It amazes me that people get hung up about supposed stereotyping of made-up species and cultures. Take a step back and think on that: doesn't it seem absurd to lose any sleep at all over something that is completely fictional? Can people no longer tell the difference?
I avoided the Drow until Eberron made them interesting. They always seemed to me to be murderous Cure fans - goths before there were goths, of a sort, and dull because they were all defined by such an extreme set of beliefs. I knew, all along, that there is no such thing as Drow, however, or any of this stuff, so I just ignored them and had hordes of evil goblins creating problems (save for the few friendly/good ones that I threw in to surprise my players and keep them off balance). The fact that they have black skin seemed silly, but perhaps fitting, given humanity's shared and general fear of the dark (not "of the black" - "of the dark") and that such skin would help them blend into shadows, making them creepier, or more effective within combat and sighting rules in the game.
Eberron made them interesting by changing their default backdrop and adding cultural elements that made a lot more sense to me. But I still was okay with them being portrayed as "all" a certain way because...it's just a story, and as a story that I am free to remake or redefine as I please. Keith Baker has his own Ideas about Eberron; WOTC has theirs; and I have mine. My use of goblinoids changed a lot in response to Eberron's portrayal of them - Hobgoblins are far more interesting as fantasy Klingons than as murderous hordes whose only purpose is to be murderous hordes. But what's wrong with relying on the trope (tired, perhaps, but hardly damaging to society or the individual) of 'evil Drow' if it makes a story work and people around the table have a good time?
And again, it's all made up, and has zero bearing on the real world, unless, again, someone can't tell the difference between the two.
I am not saying any of this to kickstart anyone, and I thought about it before responding at all. It's just amazing and troubling to watch as people get worked up, angry, upset, and draw lines between who's right/wrong/good/bad over things that do....not...exist. If anything, the absurdity of an entire species being of one moral bent or another is a teaching tool to the young that no such thing exists, and that it is silly to think otherwise. To seek a world in which all our fiction (current and past) must be perfectly aligned with the most current of social/moral fads is...creepy, and totalitarian for the conformity it demands.
Where does creativity go when the self-appointed online rage mob acts as gatekeeper to what's allowed? For a community of people who are connected through what is at its foundation a creative exercise, this should be troubling, and yet so many in this community are the ones pushing this new orthodoxy.
And yes, I did read the full article/interview. Maybe Salvatore is being honest, maybe it's shameless and proactive virtue-signaling; we don't know for sure - only he does. Beyond that, it has no bearing on what I decide to think of his fiction (which, in fact, I don't care for - I find his writing predictable and most of his characters pretty shallow).
It bears repeating for the sake of emphasis: this crap is all made up. WOTC doesn't exist to make games to make you feel good about your views about the real world and how it ought to be, per your views. WOTC wants you to buy their books, and their overpriced dice, minis, and all the adventure-specific DM screens they produce, and other junk that eventually will end up in boxes in garages, attics, or second-hand stores and, ultimately, landfills. Not any bit of it will impact the real world beyond the fact that you're spending money, they're making money, and you have heaps of things that one day you'll have no use for. If that all leads to greater happiness and creativity for you, wonderful. If, on the other hand, it leads to anger and a sense of injustice and a need to 'fix' our stories and make sure that people sign on the line to verify that they are good/right....I think you've forgotten the difference between reality and fiction.
I hope that you take some time to think about gaming as a means of having fun with some other people, first and foremost. Keep that as the animating force, and know that you can leave the real world out of your fantasy world, and vice versa. It's actually quite fun.
www.polygon.com
In 2020 WotC made a public statement about how they would be treating drow and orcs going forward -- "Throughout the 50-year history of D&D, some of the peoples in the game—orcs and drow being two of the prime examples—have been characterized as monstrous and evil, using descriptions that are painfully reminiscent of how real-world ethnic groups have been and continue to be denigrated. That’s just not right, and it’s not something we believe in. "
dnd.wizards.com
