Doug McCrae
Legend
Orcs, and other evil humanoids in rpgs, are a fictional construct. Racist ideas about people of colour are also a fictional construct. We are comparing one work of fiction with another (and noting many similarities).
I love my hobby. I've spent thousands of dollars and years of work in it. My thing is protecting it from people who want to tear it down, and I run into moderators who don't have that same motivation.
So within the censored language of THIS forum, Orcs are in the Monster Manual. They gave an X.P. value. Yes, you can kill them. The Orc Cleric in the party? Work with him/her/it. I, as GM, have had PCs kill each other and ask for X.P.
These forums are fine sounding boards, but there will always be a "level of disconnect" between what sounds good on a forum & what really happened in-game. Guess that's the essence of having moderators.
But, sometimes moderation censors reality. I've been chatting online long enough to get that. I appreciate the Mods, when they represent the RPG hobby.
You find it odd that, in a thread analyzing the parallels between orcs and colonialist progaganda with regard to racial stereotyping, you make repeated calls for moderation and I posted one of the most famous statements in history about calls for moderation in the face of racial injustice?
Bedrockgames said:I don't think the evil orc trope, or evil orcs in fantasy RPGs are racist. And I don' think the tie to colonialism is super obvious. My main contention was taking a fine tooth comb to this stuff, in my view, doesn't really help,
/snip
Is Joss Wheaton a racist?
/snip
IOW, if you want to bring up counter points, or why you don't think these tropes rely on racist underpinnings, you need to provide proof. "I don't think so" is not proof. Evidence has been presented. Pretty clear and repeated evidence. If you cannot provide counter evidence, why would we accept your opinion?
But, how is directly linking the descriptions of these races in the text "taking a fine tooth comb" to this stuff. I mean, the quotes from the Monster Manual are contained within a couple of paragraphs - they aren't buried in some appendix of some later publication. They're RIGHT THERE.
See, this right here? This is why we have such a hard time having any sort of constructive discussion.