Roll20 users; are my impressions right or wrong on this

[Dannyalcatraz]

As I understand it, if a minority business owner refuses service to a Caucasian (legally or illegally, right or wrong,) that's discrimination. If the minority business owner refuses service to a member of the business owner's minority group, that is reverse discrimination.

I’ve been an attorney for a long time. While I haven’t handled one myself- I’m not a litigator- I have been briefed by attorneys who were involved in “reverse discrimination” cases. I have NEVER seen the phrase “reverse discrimination” used that way.

 

[GreyLord]

For the most part, the context in which “reverse discrimination” claims are brought up doesn’t involve potentially day-to-day things like a minority business owner refusing to sell to Caucasians (real but illegal), but rather in response to programs that are trying to rectify past discriminatory practices (real but legal).

For example, my father was a student representative on his college’s admissions board. Each applicant was given points for a variety of qualities. So, because of an affirmative action policy, minority applicants were given 1 point.

However, there were admissions points available to Caucasian students that were, for the most part, not available to minority applicants, such as being a “Legacy”* applicant. Legacy points were not available to minority students because the school had a past history of barring minorities.

So the thing is, while someone may raise a “reverse discrimination” claim regarding school admissions because of an affirmative action program, the reality is, many of those same people would likely also decry eliminating favorable treatment of Legacy applicants.

Even though some affirmative action plans have been in place for decades, they’re combatting discriminatory policies that were in place for a century or more. Combine that differential in time with racial demographics in general, and the math still favors the Caucasian applicant.

Which is part of why those lawsuits almost always fail. (There’s more to it, yes, but I’m just pointing out one aspect of it.)




* for those unfamiliar, a “Legacy” applicant is one who has relatives- especially ancestors- who were also admitted to the school.

This topic hits too close for politics for me typically, but this brought up something to mind that I saw in the news in the past few years regarding minorities.

Isn't the school admissions related to a case in the past few years concerning discrimination, specifically against Asian Americans?

If I recall, they use these ideas in regards to Minorities of most races, but when it came to Asian Americans they were distinctly discriminated against and thus required higher scores than anyone else (despite being the smallest minority besides Native Americans in the US) in order to just get in.

This is because they are not protected by AA and thus it is legal to discriminate against this particular minority?

In that light, why is it okay to discriminate against one minority, but not against another?

One cannot claim that Asian Americans are a majority in the US (though Asians are a majority in China, but that is an entirely different nation) and thus all the claims of racism would probably apply to them...but we normally give racism against them a pass.

I think George Takei has brought this up on occasion and has highlighted it in Hollywood (this was a unique year for Asian Americans in Hollywood as they have had two films focused on Asian actors in the US).

Which brings up an oddity in the US where it appears that discrimination is still a very real thing (and it seems when there are NOT any protections, the same thing happens to ALL minorities, not just Asian Americans. Asian Americans are just the easiest to point out due to the example you brought up with College Admissions). It also brings up the weird thing where in some instances we discriminate against one race but not another race (Native Americans often also get the short end of the stick in relation to racism against them).

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The legal landscape IS a messy, messy patchwork.

The most prominent Asian (because its not just Americans affected) lawsuit I can think of involves Harvard. Most of the affirmative actions programs I know in detail don’t specifically exclude Asians, though, so they don’t run afoul of this particular wrinkle. That may be due to implementation, not the actual text of Harvar’s program.

And yes, First Nations People are often shafted in different ways than other minorities. A case before the Supreme Court in the 1990s didn’t recognize their use of peyote in religious ceremonies, thus not getting exemptions or mitigations for arrests or in prison. This, despite several Catholics on the court being aware of similar favor given to the use of wine during Prohibition (Thank you, Scalia). This led to the Federal RFPA under Clinton. Which led to state level RFPAs...some of which were written without the Federal RFPA’s explicit protections against using the law to discriminate.

 

[Greg Benage]

I wish more guys would take a step back and think this through a little more carefully, with an open mind and an open heart.

If you've been around this hobby more than a minute, you know it's been dominated by white males. It's no coincidence: The hobby historically hasn't been very welcoming to women, people of color, LGBTQ folks and other marginalized groups. This has limited the hobby's growth and vibrancy for decades.

Some people would like to see the hobby become more inclusive. Some companies in the hobby have a commercial interest in increasing representation of people who aren't straight white males, beyond the question of normative values.

One way you can make the hobby more welcoming to these folks is by prohibiting people from explicitly excluding these groups in their game advertisements on your platform. You can't force a DM to accept a woman or person of color into his game, but if you want the hobby and your platform to be more welcoming to women and minorities, you don't want them to hop on the website and immediately see "No Girls Allowed" or "No Blacks Allowed" in a game advertisement. The reason should be abundantly clear, even if your moral compass is broken.

Another way you can make the hobby more welcoming to these groups is by allowing users to create and promote games on your platform that are exclusively for them. If a member of one of these groups hops on your website and sees, "Girls Only!" or "LBGTQ Only!," they're more likely to feel welcome in the hobby and on that platform. These exclusive games are especially important to people who have been harassed and targeted for abuse when they've attempted to participate in the hobby in the past.

Is this a "double standard"? Sure. And there's a damn good reason for the double standard. The representation, experiences, and treatment of the straight white male group and the marginalized groups are decidedly different, so the standard is rightly different as well.

Fortunately, us straight white guys can still participate in the other 99.9% of games on Roll20 and similar platforms, so perhaps it isn't rational to feel that someone is persecuting us.

For the record, I play twice a week on Roll20, I'm a Pro subscriber, and will continue to use and enjoy the platform. I would never even consider leaving simply because the company is seeking more diversity in their promotional partnerships, regardless of how crudely or clumsily they expressed this position. YMMV.

 

[Shasarak]

I am also confused by the argument that "reverse racism" doesn't exist. I mean, if you discriminate against people of a different race, that's racism, right? If you discriminate against people of your own race, that's reverse racism, isn't it?

I would have thought that reverse Racism is where you give different races extra stuff.

 

[Lwaxy]

Myself, I think it is silly to sponsor or not sponsor people based on their color or gender or whatever. You should look at what they are doing, and how good they are doing it.

It would also wonder, if I was a non-white gamer, if I ever wanted to be sponsored by R20, as it seems to say nothing about ability anymore. Who wants to be the quota non-white/female/gay or whatever? I sure don't, and I have been in situations before where it was clear or became clear that I was only to be "the woman you need to have" to not be accused of sexism. There are already a lot of negative comments out there about quotas for minorities. We don't need that in the gaming community.

 

[Shasarak]

If you've been around this hobby more than a minute, you know it's been dominated by white males. It's no coincidence: The hobby historically hasn't been very welcoming to women, people of color, LGBTQ folks and other marginalized groups. This has limited the hobby's growth and vibrancy for decades.

Thats not actually true though, is it. As far as I am aware the only really discrimination in roleplaying was during the M.A.D.D. era and that was mainly focused against white males.

 

[5ekyu]

Myself, I think it is silly to sponsor or not sponsor people based on their color or gender or whatever. You should look at what they are doing, and how good they are doing it.

It would also wonder, if I was a non-white gamer, if I ever wanted to be sponsored by R20, as it seems to say nothing about ability anymore. Who wants to be the quota non-white/female/gay or whatever? I sure don't, and I have been in situations before where it was clear or became clear that I was only to be "the woman you need to have" to not be accused of sexism. There are already a lot of negative comments out there about quotas for minorities. We don't need that in the gaming community.

This ignores some issues that generally speaking opening a market more strongly to a wider more diverse crowd is often good for business. Sometimes it wont, because sometimes your customer bases rejects including those who are different but on a broad scale the more folks tend to see themselves as welcome and participating the more others come in.

Its not about "what they are doing" if you have a lot of good quality "what they are doing" on both sides to choose from - then its a case of prioritizing. Do you want 5 more of what you already have scads of or three more of what you find you have very little of?

Now, if one assumes that the decision was not between "quality" options on both types - that the one turned down was going to be the better... in any abstract - that says a lot about the assumptions.

 

[Umbran]

In other words, if you're different from me and I treat you unfairly because of it, it is discrimination.
If you're the same as me and I treat you unfairly because of it, it is reverse discrimination.

Do you consider that to be incorrect?

Google considers that incorrect. Wikipedia considers that incorrect: "Reverse discrimination is discrimination against members of a dominant or majority group, in favor of members of a minority or historically disadvantaged group."

The base definition doesn't care who is doing the discriminating, only who it is against.

Doing a little reading, it looks like using this phrase was originally (and still is) part of some rhetorical judo. Programs and policies intended to correct for past wrongs and current bad institutionalized habits and unconscious biases we might call "affirmative action", which sounds positive. If we instead call it "reverse discrimination" it sounds negative.

 

[5ekyu]

Thanks to you all.

i had used Roll20 a while back in exploring whether it would be good aide for my home game - found it to be more work for less gain given my particulars.

I had played in a Roll20 game which showed me more potential but did not last.

Saw the vague this and thats of the furor and was left with a sense of "is this what i think it is... cuz there seems to be some dancing around here on what the "type" is..."

And now i get that my suspicions were right and I **will** be supporting Roll20 going forward. this tells me - give them a little cash** to keep it up.

Thanks a bunch.