 

[Celebrim]

This is a tricky issue to answer, because White Wolf was founded on the principle of creating roleplaying games as art. The initial appeal of the games were that they provocative...

To whom?

I guarantee you that if they had offended one of their out groups, rather than an in group, they would have responded with more talk about artistic expression and defenses of their provocation as art and the need to avoid societal censorship.

It's not there status as a for profit company that determines whether they apologize or not. It's whether the offense given was intentional or not, or as you put it 'provocative'.

In this case, they didn't intend to offend.

 

[Maxperson]

You do realize the pdf version went on sale, right? Even if it were a leak they're seeing the full effects of their blurb right now.

You do realize that it's impossible to see the full effects in such a short time, right? We have no way to know how effective a boycott would have been since one never really had time to get started.

Did you miss the part where it says it's all a distraction? In the Chechnya of the v5 universe LGBT people are being persecuted not because of religious hate or general homophobia (y'know like in real life), but just to keep up the guise of "Sharia law".

It says that they are deflecting from what's happening in Chechnya by misdirecting it as Sharia law. And we know that LGBT are in fact being persecuted because of homophobia, because vampire LGBT members are also being persecuted. Were it just some sort of distraction of the kine on the part of the vampires, no LGBT vampires would be persecuted. There must be homophobia and/or religious hate involved.

If it were really just a regional issue then there wouldn't really need to be an excuse of being a "distraction", it would simply just be vampires running the Chechen government are also just really homophobic.

That's exactly what it is, though. The vampires running the Chechen government ARE homophobic, which is why vampire LGBT members are also being persecuted.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I think you're thinking about the implications more than the writers did.

Which is part of the problem, of course.

I do not think the writers of that particular part of that book thought at all about what they were doing. I think they just picked what, to the average person, is some remote, obscure part of the world, where something horrible is happening to people there and turned it into a vampire plot. What I don't get is how it made it past all the proofreaders and editors, etc and into the final product. That is where I can understand the changes in management, since it was their responsibility in the end.

 

[TrippyHippy]

To whom?

I guarantee you that if they had offended one of their out groups, rather than an in group, they would have responded with more talk about artistic expression and defenses of their provocation as art and the need to avoid societal censorship.

It's not there status as a for profit company that determines whether they apologize or not. It's whether the offense given was intentional or not, or as you put it 'provocative'.

In this case, they didn't intend to offend.

I'm not entirely sure what you are refering to when you say 'out group' or 'in group'.

When I say provocative, it's not so much that they intend to offend as much as they intend to create a strong emotional or intellectual reaction. The trouble with offensiveness, per se, is that people react in different ways. Some people might be offended by something, while others may not.

When they first started using openly gay characters as examples in their early books, some people found that offensive. Did they intend to offend? No, but as one of the first game companies to do this sort of thing, they were being provocative and some were offended by it because of their own attitudes.

 

[Celebrim]

I'm not entirely sure what you are refering to when you say 'out group' or 'in group'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingroups_and_outgroups

When I say provocative, it's not so much that they intend to offend as much as they intend to create a strong emotional or intellectual reaction. The trouble with offensiveness, per se, is that people react in different ways. Some people might be offended by something, while others may not.

While there is no rulebook as to what is or isn't offensive, there are a many things which you can predict people will find offensive.

Provocative by the way means: "causing annoyance, anger, or another strong reaction, especially deliberately". It comes from the idea of calling someone out, as to a challenge to combat.

 

[Celebrim]

site wasn't responsive

 

[TrippyHippy]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingroups_and_outgroups

While there is no rulebook as to what is or isn't offensive, there are a many things which you can predict people will find offensive.

Provocative by the way means: "causing annoyance, anger, or another strong reaction, especially deliberately". It comes from the idea of calling someone out, as to a challenge to combat.

I knew what the word meant when I used it. That's why I used it.

I don't honestly think that the early White Wolf cared too much about marketing or the like when they started at all. They were just an independent company of young turks when they started, with a bunch of new ideas about how to make RPGs. They were somewhat iconoclastic when it came to what could or could not be game-able - presenting themselves as sort of the anti-D&D group as an identity if you like - which is how they came up with the basic idea about playing vampires in the first place. The people, back then, that they were provoking were generally conservative in their disposition. The notion of playing amoral monsters in a dark reflection of our own world - including all the darker aspects of drugs, sex, violence and whathaveyou - is provocative, and undoubtedly offended some people. It's also the appeal of the game to others.

 

[Panda-s1]

You do realize that it's impossible to see the full effects in such a short time, right? We have no way to know how effective a boycott would have been since one never really had time to get started.

The whole point of the boycott was calling out insensitive material in the book. The publisher not only removed the material, but announced a restructuring for the company. All things considered, that's extremely effective for a boycott that didn't really get started. What boycott is there needed after that?

It says that they are deflecting from what's happening in Chechnya by misdirecting it as Sharia law. And we know that LGBT are in fact being persecuted because of homophobia, because vampire LGBT members are also being persecuted. Were it just some sort of distraction of the kine on the part of the vampires, no LGBT vampires would be persecuted. There must be homophobia and/or religious hate involved.

That's exactly what it is, though. The vampires running the Chechen government ARE homophobic, which is why vampire LGBT members are also being persecuted.

"The recurring international controversy over the persecution of homosexuals is a clever media manipulation designed to keep the focus on Sharia law, away from the true inner workings of the republic." They doing "Sharia law" things in an effort to distract from the fact that vampires run the country. Maybe you need more context, early last year it was reported that the government of Chechnya began a campaign of genocide against gay men. In real life, there are people in charge of the country who do this out of simple hatred of homosexuality. In the v5 universe, however, it's all just a distraction to keep the vampires safe. LGBT vampires might face the same persecution, that doesn't change the reasons they're doing it (also it says kindred are "punished harshly" for such behavior, it doesn't exactly say they get the same treatment, and it would be weird if they just let certain people go free). Also it's not even a plot to feed, it's just a simply a distraction, which altogether makes it even less palatable.

Also calling it media manipulation is completely asinine. In real life the Chechen government vehemently denies any genocidal activity is going on, yet somehow in the v5 universe they're able to do this as a means to manipulate the media?? Even if they purposefully leaked it, no one who has any real power to take on the government would do much.

 

[Henry]

I knew what the word meant when I used it. That's why I used it.

I don't honestly think that the early White Wolf cared too much about marketing or the like when they started at all. They were just an independent company of young turks when they started, with a bunch of new ideas about how to make RPGs. They were somewhat iconoclastic when it came to what could or could not be game-able - presenting themselves as sort of the anti-D&D group as an identity if you like - which is how they came up with the basic idea about playing vampires in the first place. The people, back then, that they were provoking were generally conservative in their disposition. The notion of playing amoral monsters in a dark reflection of our own world - including all the darker aspects of drugs, sex, violence and whathaveyou - is provocative, and undoubtedly offended some people. It's also the appeal of the game to others.

This thought is kind of funny since most of the original White Wolf staff, according to Lisa Stevens, were die-hard D&D gamers in addition to being the "young turks" of White Wolf. She said (in more than one of her "Auntie Lisa's Story Hour" seminars) that one of their crowning moments was when they were threatened by a couple of people from TSR after winning an award (Origins 1991, I think?) It just goes to show how cannibalistic the industry used to be compared to now. Everyone seems to be on board nowadays with the "rising tide floats all boats" theory.

 

[Jester David]

Do I think it was an artistic expression? It's a fictitious version of the real world, which I think falls into that category, sure. As for football or chess, these games don't really involve fiction, so they differ from many RPG products in that sense, but still the design of each game is probably an artistic expression. And I'd argue that playing each can be considered performance art of some kind.

Clue has a narrative. There is the murder of Mister Body and several suspects. Is it art?

And while I think one could easily argue a performance of D&D and other roleplaying games would qualify as "art", do the rulebooks governing play benefit from that. Is a book on ballet or the technical aspects of theatre craft also art?

The line is always different for everyone. Who decides where it is in any given instance?

Society as a whole.
Just like EVERYTHING ELSE where we decide if it is appropriate or not. It's what we're taught by our parents every day of our childhoods, which is reinforced by society and popular culture.

The audience and reviewers also decided when several of them independently raised the issue. Followed by the management who themselves agreed the text was inappropriate. And everyone else who was upset or thought the material was in poor taste.

If it had been a few upset people making a big deal about nothing, the story would not have spread as far and the management might have agreed it was much about nothing. Clearly they disagreed.

In this case, I have no problem with the writers painting the Chechen leadership as monstrous because they are in fact monstrous.

Here's the thing... he's figuratively monsterous, but he's not literally monsterous. Making him and actual, literal monster makes it easier to accept. Because he's just evil. He's a monster. It's almost an excuse. You don't hold the mad or hungry dog accountable for its actions.
It's simply easier to accept someone being terrible to human being when they're not human and see humans as convenient and tasty food. It removes culpability.

Reinforcing that the person behind and responsible for the purging of homosexuals in Chechnya is and always has been human is important.

Do I think that such use is a bit crass or that the fact that the tragedy is ongoing meas perhaps it shouldn't be used as a source of fiction in a RPG? Sure. I wouldn't have done that if I was writing the book. I find it distasteful.

I just don't mistake my personal taste for more than that. All it means is that I wouldn't buy that book.

Fair enough.

Will you buy future books from the line? Will you buy future books from the author(s), who thinks it's okay to be crass and to exploit an ongoing tragedy?
Because if you wouldn't... that brings up the business aspect. White Wolf and their owners want to continue to sell books. But if people move from boycotting to book to boycotting the line, then they lose money. Which is their sole reason for publishing the books.

I do think that there is value in artists producing anything that they want, and in the production of art that challenges the norms of society. No, I don't think that a company that is paying for the production of some creative work should have no say. In this case, the publisher is reacting to some level of public outcry in a way that they feel is appropriate. I don't blame them for that.

What I question is the need for people to try and eliminate things that they don't like, or that make them uncomfortable, rather than simply avoiding it themselves.

This gets into a larger issue.

Some people DO challenge the norms. And that's probably a good thing. However, some people like to just shock and be provocative. We need to separate the two. The people testing the limits of good tastes and pushing society for artistic reasons, and the trolls who just want to get a rise from people.

In general, ignoring people and things doesn't help. Because the latter group of trolls wants desperately NOT to be ignored. Which means they just push the envelope further and further until they can't be ignored. They go until you cannot help but notice them. And by that point they're so much worse than they would have been before.
But it doesn't even serve the true artist. They can't push society in different directions or cause people to question if everyone ignores them. They want people to talk and discuss things. Which doesn't happen if it's just their supporters.

Also... ignoring ideas we don't like and disagree with doesn't work out well in the long run. You can see that in the surge of internet fuelled hate and racism. Communities like 4chan and reddit where anything could be posted. When people couldn't get a rise from readers, they pushed farther and farther into racism and misogyny to get a reaction, until only people okay with those beliefs and jokes remained. Which led to online communities that were enabling and aiding radicalisation.
I could say more, but the above paragraph is already pushing the limits of this site's tolerance for politics and current events.