Casual Racism

[Wik]

I had an old Shadowrun character, who was a human journalist. When the campaign started, he decided to start writing a series based on life as an ork, and got surgery to appear as such - sort of a metahuman "Black Like Me". It was a pretty cool concept, with my character trying to observe the actions of others to this "ork", and then writing it all down.

I also like playing Elitist characters. In a D&D game that starts next week, I've made up a Darkling (a homemade race with a lame name... but kind of cool description. Think Unseelie Halfling). He's definately an elitist, referring to everyone else by how much they slide from what is "correct" and "proper" for a race.

And the dwarf who thinks every other race is stupid is always fun to play. Elves are useless tree-huggers who would rather sit in the sun doing nothing over honest work; Orcs are brutal creatures that instantly need to be killed; Humans are an alright race, just so damned impatient; and so on.

 

[Asmor]

And because the character was ignorantly racist, rather than maliciously racist, he was actually pretty fun to play--Like playing a character with Int 4, but he was only stupid in certain specific respects.

I wish I could have put it that well, but that's exactly how I felt with my preacher character. Of course, to be fair, the other player wasn't exactly going out of his way to break all the stereotypes. :/

 

[danzig138]

The ignorance of times past with racism

"Times past"? Eh. I understand if you don't understand, but that didn't make me chuckle any less after reading your post to find it ending in a large banner that says "My Color is WHITE".

I've played racists before (Grand Wizard in a CoC game is one that comes to mind - ended up commiting suicide), as well as victims of racism, and characters who were actively anti-racist. They've all been pretty equally interesting to play.

 

[arscott]

Heh. "My Color is White". Didn't even notice that.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

Well... it wasn't a character, but I have a related tale.

In a recent campaign I was running, the party leader was a son of a noble returning to his homeland after years away at war. On the way to his father's little corner of the kingdom, I presented the party with numerous challenges designed to illustrate a subtle corruption that was creeping across the land. In one town, they encountered a very strong example of racist self-righteousness. The local captain of the guard was the head of a group that called themselves the Red Guard. Believing that many of the hardships that the town had suffered over the years could be thrown directly at the feet of the non-human war refugees who had trickled through the area, the Red Guard, many of whom were in the town watch, would do anything they could to make non-human travelers feel unwelcome, including unwarranted arrests on false charges and, in the case of any dwarves staying in town, turning them over to the humanoids who mined in the nearby mountains to use as slave labor. Most of the party was, of course, not human.

It turned out to be a very powerful theme, as the people involved (and several notable townsfolk were supporters of the Red Guard) were generally good people, but the PC noble simply couldn't ignore the wrongdoings of the locals... particularly as his fellows began falling victim to their prejudices. And the locals would similarly fall all over themselves to be courteous to him, of course. It was dramatic... and it was fun. Particularly when the PCs got the upper hand.

 

[Thunderfoot]

Two situations - both involving elves.

One is an elvish thief I was playing. He still believed in racial purity and is a little disturbed by the fact that his elvish prince is currently interested in a halfling. . . . He isn't evil, but he is rather dark.

The other is a character in a game I am running. The elves of the 'known' world have found out more elves exist, ones that are religious zealots and breed with whatever moves. The half-elf/half-orc combo was nearly the death of the wizard when she found out. Even worse was when she found out the long-lived elves were actually a mutation of humans and their creation story was covered over in a conspiracy by the dark elves (who were the original elves upon which the elves were modeled). In an odd twist she has since become an evangelist of sorts helping to spread the truth about her race's beginnings. Even though she still has her racial pride, her integrity is winning out in the end.

 

[Will]

Personally, I find settings where 'the goblins are innately evil and nasty and so we are justified doing anything to them' a lot creepier than 'the goblins want our land, we want their land, no compromise has ever worked, so it's all-out war.'

 

[Orius]

Honestly, I don't see any thing wrong with racism being an element in a campaign provided that it isn't used against the players. In a world where there are active struggles between good and evil, it's a bit unrealistic to expect everyone to tolerate people actively bent on their destruction.

I haven't used a lot of outright racism IMC, but it's been there. There was the human barmaid that hated elves, and I didn't hesitate to play up racial animosities among the humanoids. My players thought it was kind of shocking the time an elf chieftain used a goblin as a guinea pig to test a scroll to see if it was cursed. I use the old-school rule that simply looking at a cursed scroll triggers the curse even if you're illiterate. The elf chief had a goblin prisoner dragged out, he opened the scroll in front of the goblin's face, and when it went blank, he handed it back to the PCs and said, "Yup, it was cursed."

 

[Loonook]

It reminded me of my own racist character: Matthias P. "Sharpshot" Smith.

Smith was transported from the 1880's American Southwest to the world where the campaign took place, and the Other PCs were similarly transported from different worlds and eras.

As far as racial attitudes go, Smith was what you might call "a product of his time". He had little respect for Maka-San, the party's Wu-Jen (and it didn't help that Maka-San was a paranoid and greedy misanthrope).

Things go even more interesting when we met the campaign's sometimes-patron, sometimes-BBEG: An encyclopedia salesman who'd emigrated from a place just a little bit east of (and a little bit after) Smith's hometown. This dude was a firm believer in the "White Man's Burden" to civilize all of the other "primitive" races inhabiting the mystical world. And with the knowledge gained from his supply of turn-of-the-century encyclopedias, he had made an excellent start on the goblinoids.

Okay... firstly, this is one of the most interesting campaigns in a 'Modern' setting I have heard of in quite some time. The concepts that could be evolved from this are staggering... we'll have to trade notes some time, because that salesman character would fit quite well with something I've been working on.

Racism? Well, I've had a few very interesting cases in games... one of them was between one player (AA) and another (bi-racial [latino/AA]) who were playing opposite each other. The first player was (unbeknownst to the other) actually a creature of some power and the other was a young street tough which played well with the player's knowledge of culture and his own personal life. Not exactly a Mary Sue sort of character, but the level of RP in the game became quite intense as one lambasted the other over issues between their races. The prior player was playing an older AA man, who was actually a dryeur (a half-dryad of sorts) who had been kidnapped from his grove and spent much of his life in the antebellum and post-war South. When they finally crossed swords over words... it was a rousing experience.

But I'm guessing you're looking moreso for between-races racism. I once played a complete scumbag who had redeeming qualities (went from a car thieving, failed stickup man to a somewhat respectable man about to make Acolyte). As a man who was raised in the West he had a great foil with a Latino PC. If I hadn't have been kicked out of the original game he appeared in due to idiocy of a DM and a player complaining that I was 'corrupting his vision' (which was to have an creepy neco-inc... okay, I was about to explain it, but let's just say he would have enjoyed his dead sister's company more than most... this obsessed PC also used his... mojo... to power his spells)... yeah, that DM quickly lost favor amongst the locals.

As a DM, we had a couple of great cases. The AA string player who got into it with his compatriots over a few issues (including their accusations against a former PC who had, sadly, become one of the undead). But the most interesting point of racial tension I ran into with that PC was his relationship with a practitioner (who was white) and another player.

Wow... I never realized how in-depth even some well-balanced people get into character when it is reflecting their own emotions on a subject. But we used it, and it became
a way to discuss our own theories on race and culture.

In game settings I think it is a necessary evil, but I DM a lot of Modern games which are set in various time periods where the tensions existed, and play to a (hopefully) pretty mature audience. All characters receive a bit of culture shock, as those who play along the normal mores of 'fantasy' society often get marked as Tolkies (pandering to the Mundanes and Shadow Human ideas of what 'good elves and dwarves' act like).

But that's false racism, and that's not the topic.

Slainte,

-Loonook.