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<blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 8037956" data-attributes="member: 5142">As I said before in another thread, when it comes to the creators (and players) of D&amp;D, I don't necessarily think that we are mostly dealing with people who actively held truly objectionable or repugnant views. I think that large swaths of D&amp;D's problems when it comes to offensive material has more to do with how these concepts/tropes were inherited, transmitted, and propagated without much critical reflection. They were white Midwestern boys who grew up playing &quot;cowboys and Indians&quot; and watching Hollywood Westerns in the cinemas and on television. They grew up reading pulp action adventure and science fiction stories, Flash Gordon serials, and the stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs, J.R.R. Tolkien, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard and the like. They knew what they liked but they never thought much about the problematic elements of race, gender, sex, colonialism, etc. that were often embedded in their childhood nostalgia. It was just harmless fun. But sometimes our fun is not as harmless as we imagine or remembered. Whereas a lot of this other media has received a tremendous amount of critical reflection from outside and inside voices, D&amp;D (and its kin) has not really gone through a similar degree of critical reflection. Some, but comparatively little. However, one reason why we likely are seeing so much critical reflection now is because there is a large enough amount of the playerbase who are emotionally removed from the nostalgic factor of the original source material that they are asking questions about the continued embedded presence of the problematic undertones that influenced the early creators and writers of D&amp;D. I also remember how my internet searches for the game Primeval Thule also brought up links involving Thule and Nazi ideology (i.e., the Thule Society).</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Aldarc, post: 8037956, member: 5142"] As I said before in another thread, when it comes to the creators (and players) of D&D, I don't necessarily think that we are mostly dealing with people who actively held truly objectionable or repugnant views. I think that large swaths of D&D's problems when it comes to offensive material has more to do with how these concepts/tropes were inherited, transmitted, and propagated without much critical reflection. They were white Midwestern boys who grew up playing "cowboys and Indians" and watching Hollywood Westerns in the cinemas and on television. They grew up reading pulp action adventure and science fiction stories, Flash Gordon serials, and the stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs, J.R.R. Tolkien, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard and the like. They knew what they liked but they never thought much about the problematic elements of race, gender, sex, colonialism, etc. that were often embedded in their childhood nostalgia. It was just harmless fun. But sometimes our fun is not as harmless as we imagine or remembered. Whereas a lot of this other media has received a tremendous amount of critical reflection from outside and inside voices, D&D (and its kin) has not really gone through a similar degree of critical reflection. Some, but comparatively little. However, one reason why we likely are seeing so much critical reflection now is because there is a large enough amount of the playerbase who are emotionally removed from the nostalgic factor of the original source material that they are asking questions about the continued embedded presence of the problematic undertones that influenced the early creators and writers of D&D. I also remember how my internet searches for the game Primeval Thule also brought up links involving Thule and Nazi ideology (i.e., the Thule Society). [/QUOTE]

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