agreed, you could make racist caricature tribes, I am just not expecting Native Americans to do so. That the fictional tribes are not that was impliedAnd if it were an issue where those fictional tribes were actually being disrespectful to real ones, then more likely this discussion becomes more directly about that problem, rather than a distractione conjured out of thin air.
I am a lot more optimistic. But I also think this sort of thing can take time as people learn more about the culture and about historyI’d say there either is a 98% chance, or you play it so superficially that I am not sure why you even bother instead of going with the options the game offers you
feel free to imagine it, but refrain from trying to act it out
We are just going to have to disagree because I think these are leagues apartprobably not as much as you assume there is
plumber is not an ethnicity, unless that is your Italian stereotype
no, they still play together, the opposite of segregation
But it specially is addressing different groups of people and telling them how to behave ...
Yes I do, and like I said, I do believe this person thinks they are doing good and promoting better ideas about how to handle culture in RPGs, but that doesn't make it less of a problem just because it is framed as a request. This isn't a straw man. The issue is asking people because of who they are, and because of things about their identity they have no control over, they not 'incorporate any of [their] knowledge or ideas of real world Native Americans into the game'. You can frame anything like that as a polite request. Imagine a header directed to 'Non-Christian Players', to Jewish players, or to non-White players making such a request. I get it is well intentioned. I get the concern is wanting the culture to be respected. My point is I don't think this is a good way to go about it, and I think that this has become so normalized in the gaming community that people don't see this as discriminatory or racist is itself a problem.Do you recognize a difference between "telling you how to behave" and "asking you to behave"? Do you recognize the difference between an imperative statement, and a request? Do you recognize the valence and meaning of the words "we ask" and "please"?
You have set up a strawman version of what the book presents. We should, collectively, refuse to engage with that strawman.
I think the problem with your argument is that you are ignoring the real world in which this work is being published. Please remember that in the United States 90% of Native Americans died during European colonization. I'm going to try to say this next part with as little politics as possible: policies by the US government have tended to be oppressive and destructive towards Native Americans.Yes I do, and like I said, I do believe this person thinks they are doing good and promoting better ideas about how to handle culture in RPGs, but that doesn't make it less of a problem just because it is framed as a request. This isn't a straw man. The issue is asking people because of who they are, and because of things about their identity they have no control over, they not 'incorporate any of [their] knowledge or ideas of real world Native Americans into the game'. You can frame anything like that as a polite request. Imagine a header directed to 'Non-Christian Players', to Jewish players, or to non-White players making such a request. I get it is well intentioned. I get the concern is wanting the culture to be respected. My point is I don't think this is a good way to go about it, and I think that this has become so normalized in the gaming community that people don't see this as discriminatory or racist is itself a problem.
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That doesn't require treating readers differently based on their race in that case. Nor does it require telling one group they can't play a particular thing. All that requires is an explanation of the setting in the introductionBut the cultures of Coyote and Crow don't exist in our world. They haven't faced the cultural impact of hundreds of years of genocide and oppression. To play as a person using what you know about modern day or historic indigenous peoples, instead of the cultures in the book, is inappropriate to the setting.
But it's not discriminatory or racist to be put in that situation.
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Is it the fact that this message is specifically targeting non-Native American Players that's making you feel uncomfortable? If so I would challenge you to to sit with that discomfort for a bit. Are you being threatened or harmed? Is your culture or cultural identity being threatened? When I am in these situations, I often realize my discomfort comes from the fact that I'm being asked to see through the perspective of people who have, historically, been harmed by people I identify with. That's an emotionally challenging thing to do, and I think it's okay to feel discomfort in that situation.