Oriental Adventures, was it really that racist?

[Bedrockgames]

Again, I think people make credible arguments as to why, "This time it's different." But that doesn't mean that there are credible arguments the other way as well. A person can agree that speech is harmful, or distasteful, or offensive, and still disagree as to the proper course of action.

This was the heart of the free speech movement. You were very often defending speech you disagreed with, because that is where the encroachment starts (no one begins by censoring speech we all agree is great, it starts with stuff there is consensus around, and then that mechanism tightens and tightens).

 

[Alzrius]

This was the heart of the free speech movement. You were very often defending speech you disagreed with, because that is where the encroachment starts (no one begins by censoring speech we all agree is great, it starts with stuff there is consensus around, and then that mechanism tightens and tightens).

I agree completely, and think it's worth noting that too often that particular stance on principle is demonized as being cover for promulgating various unpalatable messages. While there are undoubtedly bad actors who use free speech as an excuse for pushing ideas that are distasteful (at the very least), that doesn't mean that the metaphorical well has been poisoned. Principled arguments on this particular subject remain important (at least, I think they do).

 

[Bedrockgames]

One of the primary ways in which this was fought was to invoke the principles of freedom of speech, so that retailers like Waldenbooks would continue carrying this so-called harmful speech despite continued pressure.

And one reason this also matters is because that content can disappear if it isn't commercially available. People have argued that because of public domain, because of the internet, these things have no real danger of disappearing. But I think stuff like the TSR back catalog could easily disappear or become inaccessible. In fact until they put that stuff up on drivethru, a lot of it was (I know because I was trying to re-buy Ravenloft books I no longer had and some of them you simply couldn't get or you could only get if you were willing to fork over a lot of money). Twenty years ago, you could get many of these books cheap used. But collectors changed that (and time changes that even without collectors). I suppose you can argue that people can always go to piracy sites, but technically those are illegal. People want to obtain these things legally. And it is the same with movies. I am a martial arts film buff, and collect DVDs, VHS and Blurays. Movies do disappear. There are films you can't get, or films that you can only get incomplete versions of. Often this isn't a result of censorship (though it can be). But it is a product of things not being commercially available and there not being any reason for the company to either maintain the masters or for people to have physical copies of the media. To me, that is a loss of culture over time. I want to be able to engage with old media. Something as simply as a company not publishing something when it wants to or can, can result in that thing not being available. And even when there are still copies around, people have different degrees of access to libraries. Even when things are on the internet, people have different degrees of access to the internet.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

I really would NOT be so sure about that! If you SELL me an ePub, the First Sale Doctrine would seem, ON THE FACE OF IT, to still apply. OTOH if you 'license' it to me, there are still serious questions. That is, if the licensing is essentially a sham, if the transaction has all the character of a sale, many courts have held that it "quacks like a duck" and again the same doctrine holds. That is far from universal, and what any given court would rule is difficult to foretell. Still, you can easily argue there's a CONTRACTUAL issue, but not a copyright violation, which is a lot easier to deal with. Also, what are the damages, $29.95? Trebled?! Wow!

In theory yes, and libraries have done so, but there has definitely been a lot of erosion, here's a page of resources on the subject from the American Library Association. The main problem is that when a patron borrows a digital copy of a library book, they are themselves creating a new copy of it, that's just how sharing content digitally works. That essentially functions as a loophole in the intent of first sale by ensuring that any (digital) sharing of that material violates copyright by producing a copy of it.

The U.S. is in dire need of copyright reform.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well, we are all limited to our own identities, but I still think people can make informed attempts to understand other points of view and other experiences. In terms of not being targeted, maybe not in the case of the OA book, but in many other instances I had in mind for historical readings, I was certainly among the groups targeted. It is hard to read old books and not encounter someone with negative feelings or even hatred towards who you are at some point. Which is my point. And some of that may be having a history background. Where when I encounter something like that, my impulse is curiosity.

That is one of the reasons I brought up Lovecraft. And the Irish and Scottish stuff is no accident. It is one of the reasons people need to take a more nuanced lens to Lovecraft's attitudes on race (I am not defending his views on race, just pointing out it is a different kind of racism than people are accustomed to thinking about). Now I should say, it has been about ten years since I have done heavy reading of Lovecraft (I read him almost religiously in high school and into my 20s). More recently I've been fonder of Howard (I just like Conan stories a lot for some reason). I am hoping to go back and read all of Lovecraft again when I have time to do so. So my breakdown here might be mixing up details I am remembering. I am going by what I remember (the most recent re-read of Lovecraft for me was Herbert West about a year ago when I rewatched the re-animator).

His racism, and I think he is too big a topic to really get into in this thread but I want to address it, is uniquely patrician New England form of racism. And that is an easily misread form of racism. It isn't like the racism of say the segregated south, where the emphasis is on the dividing line between white and black. It is more like a continuum and grounded in xenophobia and concern about bloodlines I think. It is a type of racism that is very specific about what it likes: English Blood (and specifically people in New England with bloodlines that can be traced back to the very early days of the first settlers). The term we used to use her for that is a Yankee. That word means other things in other parts of the country, and even in New England today its largely lost the meaning I am using here. But when I was a kid when my grandfather talked about yankees, he wasn't talking about him and I, he was talking about New England patricians). I am Italian, Jewish and Irish: as far as I can tell from reading his stories and some of the things he has said, Lovecraft had misgivings about all of those groups (though he did marry a Jewish woman, so his feelings clearly complicated). And I believe it was the Irish he held in the lowest regard among the three (I could be wrong on that). My point here is just that, if you are not English, there is a good chance that Lovecraft's xenophobia and racism are targeted at you (some more than others obviously). Because it is about ethnic purity, and the Anglo-heritage of New England, versus the melting pot and new immigrant groups breathing life into the culture. And that kind of thinking is something I remember encountering still in New England as a kid. Again it had mostly faded but there were traces of it. In my grandfather's generation (he was born in the 20s) it was a lot more common. He told me for example the Italian from the brickyard (a section of Lynn where the italians used to live) weren't allowed to go into the Diamond District. I don't think this was an official decree. I doubt there was an ordinance against it, but it was known he couldn't go there freely (unless he was helping build a wall or something).

I do think it is also just a complicated topic with Lovecraft and race, and I am not refreshed enough on his writing to comment deeply. But I think in terms of when and where he lived, that viewpoint wasn't all that uncommon (I even remember bumping into it in the 80s here). And he was a very complicated person. In these discussions I think we often get a very simplified presentation from ether the 'he was not a racist' or 'he was a racist' camp, and the reality is pretty messy and evolves over time (and seems to change in different contexts).

What I will say is I think we sometimes make the mistake of reading everything he wrote through the lens of his racism. Or misapplying exactly what races he has in mind. There are a number of stories I remember where you have these old new england communities and I actually read the racial stuff in some of those as being more about inbred New England patricians in places like Marblehead (but I have seen others interpret them as other groups). I've also read plenty of stories where I don't think race was really a big concern in his mind and people have projected that onto the tales. I am not saying my interpretations are the correct ones, this is just how I reacted to some of those stories when I first read them (and I think being from this region helped inform that intrepration). The race thing is there for sure in places (and it is often directed at everything from black people to Italians), but I think we are so conscious of it now it is becoming our primary lens for reading Lovecraft and lovecraft was a deep horror writer who wasn't soley about race.

I would say, familiarize yourself with the correspondence of Lovecraft, which has been analyzed and discussed quite thoroughly. He's as much a raving monstrous bag of toxic racism as Uncle Adolf at his worst, to put it quite bluntly. In his stories I think it is pretty blatant too though, to be honest. With few exceptions every story talks about 'degenerates' and references concepts like miscegenation, which are simply blatant outright racism in its most virulent forms. It would really be hard to find someone more racist, even if we can say that perhaps HPL didn't DO much/anything actively about it (and I'm not sure that we can assume this). As for his choice of a spouse... well, that didn't last long! While I really enjoy the genre(s) he helped to develop, I can only say that I have no illusions about or patience with the man himself. He was a rotten apple in that regard, perhaps for reasons that we should attribute to forces outside of his own person to a degree, but if I absolve this one, who is it that I would condemn?

 

[Bedrockgames]

I would say, familiarize yourself with the correspondence of Lovecraft, which has been analyzed and discussed quite thoroughly. He's as much a raving monstrous bag of toxic racism as Uncle Adolf at his worst, to put it quite bluntly. In his stories I think it is pretty blatant too though, to be honest. With few exceptions every story talks about 'degenerates' and references concepts like miscegenation, which are simply blatant outright racism in its most virulent forms. It would really be hard to find someone more racist, even if we can say that perhaps HPL didn't DO much/anything actively about it (and I'm not sure that we can assume this). As for his choice of a spouse... well, that didn't last long! While I really enjoy the genre(s) he helped to develop, I can only say that I have no illusions about or patience with the man himself. He was a rotten apple in that regard, perhaps for reasons that we should attribute to forces outside of his own person to a degree, but if I absolve this one, who is it that I would condemn?

I have read them. But it has been a while like I said. And again, I am not defending his views. Again, read what I said. I feel like I am seeing a caricature of the point I was trying to make.

Also just to ground this in some common point, this is the wikipedia entry on H.P. Lovecraft's views on race:

Race​

Race is the most controversial aspect of Lovecraft's legacy, expressed in many disparaging remarks against non-Anglo-Saxon races and cultures in his works. As he grew older, his original racial worldview became a classism or elitism which regarded the superior race to include all those self-ennobled through high culture. From the start, Lovecraft did not hold all white people in uniform high regard, but rather esteemed English people and those of English descent.[139] In his early published essays, private letters and personal utterances, he argued for a strong color lineto preserve race and culture.[140] His arguments were supported using disparagements of various races in his journalism and letters, and allegorically in his fictional works that depict non-human races.[141] This is evident in his portrayal of the Deep Ones in The Shadow over Innsmouth. Their interbreeding with humanity is framed as being a type of miscegenation that corrupts both the town of Innsmouth and the protagonist.[142]

Initially, Lovecraft showed sympathy to minorities who adopted Western culture, even to the extent of marrying a Jewish woman he viewed as being "well assimilated".[143] By the 1930s, Lovecraft's views on ethnicity and race had moderated.[144] He supported ethnicities' preserving their native cultures; for example, he thought that "a real friend of civilisation wishes merely to make the Germans more German, the French more French, the Spaniards more Spanish, & so on".[145] This represented a shift from his previous support for cultural assimilation. However, this did not represent a complete elimination of his racial prejudices.[146] Scholars have argued that Lovecraft's racial attitudes were common in the society of his day, particularly in the New England in which he grew up.[147]

That isn't much different from things I was stating. My point wasn't that he wasn't racist, or that it isn't present in the works. It was that his racism was a specific brand of New England Racism (which was directed at just about anyone who wasn't English), that his views are not always easy to pin down because they shifted over time and he was a troubled man, and that his works are more complicated than just being products of that racism). I can hold in my head the idea that Lovecraft was racist, while also understanding the works have value beyond that, that you can enjoy them despite the racism, and that he is a very complicated human being.

And on the point of miscegenation, yes I find miscegenation appalling (both because I am in an interracial marriage and a product of unions Lovecraft would have considered miscegenation. That doesn't mean I can't also enjoy the horror stories he wrote, or that I can't see them in numerous lights (i.e. not reduce every story to racial issues). I live in New England. I like reading the works of New England horror authors. Again the most recent story I read, which is something of an atypical Lovecraft story but it is the one I remember best at the moment, is Herbert West-Reanimator. There is racism in that story, it is definitely there for sure. But there are other themes. The core idea of the story can easily be told without the racism for example.

 

[Bedrockgames]

He's as much a raving monstrous bag of toxic racism as Uncle Adolf at his worst, to put it quite bluntly.

This needs some serious push back. No doubt, Lovecraft held racist views, I believe he even expressed admiration for Hitler (though I also understand he was uneasy about some of the news he heard coming out of Germany later on), but Hitler murdered 6 million Jews (and many others, including something like a million Roma). Hitler had murderous views on race. Lovecraft wrote books, and expressed racist views that were weirdly oriented around English blood-lines. I don't see either as a good thing, but there is a reason we say "He's the next Hitler" and not "He's the next Lovecraft" when we are worried that someone is evil and dangerous. Again, I am not saying Lovecraft's views on race were good, or should be defined. But I don't think it is accurate or wise to compare Lovecraft and Hitler in that way because all it does is minimize the evil of Hitler.

 

[Alzrius]

But I don't think it is accurate or wise to compare Lovecraft and Hitler in that way because all it does is minimize the evil of Hitler.

This needs to be repeated ad nauseam. Contemporary rhetoric around Lovecraft tends to say that he was egregiously racist even compared to other racists of his time. That's simply not true; while his views were odious, the manifestation of them was to write stories with xenophobic overtones, give his cat an offensive name, and write a bigoted poem (which he never intended for publication; it wasn't until decades after his death that it was released publicly). That's a very far cry from putting on a white sheet and committing mass murder and domestic terrorism, let alone setting up concentration camps.

 

[Dire Bare]

So, I'm just wrong.

I thought the disclaimer was applied to all the legacy products on for sale on-line, and that contributed to my impression that it wasn't pointing to any particular book's fault but was so broadly applied as to be meaningless.

That's the not the case.

My apologies for the error.

Carry on.

I might have missed part of this conversation, but . . . the disclaimer IS on all of the D&D legacy products, and I'm fairly sure it's on all the other legacy products as well (Gamma World, Star Frontiers). The only products that don't have the legacy disclaimer are the current 5th Edition titles on D&D Beyond.

 

[Bedrockgames]

As for his choice of a spouse... well, that didn't last long!

On this point, I wasn't saying it nulifies his views on Jews. But like I said, I am Italian, Irish and Jewish. I have always been curious about his specific attitudes towards those groups for personal reasons. When it comes to his views on Jewish people, I think this a detail that complicates the man further. Obviously it wasn't a very successful marriage, and I have long assumed his views on race may have been a part of that (though that is just my guess). Also, there is something kind of sad about a person who failed at so many things (including love and marriage), and ended up dying such a grisly death (I can sympathize with the bowel cancer because I have had about 7 bowel surgeries myself, not for cancer but certainly not something I would want to ever have to repeat). I see him more as a pathetic figure. Someone who maybe was clinging to this idea about the value of English bloodlines, because maybe that was all he really had. It doesn't justify it, but it is an explanation that makes me more puzzled and curious than angry when I read about him.