Is this gaming product too offensive or merely funny?

[Malic]

So, where's the dividing line between crudely and offensively stereotyping people and self-deprecating parody of crudely and offensively stereotyping people?

This product is not my cup of tea at all - based on reviews as well as web content - but I won't be avoiding Mongoose over it. Still, they must have anticipated annoying some people with this stuff. And honestly, why would you not expect people to consider web content a good guide to what the book is like?

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

But gamers who value an inclusive and tolerant gaming community free of hatred are also free to choose to support only those publishers and authors who share their values.

Ah yes, the hyperbole of the lowest-common-denominator-sensitivity-factor. Almost as offensive as the windmills of illusionary "hatred" being tilted at.

 

[S'mon]

I think it was wise to delete it. A reasonable alternative would have been to use an access-control key so you could only download it if you'd bought the book.

 

[Malic]

Ah yes, the hyperbole of the lowest-common-denominator-sensitivity-factor. Almost as offensive as the windmills of illusionary "hatred" being tilted at.

There is real hatred and discrimination out there, Eric, and some of us real people have to deal with it.

 

[James Heard]

Personally I find the idea of actively campaigning against the product on three (or more?) forums as some sort of crusade to be more offensive than the web enhancement. I mean, it's not my cup of tea but it's fiction. I don't read a lot of things, but I find the idea of championing an attempt to mobilize a community into censorship repugnant in the extreme. If someone wants to write and publish The Slayers Guide To Jews or some nonsense then I won't buy it - but neither will I enjoy watching people froth and titter over calls to boycott the publisher.

There are more important reasons to boycott publishers, like poor binding and bad editting. What they choose to market and sell really shouldn't enter into it at all, especially considering how fringe the market is in the first place. That is, if you're really interested in killing the company over this then you should do it properly, with the people with the most to gain: Tell Jack Chick, and Oprah. They might even get the rest of everyone else's books off the shelves too. That would be so good for the hobby.

 

[James Heard]

There is real hatred and discrimination out there, Eric, and some of us real people have to deal with it.

Sure. Is it the book's fault? It's fiction. Not. Real.

When a book offends you, put it down. Offense over. I don't read Salvatore, but I'm not calling for a boycott crusade against the man or his publisher.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

There is real hatred and discrimination out there, Eric, and some of us real people have to deal with it.

It wasn't in the now-deleted web enhancement. It was tastelessness. Never attribute to malice what is more likely boneheadedness or bad judgement. You just might find that at one moment you don't meet the standards you are holding others up to.

 

[Jupp]

Just wanted to thank all the moral apostles on all the boards that discuss this topic at the moment. I had some good chuckles reading some of the posts made about this pdf (In fact those posts were much more funny than the pdf itself)...And I am happy that I live far away enough from those guys (hopefully).

 

[beakie]

Ah yes, the hyperbole of the lowest-common-denominator-sensitivity-factor. Almost as offensive as the windmills of illusionary "hatred" being tilted at.

"Sensitivity" is the will to say that the words that symbolize violence against and subjugation of groups of people by others, that carry the threat of the continuation of such violence and subjugation within them, that exclude people and deny their value as human beings are no better than the acts of violence and subjugation they inherently refer to.

To refuse to take discrimination, inequality, and hatred seriously, and to make sensitivity to them the "lowest common denominator" is to spurn the ideals of freedom and equality. To call the hatred that epithets embody "illusionary" is to refuse to acknowledge the intolerance that exists in the world, and to further ridicule those who suffer from it. Homophobia, racism, sexism, and other forms of discrimination exist, and to be insensitive to that fact, and to attempt to make them mere trifles is to justify the violence and pain that they cause every day.

I'm glad that you are fortunate, as James Desborough is, to be unharmed by hatred or prejudice, to be free from having to deal with their consequences. Things that don't affect you can seem insignificant. To be blind to or ignorant of them is forgivable. But to attempt to justify them is shameful.

jakebone

 

[Paragon Kobold]

"Sensitivity" is the will to say that the words that symbolize violence against and subjugation of groups of people by others, that carry the threat of the continuation of such violence and subjugation within them, that exclude people and deny their value as human beings are no better than the acts of violence and subjugation they inherently refer to.

Let me make something absolutely clear: If I actually belived that by not buying
'Conan: The Pirate Isles' I would somehow help people subjected to violence
and discrimination, I would boycott Mongoose.

I believe this goes for most people on this board.