D&D General Companies Cut Ties With Judges Guild After Owner's Racist Posts

Several game publishers, including Bat in the Attic, have said that they will no longer do business with Judges Guild after its owner posted a number of racist and anti-semitic statements. They don't need to be repeated here; but there are several examples.

Judges Guild has been around since 1976, producing products compatible with Dungeons & Dragons; the current owner, Bob Bledsaw II, is the son of its co-founder, Bob Bledsaw, and has run the company since 2008. The company is well known for 1976's City State of the Invincible Overlord, amongst other classics. Bat in the Attic and Frog God Games both license Judges' Guild properties.

Rob Conley of Bat in the Attic stated yesterday that the company would no longer do business with Judges Guild, or its properties. "Sunday evening, I called Robert Bledsaw II and discussed the issue. I notified him that I will no longer be doing future Judges’ Guild projects and will only continue to sell what I have currently listed. I stated that I will be calling the other Judges Guild licensee and inform them of the situation and of my decision."

Frog God Games, which has been working with Judges Guild for nearly 20 years, followed suit. "Recently the owner of Judges Guild made a series of racist and anti-semitic posts on Facebook. We will not reproduce them here; they are shown on Rob Conley's Bat in the Attic blog, and we are convinced of their authenticity. Rob wrote his post because, as a licensee of Judges Guild property, he felt he needed to state clearly that he would not be doing business with Judges Guild in the future. We have also licensed property from Judges Guild in the past, and we are seconding Rob's example by cutting off all future business with Judges Guild. The posts made on Facebook were completely unacceptable."

UPDATE — DriveThruRPG has severed ties. “The Judges Guild publisher account has been closed and they are no longer available on DriveThruRPG.”

A few years ago, Judges Guild ran a Kickstarter to bring back City State of the Invincible Overlord, with nearly a thousand backers raising $85K. The Kickstarter has not yet been fulfilled. The latest update was in October 2019.

 

[CleverNickName]

Well that's even worse.

A person is smart, people are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals.

Don't worry; the status quo won't change overnight. But it will change; it always does. My grandmother was convinced that school segregation in the south would never change (hard to believe it was only 70 years ago, isn't it?) because it was futile. According to my dad, my grandma believed that nobody wanted desegregation, nobody would support it, and all of the people complaining about it were just being silly. In short: the status quo didn't need to change, wouldn't change, and attempts to change it were silly.

The issue isn't the same here, and the outcome won't be the same either. But some attitudes toward the status quo are pretty similar.

Quiet boycotts are a bit like peeing in a dark suit, you get a warm feeling but nobody notices. Part of the point of a boycott is to gather support for it and make it known why. Otherwise, you're just a drop in a vast bucket of non-customers and irrelevant to the company. To work, a boycott needs large numbers of people so that the target of the boycott actually feels the impact and knows why they're feeling it.

I don't think anyone has called for a boycott yet, or at least I haven't heard anything about one. As for myself, I'm not demanding a boycott, and it's not part of a great, world-changing agenda of mine. It's just that I get to choose who I do business with, and doing business with anti-Semitic bigots feels like the wrong choice.

Besides. What's so wrong with a "warm feeling"? It's certainly better than cold indifference or fiery hatred.

 

[ad_hoc]

I know some disagreed with this, but this HAS happened. I know of a Rabbi who convinced a neonazi who was harassing him of the error of his ways. The man eventually left the movement, married a nice hispanic girl, and even lived with the Rabbi When times were especially tough for him.

...and then there’s this man.

More often what happens is that the problematic person calls for people to debate them to try to convince them of the error of their ways. This gives them a platform to talk about their views as well as cost those who are well intentioned their emotional labour. Even worse, sometimes those who don't want to put in work trying to convince the abusive to stop being abusive are called lazy or selfish for not putting in the labour to do that.

No, better I think is to let the person know in no uncertain terms that their actions and views are unacceptable by not engaging with that person anymore.

Either they change because they don't want to be left out in the cold anymore or they don't and they stop having power over others because those people have turned their back on them.

A win either way and requires much less effort.

 

[jasper]

Besides. What's so wrong with a "warm feeling"? It's certainly better than cold indifference or fiery hatred.

I loved giving my neighborhood kids warm feelings but it is illegal.
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Something about flamethrowers and uncontrolled burns.
Now cold indifference. Well the freezer holds 3 kids with not problems.
Yes jokes. This thread is getting a little to depressing for me.

 

[HarbingerX]

Don't worry; the status quo won't change overnight. But it will change; it always does.

I remember reading about a study by information scientists that looked at how opinions propagate through a social trust network. They found that the status quo will dominate until 25% of the network holds a different opinion. That's the tipping point when the minority opinion then rapidly spreads to become dominant.

This is much like how same-sex marriage went, and many other changes before it. Massive societal and institutional resistance until a tipping point is reached and then suddenly it becomes the predominant. Of course the same holds true for more negative views and opinions, but in general the past several hundred years has seen western democracies move toward greater inclusion that away from it, not withstanding the setbacks of the past decade.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[gyor]

Generally not. These positions are not generally arrived at after some well-considered, logical thought. They are typically emotionally based, with a wall of rationalizations stacked up to protect that emotional position.

It is sometimes possible to change their minds. But not through discussion on the internet. It typically takes making a real emotional connection that challenges their current stance on that more visceral level to get them to abandon their position.

The Darrell Davis method of changing racists hearts and minds, build and relationship with them. His actions lead to the leader off a national KKK organization voluntarily shutting down the organization, and this was a guy linked to terrorism, guarded by Nighthawks (KKK body guards), and he saved the guy from his own evil.

 

[David Howery]

as an aside from the current controversy... I have to admit, I was surprised to hear that JG was still around... I thought they'd disappeared years ago...

 

[Umbran]

The Darrell Davis method of changing racists hearts and minds, build and relationship with them.

I don't have time to watch a two-and-a-half hour video on the matter, but if I recall what I heard of the case - the element of import here is build a relationship. That's much of what I mean by giving them another emotional position that contrasts with their beliefs (like, say, friendship). That is way more than "discuss".

 

[Celebrim]

We made it past page 12.

 

[generic]

I feel like it's the right time to, after reading all of these posts, say that I agree with @lowkey13 on most of this, my joke was tasteless, and, maybe, I should quietly go to another thread.