Goodman Games: Our Efforts Have Been Mischaracterized

Goodman Games' CEO Joseph Goodman made a statement via YouTube over the weekend*. The video itself focused on the content of the controversial upcoming City State of the Invincible Overlord crowdfunding product, but was prefaced by a short introduction by Joseph Goodman, in which he reiterates his company's commitment to inclusivity and diversity and its opposition to bigotry, something which they say they "don't want to be associated with".

Goodman goes on to say that the company's efforts have been "mischaracterized by some folks" but does not go so far as to identify the mischaracterization, so it's not entirely clear what they consider to be untrue other than the "inaccurate" statements made by Bob Bledsaw II of Judges Guild about Goodman Games' plans, which Goodman mentioned last week.

For those who haven't been following this story, it has been covered in the articles Goodman Games Revives Relationship With Anti-Semitic Publisher For New City State Kickstarter, Goodman Games Offers Assurances About Judges Guild Royalties, and Judges Guild Makes Statement About Goodman Controversy. In short, Goodman Games is currently licensing an old property from a company with which it claimed to have cut ties in 2020 after the owner of that company made a number of bigoted comments on social media. Goodman Games has repeatedly said that this move would allow them to provide backers of an old unfulfilled Judges Guild Kickstarter with refunds, but there are many people questioning seeming contradictions in both the timelines involved and in the appropriateness of the whole endeavour.

Despite the backlash, the prospects of the crowdfunding project do not seem to have been harmed. The pre-launch page has over 3,000 followers, and many of the comments under the YouTube videos or on other social media are not only very supportive of the project, but also condemn those who question its appropriateness. In comparison, the original (failed) Judges Guild Kickstarter had only 965 backers.

The video is embedded below, followed by a transcript of the relevant section.

Hi everybody, I'm Joseph Goodman of Goodman Games. We recently announced our City State of the Invincible Overlord crowdfunding project for 5E and DCC RPG.

In the video you're about to see, some of our product development team is going to tell you about what makes the City State so amazing and why we're bringing it back to 5E and DCC audiences nearly 50 years after it was first released. It really is an amazing setting.

But we could have rolled this project out with a lot more clarity. Now, to be clear, Goodman Games absolutely opposes any sort of bigotry, racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, transphobia. We don't want to support it. We don't want to be associated with it.

Our well-intentioned effort to launch this project in a way that refunds backers of a former failed Kickstarter from another publisher kind of backfired in the way we announced it. Rest assured, the funds from this crowdfunding will actually fund refunds to backers of the original City State crowdfunding for the Pathfinder edition from 2014.

Unfortunately, our efforts have been—you know, I didn’t clarify them perfectly when we rolled it out—and they've been mischaracterized by some folks since then. But please rest assured, we stand for inclusivity and diversity.

You can read a lot more detail in the post that's linked below, and there's another video linked below where we talk about this in even more detail. But for now, we hope you will sit back and enjoy as some of the product development team tells you about really what makes the City State of the Invincible Overlord so amazing, and why you might want to check it out when it comes to crowdfunding soon.

Thanks, and I'll turn it over to them now.

The statement refers to a post about this that is supposed to be linked below, but at the time of writing no post is linked below the video, so it's not clear if that refers to a new post or one of Goodman Games' previous statements on the issue.

I reached out to Joseph Goodman last week to offer a non-confrontational (although direct and candid) interview in which he could answer some ongoing questions and talk on his reasoning behind the decision; I have not yet received a response to the offer--I did, however, indicate that I was just leaving for UK Games Expo, and wouldn't be back until this week.

*Normally I would have covered this in a more timely fashion, but I was away at UK Games Expo from Thursday through to Monday.

 

[mamba]

I'm not sure if you read my second post where I state the reasons for why 2 persons (and please note I'm not a town planner, architect ...etc) so this is my layman knowledge.

here’s the thing though, it doesn’t matter what the supposed intent is, what matters is whether the result leans racist. If it does, then it is racist, no matter the proclaimed intent

When I moved into the complex, it was predominantly white, but now it is predominantly PoC. This is 15 years on. The regulations never changed.

guess it was not racist then

 

[Gradine]

My opinion of course, but I think the predominant factor for the demographic change was a steady migration of people from other parts of the country...

That's the thing; can the impact be directly tied to the specific policy? Are there other factors (such as, say, similar demographic shifts in the larger community) that are more likely to be the source of the impact?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I don't know if they are oddities. I think understanding comes to us unevenly.

It does, but I still see some quirks in my community’s discussions of racism that indicate a drive to frame it as a distinct and therefore somehow worse form of bigotry than the others.

For instance, several of my mentors over the years have insisted that racism requires a power imbalance in favor of the racists. OTOH, there are definitely racists within my family- some self-described. Some hate whites; some hate Koreans; some hate Indians. Etc. So I don’t buy that power imbalance prerequisite.

 

[Umbran]

I think classism many a time finds itself to be mischaracterised as racist. Don't you think?

When the class divisions are so strongly supported by racist policy and history? No, not really.

For instance, several of my mentors over the years have insisted that racism requires a power imbalance in favor of the racists. OTOH, there are definitely racists within my family- some self-described. Some hate whites; some hate Koreans; some hate Indians. Etc. So I don’t buy that power imbalance prerequisite.

So, the language I suggested above kind of handles that. With that form, usually it is said that racism does require a power imbalance - it is looking at impact, rather than intent of individuals. Bigotry, however, does not require power imbalance. Anybody can hate anybody.

 

[The Firebird]

I'm not sure if you read my second post where I state the reasons for why 2 persons (and please note I'm not a town planner, architect ...etc) so this is my layman knowledge.

But to your point...
I do not think the health, safety, town planning regulations etc are racist.
I think that is an extremely short-sighted reactionary view.
When I moved into the complex, it was predominantly white, but now it is predominantly PoC. This is 15 years on. The regulations never changed.

And again, this regulation of 2 people per bedroom for Body Corporates (BC) is country wide.
It is a way for people to protect their investment in the BC.
Your home is your biggest investment usually.

The definition that is now in vogue is fuzzy because it interacts with other systems in nonobvious ways. For example, what if the percentage of group A increased, but by less than it would have in the absence of that policy? We can't assess that case directly. Likewise the same policy implemented in different locations can be racist in one and anti-racist in another.

That isn't a problem as far as it goes, as long as the limitations are acknowledged. But it becomes problematic because the new definition picks up older connotations (i.e., racism = bigotry). So the policy in location A sounds bigoted while the same policy in location B is anti-racist and progressive.