Even when you limit it to that I disagree. Why would a black person born and raised in the US automatically have any connection or idea about being disaporic or, when you consider the ItML setting, go out and explore unknown lands?
D&D 5E On Representation and Roleplaying
jmartkdr2
Hero
Well this one's simple: they're part of a diaspora.
I don't think I've heard a single person every state that people who aren't adventurers shouldn't make adventure games.
What? Why would a black american automatically be part of a diaspora? Even when he or she was born in the US, as were (probably) their parents? You do seem to attribute quite a lot to the skin colour a person has.
Which is exactly what I was talking about why it is about appearances. No matter their personal background of someone, if they are black they are more qualified to write about diasporic people etc...
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Thomas Shey
Legend
Diaspora is not an issue of just immediate events. People referred to as part of the Jewish Diaspora had often been in the parts of Europe they were in for generations.
Some American blacks aren't part of a diaspora, but they're in the minority.
Being part of a diaspora does not mean being a first generation immigrant. It means people who have been forced out or fled their ancestral lands (e.g. the Jewish diaspora). Further, the transatlantic slave trade and colonialism wasn't just an event that happened and then went away, but was a process of forming societies and their institutions in ways that still affect--deeply--present-day experiences. That's the key--it's not about some mystical connection to one's ancestors, but about the way that history is an on going process, and how the past has informed and continues to inform everyday life.
BookTenTiger
He / Him
You're getting into deep topics of culture and identity here that I'm not sure a D&D Forum is equipped to handle. There are some great authors of books on black identity you can check out. I highly recommend Ta-Nahesi Coates' "Between the World and Me." It's a really approachable and personal book that communicates a lot about some of the questions you've had.
One thing I've noticed in these discussions is that they are almost always exclusively talked about from the perspective of American race relations and tend to dismiss other viewpoints if such considerations are raised at all. Japan, as an example, is rather particular in how it views gaijin, but their views aren't the same that an American would have. Nor are the issues immigrants face in Germany the same as those faced in the US.
We need to carefully consider that what is problematic at home, such as the choice to cast ScarJo as the Major in GitS, isn't an issue in the country that initially created that character.
We need to carefully consider that what is problematic at home, such as the choice to cast ScarJo as the Major in GitS, isn't an issue in the country that initially created that character.
This can be true, but in D&D you choose the character you roleplay ....... unless you are a DM .... and then you can still choose to change the entire encounter and NPC.
I generally play women characters, not always but usually and I find I can roleplay them well (at least I think so) and I enjoy it. However I never play a woman Cobold, Lizardfolk or Dragonborn because I have realy trouble doing that well.
When it comes to accents I am awful, so most of the time I don't do it as a player.
There are two things I would like to note here.
1. First much of the rules themselves are based in stereotypes. For example the entire Samarai subclass is based on tropes of Asian samarais. There are other less obvious stereotypes, but they are there. It is difficult to completely avoid these and still play anything that looks like actual D&D.
2. While real-world stereotypes exist, many things are criticized which have no real world counterparts. An example is the racial abilities and specifically intelligence penalty to Orcs that was taken out. I am all for taking that out and it was stupid to be in there to start with. I am also for making the abilities movable as this enables more creativity and options. But this was painted as some sort of prejudice when in fact there are no actual Orcs in the world and a D&D "race" is not equivalent to a real-world "race".
Finally I will note that people can play what they want at their table and the metric by which it should be judged is not whether it is "right" or
"wrong" but rather if the people at the table are having fun. In organized play there certainly needs to be ground rules to ensure no one feels unsafe or pigeonholed and new groups forming up should talk about this in session 0. However in private games with people who know each other well and have played for years this can be completely different and the important element is if everyone is having fun.
ad_hoc
(they/them)
Whether or not that is true, it could still be an issue for people of heritage from those countries living in North America.
It is an understatement to say that people of both Japanese and Chinese heritage have been treated very poorly in North America. Chinese people were enslaved to create railroads and Japanese people were put into concentration camps for example.
Violence against them has risen dramatically with the onset of the global pandemic as well.
Having positive representation in popular media would make a meaningful difference for them. At the very least it will heighten empathy toward them when white people see them as protagonists on screen.
MGibster
Legend
Chinese people were not enslaved in the United States. After the Civil War, they were used as cheap labor to build our rail roads and even a bit in the American South to replace black laborers who demanded higher wages. And while Chinese laborers were often treated poorly by by all sorts of different groups in the United States, they were not slaves.
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