D&D General Drow & Orcs Removed from the Monster Manual

[Bedrockgames]

Congratulations on reaching enlightenment. Now work to get your fellow countrymen to the same level.

Thank you!

 

[delericho]

The game literally justifies killing orcs on site by saying they are unredeemable monsters.

Where does it say that? Because Orcs haven't been universally evil, never mind unredeemable, for decades, if ever.

 

[Maxperson]

You have it backwards. People don't mistreat people like they are orcs, they treat orcs as people they don't like.

Look at the terms used to classically describe orcs. Primitive, savage, stupid, aggressive, lazy, violent, antisocial, inhumane. Those words didn't exist to describe orcs, they described a lot of people's who used them to justify mistreatment and worse. People take the same words, the same notions, they used to describe various minorities and use them to describe orcs and goblins because even if they aren't 1:1 stand-ins for specific groups (and sometimes they are, Orcs of Thar) you get to apply the and emotional response to them that you could to a minority group.

And that's actually where the problem lies. It's not that the average D&D player fought orcs and said "wow, this feels like I'm beating up minorities", it's that it normalizes the idea that it's ok to hate people who are viewed as primitive and evil. You can't reason with them, you only put them to the sword. The game literally justifies killing orcs on site by saying they are unredeemable monsters. And once you forge a link between a group of people being unredeemable and violence, you are much more willing to accept (even in you aren't actively engaged in) violence against them.

I mean, we've been reasoning with orcs and wondering what to do with orc children since murder of the helpless is bad since 1e and we were in junior high school.

As for the bolded, I've never encountered that, either. Nobody I've played with has ever been like, "I think it's okay to hate some primitive tribe in the Amazon and they're evil, because orcs have language that says, "Primitive, savage, stupid, aggressive, lazy, violent, antisocial, inhumane." I maintain that the kind of person who is going to hate a primitive tribe and think that tribe is savage and evil, doesn't get it from orcs and will still hate that tribe without orcs and orc language.

You also mention that it isn't a 1:1 stand-in for specific groups. The problem is that almost anything you can say that is negative about a fantasy race is a 1:? stand-in for some minority group, because humans in the real world have been kinda crappy as a race for a very long time and have mistreated many minority groups in many different ways.

I also have personal experience to relate. As a Jewish man I happen to have enjoyed the Harry Potter movies when they came out. Rowlings other issues were not known back then, or at least weren't known by me. People started saying how goblins are stand-ins for Jews because they are greedy, have big noses, and run banks. I was not then and still am not offended by coincidence. They looked like goblins and happen to be in charge of banks. People were able to draw a 1:? stand-in, and so they concluded that it had to be offensive. Jon Stewart who called out those similarities also clarified that he didn't think Rowling was antisemitic and didn't think the books needed to be changed.

A similar thing came up in the phylactery thread here on this site. Non-Jews were telling me that lich phylacteries were offensive to Jews, despite multiple Jews here on the site saying that it was not offensive to us and we don't even call the Tefillin phylacteries. They insisted that it was offensive and needed to be changed. Not one Jewish player backed them up in the thread.

 

[Dire Bare]

Where does it say that? Because Orcs haven't been universally evil, never mind unredeemable, for decades, if ever.

Please. Check the 2014 Monster Manual on how orcs are described.

The shift from always-evil monsters to characters capable of holding any alignment and behavior certainly has been evolving for decades. But the problem is hardly solved and done.

 

[Maxperson]

Where does it say that? Because Orcs haven't been universally evil, never mind unredeemable, for decades, if ever.

In 3e nearly half of all orcs were not the alignment listed in the MM.

 

[Maxperson]

Please. Check the 2014 Monster Manual on how orcs are described.

The shift from always-evil monsters to characters capable of holding any alignment and behavior certainly has been evolving for decades. But the problem is hardly solved and done.

Nothing there says or implies irredeemable, or that every last one of them is evil. Even the death knight, an evil undead monster, is immortal until redeemed.

 

[delericho]

Please. Check the 2014 Monster Manual on how orcs are described.

The shift from always-evil monsters to characters capable of holding any alignment and behavior certainly has been evolving for decades. But the problem is hardly solved and done.

I don't disagree that the portrayal or orcs has been problematic. I was querying the specific claim. Where does it literally justify killing orcs on site by saying they are unredeemable monsters?

 

[FrogReaver]

And that's actually where the problem lies. It's not that the average D&D player fought orcs and said "wow, this feels like I'm beating up minorities", it's that it normalizes the idea that it's ok to hate people who are viewed as primitive and evil. You can't reason with them, you only put them to the sword. The game literally justifies killing orcs on site by saying they are unredeemable monsters. And once you forge a link between a group of people being unredeemable and violence, you are much more willing to accept (even in you aren't actively engaged in) violence against them.

The idea that it’s ok to hate people that do nasty and deplorable things is normal.

 

[Dire Bare]

I don't disagree that the portrayal or orcs has been problematic. I was querying the specific claim. Where does it literally justify killing orcs on site by saying they are unredeemable monsters?

In the 2014 Monster Manual. Orcs are portrayed as evil, savage monsters.

While it doesn't literally say, "and that means you can slaughter them without remorse." That is the obvious implication.

Please.

 

[delericho]

In the 2014 Monster Manual. Orcs are portrayed as evil, savage monsters.

While it doesn't literally say, "and that means you can slaughter them without remorse." That is the obvious implication.

Please.

It does not, however, say that this is universally so - in fact, it details an exception in the form of Obould Many-arrows. Nor does it say they are unredeemable.

And the 2014 MM notes that the stated alignment is a default only.

The claim is overstated.