D&D General Rant: Sometimes I Hate the D&D Community

[Oofta]

I literally got got racist IRL for saying I hate gnomes so

Wait, let me understand something. You're saying there are people who don't hate gnomes?

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Wait, let me understand something. You're saying there are people who don't hate gnomes?

The supposed hatred of gnomes is just Elvish propaganda to make you forget about the real villains.

Just think- in the last 10 minutes, while you were busy hating gnomes, another 20 Elvish subtypes were created for D&D.

Wetland Elf. Hammock Elf. Mesa Elf. Elf on the Shelf ....

 

[Oofta]

The supposed hatred of gnomes is just Elvish propaganda to make you forget about the real villains.

Just think- in the last 10 minutes, while you were busy hating gnomes, another 20 Elvish subtypes were created for D&D.

Wetland Elf. Hammock Elf. Mesa Elf. Elf on the Shelf ....

Only another 20 elf subtypes? Slackers.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Knife-ear is a racial slur, "stunty" is a racial slur. To me they aren't causing harm, the animosity between elves and dwarves is a well known fantasy trope.

I don't see violent inherently evil orcs as based of a real life racial stereotype, other people do, but those other people aren't at my table, and won't hear about the game so how it "directly" at their expense or hurting them in anyway?

see this is why we can't even talk about this stuff.

I am pure on the "no evil races" camp (I even had a starving good mindflyer in a game once, and often used 'vampire with a soul' in 2e) but I don't think if some guy or gal over there runs a 'orcs are just evil, born evil, can't be reasoned with' campaign that it is in anyway harmful... but just that middle ground statement "I don't do it but I don't see the harm in someone doing it" can get me kicked out of facebook groups and called a bigot.

 

[James Gasik]

The supposed hatred of gnomes is just Elvish propaganda to make you forget about the real villains.

Just think- in the last 10 minutes, while you were busy hating gnomes, another 20 Elvish subtypes were created for D&D.

Wetland Elf. Hammock Elf. Mesa Elf. Elf on the Shelf ....

With the exception of 3.5 Gnomes, who had a favored class of Bard, right? : )

 

[Oofta]

With the exception of 3.5 Gnomes, who had a favored class of Bard, right? : )

Hey now, be careful tossing that b***d around! There are impressionable youngsters on this forum!

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

With the exception of 3.5 Gnomes, who had a favored class of Bard, right? : )

Just more lies propagated by BigElf(tm).


What's the difference between a porcupine and a house full of elves?

Spoiler: language

The porcupine has the pricks on the outside.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

You could probably swap out "D&D Community" for "Knitting Community" or "[Sport] Community" or any number of categories of so-called communities out there and little would change about everything that follows in a general sense.

Actually, not every community is like this.

I'm in, among others, Ghostbusters cosplay, tiki and hot sauce communities.

The Ghostbusters community, even when they stay away from talking about the female-led movie (you may dislike it for reasons other than the gender of the actors, but whooo boy, are there a lot of misogynists who come out of the woodwork every time it's mentioned), are extremely happy to tell each other how the way anyone is doing their cosplay is wrong, they aren't "real" fans because they don't know every bit of minutia about the Ghostbusters cartoons and comic books and action figures, and so on. They're honestly a pretty miserable bunch that I keep muted except when I'm working on upgrading my costume each Halloween, as it's my fallback for walking around with my kids during trick or treating.

The tiki community all clearly needs a drink or two, because, again, whatever bottle you're using is inferior to the $300 rare bottle you should obviously be using and the fact that something isn't easily available in your region means you should get on the phone, call all the liquor stores within a five state radius and then drive through the night to get an obscure brand so you can have the "right" bottle for your cocktail. And if you post a home bar with insufficiently tiki decorations, there are Facebook groups that will ban you outright.

But then there's the hot sauce folks. Whatever hot sauce you like, everyone is excited for you. Whatever you find at the farmers market or grocery store or on a foreign vacation or make yourself, there's a ton of enthusiasm for it. No one is scoffed at for being a newbie or being into the "wrong" hot sauces.

So, no. Some communities are full of miserable jerks. And honestly, we're letting them off the hook by acting like this is just human nature. We can and should expect better.

 

[iserith]

Actually, not every community is like this.

I'm in, among others, Ghostbusters cosplay, tiki and hot sauce communities.

The Ghostbusters community, even when they stay away from talking about the female-led movie (you may dislike it for reasons other than the gender of the actors, but whooo boy, are there a lot of misogynists who come out of the woodwork every time it's mentioned), are extremely happy to tell each other how the way anyone is doing their cosplay is wrong, they aren't "real" fans because they don't know every bit of minutia about the Ghostbusters cartoons and comic books and action figures, and so on. They're honestly a pretty miserable bunch that I keep muted except when I'm working on upgrading my costume each Halloween, as it's my fallback for walking around with my kids during trick or treating.

The tiki community all clearly needs a drink or two, because, again, whatever bottle you're using is inferior to the $300 rare bottle you should obviously be using and the fact that something isn't easily available in your region means you should get on the phone, call all the liquor stores within a five state radius and then drive through the night to get an obscure brand so you can have the "right" bottle for your cocktail. And if you post a home bar with insufficiently tiki decorations, there are Facebook groups that will ban you outright.

But then there's the hot sauce folks. Whatever hot sauce you like, everyone is excited for you. Whatever you find at the farmers market or grocery store or on a foreign vacation or make yourself, there's a ton of enthusiasm for it. No one is scoffed at for being a newbie or being into the "wrong" hot sauces.

So, no. Some communities are full of miserable jerks. And honestly, we're letting them off the hook by acting like this is just human nature. We can and should expect better.

You may note that I did not assert all communities are this way, just that any number of them are, and that my general approach is to just carry on with my life when I see people behaving in a way I don't like. I'm not engaging with D&D forums to try to change the human behavior, but good luck if you give it a go.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Knife-ear is a racial slur, "stunty" is a racial slur. To me they aren't causing harm, the animosity between elves and dwarves is a well known fantasy trope.

They're not real-world racial slurs, are they? If not, I don't care.

I don't see violent inherently evil orcs as based of a real life racial stereotype, other people do, but those other people aren't at my table, and won't hear about the game so how it "directly" at their expense or hurting them in anyway?

People don't necessarily care when Orcs are basically demons in your world. They care if they're people that you make be always evil, especially if you attach them to the culture of a real-world group of people (like Orcs of Thar from Mystara did).