Plenty of people have when the discussion is about othering in horror movies. This is a not uncommon conversation because monsters are often seen as the other in commentary on film. I don't even particularly object to that idea, they often are. My point was because the poster mentioned depictions of people who had been othered and the need to avoid that. I was just pointing out these things can do both, they can do what Night Breed did, which is explore monsters as misunderstood, and you can have movies like a Nightmare on Elm Street, or the thing, or you have the Howling, where the monsters are out to eat you but there is one among them trying to civilize the werewolves even though it all goes wrong. You could read that as some kind of othering of primal people, or you could simply read it as a primal evil that is in all people due to our evolution. My point is it isn't as simple as building a list of things you can and can do in building a world, making a movie, etc. Or even just a list that WOTC specifically can't or shouldn't do.
Well, this isn't a conversation about othering in horror movies. And when we talk about othering people, we are referring to the plural version, not the singular version. So again, none of that applies.
And no one said this was as simple as building a list, we know it isn't that simple, because again this is something creatives in every medium have done since forever. There is always a list of things you can and can't do. Whether or not you successfully agitate for WoTC to never change these things won't prevent the list, it will just change the contents of it.
There are plenty where there are whole groups or races of monsters. Aliens for example. Ghoulies, Puppet Master (albeit a much more nuanced take with some social commentary for sure). Monsters not being able to communicate with humans doesn't necessarily make them any less intelligent or sapient. I think generally though it's easier in movies and in horror in general to focus on one creature.
Aliens, like from the franchise Alien? Those are certainly not intelligent enough to be sapient. Ghoulies seems like demon spirits that grunt and growl, so no communication. Puppet Master, ah okay, these are marionettes brought to life... but not really a "race" or "species" more like.. these five distinct people. So, borderline.
But again, you don't generally a non-human, intelligent, coherently speaking species of horror monsters. And it can be for many reasons, but again, that makes horror movies and horror movie monsters fundamentally different than what we are talking about for DnD.
Again, it is fantasy, it is fiction. If someone wants to go around painting all Russians as Evil or all Japanese people as evil (or even just all one thing), obviously that is wrong. But a world where you have a monstrous species that behaves in a way humans would consider evil? That is not a problem. It might be dull if that is the only way these things get handled (I think plenty of settings benefit from more fleshed out takes on humanoids and monsters, and I quite like genres where monsters themselves even are very human like and have human needs and desires----A Chinese Ghost Story for example). But I don't see any issue with a game being overly simplistic about good and evil or a writer making a fantasy world decides it would be cool to have legions of evil monsters attacking a fantasy city because the imagery of good versus evil is compelling to them for some reason (it doesn't necessarily mean they would be that reductive when dealing with real conflicts people real people in the world, or that people reading it should come away thinking that its okay to do that).
Yes, I understand that it is fiction, and that it is fantasy. But it isn't JUST that we have a species that behaves in a way we consider evil. That species also acts like humans. They have families and children, they use armor and weapons, they react logically in ways we could expect humans to react.... and then we are told that they have no real goals or motivations, they are just all evil. And you can claim that that is bad and dull, but you don't seem to get the extent to which that break worldbuilding. I would honestly struggle to find a CHILDREN'S SHOW that has a species of human-like bad guys that are bad just for the sole purpose of being bad. They all have goals, many of them show that the bad guys are redeemable. You are presenting something too unrealistic for most children's programming, and then just shrugging like "well, it is fine"
And that is solely covering the mechanics of writing part of why this is bad, we also need to consider "well, why can a book or movie get away with it?" In part? Time. A movie is 2 to 3 hours. It doesn't have space for everything and we forgive it for that. But DnD? They expect you to engage with DnD for hundreds of thousands of hours. The world building needs to be fairly robust to stand up to that much scrutiny and familiarity.
And finally... they didn't just say "orcs fight people and that's it" they used language and images which denoted cultures and racism. And all we need to fix this situation is too things. Remove the racist language, give them motivations beyond "am evil" and... that's about it. That is enough to fix this. And I don't think that is a bridge too far.
It isn’t revealed religious truth though. Just because you present a trope that doesn’t mean I am going to agree with you. I understand it can be frustrating. But we aren’t trying to convert each other, we are giving our opinions and talking. The needle hasn’t moved on the other side either. But I have no expectation that anyone here is going to alter their views of the world or media simply because I make a particular point about a trope
But you keep defaulting to "but it is fiction, so it doesn't matter", "It isn't real, so it doesn't matter" and we keep trying to explain to you that it can matter. It matters a lot. Heck, I'd never heard of the Scully Effect, but it certainly does make a lot of sense that seeing a female doctor who was presented as the hero would inspire people to become doctors.
Fiction matters. Yes, even fantasy races that "aren't real" matter. If it didn't matter, no one would talk about them.
Does it? I am not so sure this is true anymore than ‘everything’ or ‘all art’ is political is true. Yes people bring perspectives and schools of thought to art. That doesn’t mean all art is reflecting an ideology or advancing one (particularly if we are speaking of political ideologies). Sometimes art is just the expression of an emotion or an experience
What kind of experience? Is the art trying to communicate that experience to you? Isn't that implying an ideology that that expierence is meaningful and worth experiencing?
Expressing an emotion how? Through color? Isn't it part of an ideology that certain colors are linked to certain emotions, that certain line shapes are connected to certain emotions?
Doesn't "art for arts sake" fall into an ideology that says that art is important for its own sake?
All an ideology is is a system of ideas and/or ideals. They don't have to be political, or economic ideologies. They just have to be systems of thought.
As I said before I don't share this assumption about art. For me actually the most important thing about art isn't message at all but how it moves and makes people feel. That is where I think art is most interesting. I am not saying art can't have a political message or that art has no power. I just think there are other aspects of society that have considerably more direct power on our lives and art is often just a means of people expressing themselves.
"Power" isn't just political power. I'm struggling to understand how you can say what is important is how it moves you, then turn around and act like that means you have to clarify that statement doesn't mean you think art lacks power. That would be like me telling you that I enjoy walking in the rain, but that isn't to say that I mind getting wet. That is a nonsensical statement.
Where it does have power though, I would say that is an argument in favor of being less rather than more restrictive. I still that power is vastly overblown. Ideas need fertile ground to take root in. You can't just show propaganda films and expect them to act accordingly, you need to be speaking to ideas, fears and hatreds that are already present.
And where do those fears and hatreds come from? Doesn't it seem like, if you get used to saying "this fictional thing is okay to hate" that you are laying groundwork for "well these people are like that fictional thing that is okay to hate, so you should hate them too"? Art doesn't just need fertile ground, it CREATES fertile ground.
Usually efforts to control art, whether official, academic, through criticism in media, often end up serving the interests of the powerful (i.e. it is very easy to start with good reasons for why things ought to be controlled in art----Fahrenheit 451 starts with this premise actually----but it often just ends up being a lever exploited by other people down the road. And I realize people here aren't calling for official censorship, but we are talking about whether things ought or should be able to be in a book.
All the above, to be clear is speaking much more generally on the topic and not necessarily related to the more ground level conversation we are having. Where we are just talking about whether people find certain tropes in a fantasy book repugnant or compelling, I think the criticisms often miss the mark and mistake content for message, or read the worst possible interpretation, and that leaves out a lot of interesting content in my opinion. I'm finding the direction people seem to be advocating for, one that just doesn't seem as interesting or as gameable to me, and I think it over prioritizes the concerns being expressed.
Why is it interesting to have savage, dumb, brutish raiders whose only desire is killing and pillaging? Who have little to no culture or motivation beyond being fodder to kill? You are claiming that you find the direction of removing this to make things less interesting, so how is this interesting?
Or is your argument that it is more gameable? Well, that's odd. I've never found humans, elves, dwarves, gnomes, or any of a dozen other races to be ungameable. They are quite gameable in fact. So how would making things more like those species make anything less gameable?
I have offered plenty of reasons, evidence, etc. I don't think you've found it compelling, which is fair. You don't have to. Perhaps I am not making a strong argument to support what I feel I see going on. But I never said you asking for content to be removed from RPG books is going to need to the entirety of art across society being bland (I do think we are in a period of extremely bland and forgettable media with a handful of exceptions, because of trends like this in broader society----but I wouldn't limit that issue to just this one subject, I think it also to do more widely with the way creators and producers are responding to the internet and not necessarily the specific issues involved).
No, it would just bring things "closer to pablum" which you repeated. And in the thread before I got involved you consistently were warning about the slippery slope of our criticism going too far and removing everything "interesting" from the game.
And other than this assertion, you haven't given evidence. You just assert this will be true. And when we show you examples of it not being true... you just assert it will be true.
Again, the slippery slope can still happen. And I think we have certainly seen it happen in the RPG hobby. Originally there were just some minor rumblings about orcs and how its okay to like problematic things, but this has very rapidly I would say become an overriding obsession where it covers anything now from exploration adventures where you kill things and take their stuff and attaching that to colonialism, to all sorts of things we've had any number of discussions on here. Perhaps you don't see it as a slope, maybe you see it as a golden path forward to a better hobby. And fair enough. If I agreed with all your suppositions here, I'd probably feel the same way. But I don't. I think these things are leading us to worse content. When I look at where D&D is going in terms of how they are navigating this, it just doesn't look interesting or gameable to me (and of course that is preference, others might have a totally different reaction). For example, I didn't find the new Ravenloft all that compelling. I found the art, the illustrations and some of the ideas great. But I think it paled compared to Curse of Strahd or the original setting material.
See, right here. Your entire argument is that this is a slippery slope leading to a worse hobby. You see this as an "obsession" but it covers things that... have been discussed many many times. You have people saying there were colonial elements they didn't like in the game since 2nd edition.
Heck, the Fires of Zatal were published in 1991. It features Cordell, the leader of the Golden Legion, which colonizes the "savage jungles" that have a distinct aztec look to them. Hmm, Cordell and the Golden Legion... Hmm... Cortes? I mean, it isn't like the adventure features a pre-written character whose goal is religious conversion of the native population or that The Golden Legion kept slaves, or had a pre-written character who dreamed of becoming a land owner who had slaves... Oh wait. That all is true.
Kixitiloc was an adventurer in Maztica. Kixitiloc lived in a small Payit village that was destroyed during a battle against another village. Kixitiloc was taken as a slave. In 1361 DR, he arrived in Ulatos the same day as Cordell's forces arrived. He soon became a slave of the Golden Legion...
forgottenrealms.fandom.com
Gontonia of Helm was an adventurer in Maztica. Gontonia was one of the Godseyes, or Watchers of Helm, and went to Maztica in order to research the ways of this new world and convert the natives. He had learned the Payit language and some of the Nexalan language. He befriended the desert dwarf...
forgottenrealms.fandom.com
Huh, wonder why people might think DnD has some troubling history with colonialism when in
1991 they released an adventure where you play on the side of the conquistadors, with a pre-written priest gunning for religious conversions, a pre-written warrior who wants to be a slave owner, and has one of the major villains be a high priest of the local religion who is secretly a cult leader.
Too bad we've moved to making things so much less interesting these days.
I would say the ability to express ideas in a way that is genuine and not filled with second guessing or trying to always read an imaginary audiences mind is under threat. So I would say this is threatening artistic expression at its core. Because everything gets put under this microscope and virtually anything is found to be a problem. All you have to do is look back on the pages of this thread and similar ones to see how constraining that might be.
And again, maybe you don't share my concern. That is fine. But I can tell you honestly, both as a player of RPGs and as a designer, I don't think I've ever felt such a chilled atmosphere for creativity.
Huh, threatening artistic expression at its core, but you wouldn't say that our push "
is going to need to the entirety of art across society being bland"
And yeah, we are more observant than before. We are questioning things that we are writing. But you don't have to. You don't have to second guess yourself or try and imagine your audience and what they will find acceptable. Write whatever you want. If it is good, people will buy it, if it isn't, they won't. And if people decide your stuff is offensive and they don't want to buy it... well, that's their right and it turns out you didn't make a product that could be successful. Sorry about your luck, but it happens.
I don't see you as a threat at all. I see some of the trends in RPGs right now, especially those stemming from some of these cultural debates, as very well intentioned but ultimately leading to not great content and not a great environment to be creative in as a designer.
Hasn't stopped Ghostfire games, or Kobold Press, The Dungeon Dudes, or... really any designer I've heard of. They seem to be able to figure this out.
In terms of the mechanics, to me the way they've handled it really feels muddled. One I think having mechanical weight is important here. I also think one of the things that really makes D&D work is those initial choices of race and class, including, if you have them, the half elf and half orc being part of that.
I can agree that in an ideal world, we would have the mechanics. But as discussed, there is very much not a clear way to actually do that in a balanced manner. Either you have "build-your-own species" or you have over a thousand unique entries and growing. Neither way works better than what was done.
And I don't see D&D as being about portraying people in the real world. I am all for having settings that are diverse, and all for not doing offensive things (though we probably disagree on what qualifies as offensive). But I don't want this to be the priority of design. Don't get me wrong I like books and games that are written by different people from different backgrounds, I think it is good to have more creators from different backgrounds, but I don't think we should make that the reason for doing things if that makes sense. It should be one reason among many, not the overriding one. But the way this issue has unfolded in the hobby it often seems like we are exclusively focused on this, sometimes so much so, to its own determent.
I am also not interested in moral perfection of a product. We aren't making bibles or creating study material for school children. We are making games set in fantasy worlds that I think benefit from being messy and weird sometimes.
Sure, there needs to be a balance. Thirty years ago, it was making a game where you had pre-written characters in the Forgotten Realms who dreamed of being slave owners. Today, we say we would prefer to not have the core books depict racism just because some people think that's "interesting".
The reason it is an "obsession" is because the other stuff? Make a villain, give them a plot, design a map for battles? All that is trivially easy. We've been doing that part successfully for decades. Now we are focused on getting the part we keep messing up right.
