WotC Dungeons & Dragons Fans Seek Removal of Oriental Adventures From Online Marketplace

[Xenonnonex]

What mistake?

Are you saying the quote of you saying "Can bin outdated ideas and books." does not read as an endorsement of Kwan's request for the books to be removed? I have not gone over your later stuff again, so I do not know if you take different positions later, I just re-read the first page again after reading Chaosmancer's assertion and your statements seemed relevant.

Can bin outdated ideas and books means work on them.
I said warnings are good. And open dialogue to address this is good.
Do not make the mistake of saying things for me.

 

[Danzauker]

facepalm

Integrating cultures together and growing together is vastly different than looking at a far flung section of the world and defining it as a single monolithic culture.

You can't lump all of South America as being one culture, you can't lump all of Africa as being one Culture, you can't lump all of North America as one culture.

That is an attempt to erase people's cultures instead of appreciate them for what they are.

Why not? i still see no evil in a work of fiction where there's a nation that seems Mexico but has lama riding people throwing bolas and practicing capoeira.

It's fantasy.

And from what I recall, that's not even what OA was. It had different nations in a sort of continent, each of those vaguely resembled one of the most famous Asian country. One was quasi-India, one was quasi-China, one quasi-Japan...

They were all crammed together in a smaller area than the real word just for convenience. Imagine Asia was as big as Europe. That's all.

And the country depictions were sketchy at best. It was a theme sourcebook more that a full setting. And like with every sourcebook, of course, a master/group could just take whatever he wanted. Interested in Japan only? Relocate places and rules in your homebrew and you're done.

In fact, it just hit me of a good example, Olrox was saying that he doesn't mind that pasta and pizza is associated with Italy, because he likes the food and the food culture. Imagine for a moment a book where the great Celtic tribes of England were the inventors of pizza and drank copious amounts of Beck's Beer (a massively popular beer in Germany).

None of that is right. And you might laugh and say "well it doesn't bother me" but let us say that that book went on to sell continuously for fifty years, and that people constantly stopped by your home town asking about the Celtic Pizza. And the company publishing the book made another, and another and another, then movies depicting the same stuff, then comics, then held conventions for Celtic Pizza. All pushing forward this warped view of your world. Can't you imagine, eventually, that it would start to aggravate you? That eventually you would tell them to at least admit that none of that is true, so people would stop associating these cultural things as being one and the same?

Dude, It happens EVERY time an american asks directions for a Pizza Hut here!

Don't forget Americans were the inventors of fortune cookies and fettuccine alfredo.

 

[Fenris-77]

@Xenonnonex - To 'bin' something means to throw it out, as in 'put it in the dustbin', not to work on it. You may have meant 'to work on it' but I think people can be forgiven for thinking that you meant what you literally said.

 

[Sadras]

Imagine for a moment a book where the great Celtic tribes of England were the inventors of pizza and drank copious amounts of Beck's Beer (a massively popular beer in Germany).

So many John Lennon fans on this board.
Imagine this. Imagine that.
Reality. Nothing like that was ever done in the book.

And the pastiche complaint, it was done to every culture, people and history period there was. That was/is D&D.
There is no value statement to be made. Kids wanted to play Knights. Kids wanted to play Samurais. Kids wanted to play Barbarians.
The Honour code was there for flavour, a mechanic to assist with/heighten the difference between the cultures of east and west.
Again, not a value mechanic, so there is no need to make it one.

You have people of all ethnicities on both sides of this issue defending and attacking OA. There is no one unified voice.
I think the majority agree that a disclaimer of sorts is sufficient and a worthy compromise.

Now find something real to be offended about and leave our fantasy games alone.

Imagine listening to prior mod warnings about not telling people what they can be offended by. Those admonitions go for EVERYONE.

 

[Xenonnonex]

So many John Lennon fans on this board.
Imagine this. Imagine that.
Reality. Nothing like that was ever done in the book.

And the pastiche complaint, it was done to every culture, people and history period there was. That was/is D&D.
There is no value statement to be made. Kids wanted to play Knights. Kids wanted to play Samurais. Kids wanted to play Barbarians.
The Honour code was there for flavour, a mechanic to assist with/heighten the difference between the cultures of east and west.
Again, not a value mechanic, so there is no need to make it one.

You have people of all ethnicities on both sides of this issue defending and attacking OA. There is no one unified voice.
I think the majority agree that a disclaimer of sorts is sufficient and a worthy compromise.

Now find something real to be offended about and leave our fantasy games alone.

"Only the right people are allowed to voice opinions".

 

[Sadras]

"Only the right people are allowed to voice opinions".

Who said anything about right or wrong people. Thats playing legislative distinctiveness.

 

[Xenonnonex]

Who said anything about right or wrong people. Thats playing legislative distinctiveness.

Why claim it is not something real to be offended about. How would you know. Are you their spokesperson
Why make it so it seems a group cannot voice their opinions. That is not good. Literal intolerance that is.

 

[Aldarc]

Don't forget Americans were the inventors of fortune cookies and fettuccine alfredo.

Pssst... FYI, Fettucine Alfredo was invented in Rome but it certainly became popular and ubiquitous in the US. You can look this up yourself.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Why not? i still see no evil in a work of fiction where there's a nation that seems Mexico but has lama riding people throwing bolas and practicing capoeira.

It's fantasy.

Being Fantasy isn't an excuse to keep perpetuating the same stereotypes.

I'm glad if the book presented multiple different cultures from multiple different countries, that means there are fewer things to change to make it better.

Dude, It happens EVERY time an american asks directions for a Pizza Hut here!

Don't forget Americans were the inventors of fortune cookies and fettuccine alfredo.

I'm very aware.

So many John Lennon fans on this board.
Imagine this. Imagine that.
Reality. Nothing like that was ever done in the book.

And the pastiche complaint, it was done to every culture, people and history period there was. That was/is D&D.
There is no value statement to be made. Kids wanted to play Knights. Kids wanted to play Samurais. Kids wanted to play Barbarians.
The Honour code was there for flavour, a mechanic to assist with/heighten the difference between the cultures of east and west.
Again, not a value mechanic, so there is no need to make it one.

You have people of all ethnicities on both sides of this issue defending and attacking OA. There is no one unified voice.
I think the majority agree that a disclaimer of sorts is sufficient and a worthy compromise.

Now find something real to be offended about and leave our fantasy games alone.

1) Doing it to everyone doesn't make it okay.

2) There is no need to "heighten the difference" between east and west if you are doing it properly in the first place, especially not by an out-dated and silly stereotype.

3) Maybe stop being intractable and let me change my fantasy games to be more appealing to a wider audience? After all, it is my game too.

 

[Sadras]

This is a quote from Orcslayer78, from this thread. Since Orcslayer was moderated out, I am posting it manually:
Extremists are never satisfied, they want only the complete desctruction of an hobby finding every small invented reason to be outraged.

The phrasing “invented reason”, is probably the single most intolerant and offensive statement, possible. Essentially it is negating the personhood of others, and saying any viewpoint that, YOU personally don’t see or agree with is artificial, not natural, and thus FAKE.

@Derren, @tommybahama, @Sadras.....I write this with a true spirit of inquiry, as I trust you are posting not as agent provocateurs, (which I can not say for some, alas), but would you be so kind as to explain why you agree with the sentiment? I truly want to understand your viewpoint.

I have posted numerous posts since so I do hope you take into account that I'm ok with a disclaimer page - i think it is the quickest and dirtiest solution to this that makes neither side happy.

You also need to take into account that there are Asian people on both sides of this argument.

Now I have watched the first video and some issues I can empathise with, but the majority of the issues raised by the two are so weak and so uninformed, that I cannot but view it as outrage for the sake of outrage, particularly so in this climate where (1) The Community episode was taken down (2) people are having issues with inherently evil fantastical creatures in an attempt to expunge in-game racism. I mean I get let's remove or balance out the 19th century wording - but why the rest?
When you actually delve into their issues - they're petty. Do not take my word for it - watch the videos yourself and form your own opinion based on how D&D settings came to be, based on the stereotypes we adopted from pop culture...etc