The problem with Evil races is not what you think

[AbdulAlhazred]

Which places do you have in mind?

Yeah, I was going to say... Where do people think the English Common Law which we live under today (in the US at least) came from? Courts, which were literally the lords acting as judges, were bound by tradition. This wasn't really, AFAICT, so much a matter of high-mindedness as it was that even the 'guy with the sword you don't want to mess with' NEEDS the cooperation and loyalty of the subjects, he can't watch his own back all the time. So he has to construct some sort of legitimacy, and ruling consistently, and agreeing to be bound by traditional consistent rulings, is a pretty quick way to get there. Also without predictable rules you cannot have things like trade. Lords would rather raise taxes and get luxuries from trade than rule with absolute arbitrariness over mud pits.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Mainly Central Europe.
In general the local lord ruled on issues brought to him (or had a servant do so in his name) and was not bound by any codified laws except maybe the bible.
And there was a sharp divide between nobility and the common folk basically everywhere (Japan has already been mentioned) which affected how law was spoken (and I specifically did use the word trial as most people didn't get one). Nobles were right, free men when they were respected or useful (=rich or influential) and serfs were at the bottom. And in any legal case between people of different classes the their statues determined guilt, not evidence.
Or the lord wouldn't bother and let god decide with a trial by ordeal. If the accused survived he obviously was innocent.

Right, but all of this is highly situational and certainly only applied in specific places and times, or at least there was a lot more nuance to it.

 

[pemerton]

A very good point! The REACH of the authorities was exceedingly limited as well. Outside of areas directly controlled it was quite tenuous. Even in the 15th and 16th Century in England the roads were frequented by many notorious bandits, for example.

I wasn't referring only to geographic reach, but to penetration into society. Whether one thinks it's good or bad - a matter we don't need to get into! - there's no doubting that the capacity of the contemporary US state to engage with its citizens and residents as individuals - eg via the tax return - is a remarkable technical achievement. It also depends upon the reduction in social power of non-state "intermediating" groupings, which - where they are strong - increase the opacity of society vis-a-vis the state.

If the worlds of D&D are quasi- or pseudo-mediaeval, it's as "unrealistic" to posit modern governmental capacities as it would be to posit, say, steam railways and machine-woven t-shirts.

 

[Ixal]

A further thing, which I think is underappreciated in a lot of FRPG world-building, is what is encompassed by authorities. I think it can be hard, for those who haven't experienced it or really intellectually engaged with it, to imagine the radical difference between the reach and the capacity of (say) the contemporary American state and the reach of (say) an 11th century central European noble.

One reason for structuring liability in group terms is simply that anything more fine-grained was not technically feasible.

This is one major point which differentiates historic/fantasy settings and modern/futuristic ones. And it is very easy to spot modern settings written by people who are used to fantasy settings as they have no idea how to deal with the increased reach and power of the state (yes, I mean you Starfinder).

Another thing to remember, not everywhere was the nobility in charge. On land held by clergy for example the rules of law were different (and often more fair with actual trials beyond the nobles gut feeling).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

This is one major point which differentiates historic/fantasy settings and modern/futuristic ones. And it is very easy to spot modern settings written by people who are used to fantasy settings as they have no idea how to deal with the increased reach and power of the state (yes, I mean you Starfinder).

Another thing to remember, not everywhere was the nobility in charge. On land held by clergy for example the rules of law were different (and often more fair with actual trials beyond the nobles gut feeling).

Well, for many centuries, Friesland basically outlawed nobility entirely! I mean, you could BE a 'noble', technically, but it had effectively no bearing on your legal status. Every adult man was adjudged free (I don't know if there were institutions like indenture or debt prison or whatever).

It is interesting to study the history of this region as a contrast with the rest of Medieval Europe. Notably Frisia was eventually overrun by late Medieval lords, partly due to infighting and a slow breakdown of social equality and institutions which supported it. By the end of the 15th Century their egalitarian system largely ceased to exist, but for 800 years they formed a completely different and unique social/political system.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I remember years ago, back in my uni age days (so, FAR too many years ago, ) playing with a DM who depicted his orcs as First Nations (well back then, that wasn't the term we would use) people defending themselves from the colonial forces. It was a real eye opener and not something I'd ever even considered before. Just wasn't part of anything I'd read in fantasy or any of the D&D books or anything. I was playing a paladin in the game and it became are fascinating game of how I could reconcile this character who was created using the more or less bog standard tropes of the game with this very on target depiction. It's a game that ended far too early and it's something that I've always remembered.

It really did open my eyes, all the way back then, and this would have been in the early ish 90's, to just how ingrained the racism of the game really is. Once you've seen it, it's practically impossible not to see it throughout so much of the game.

That’s similar to the treatment of dwarves in Daniel Collerton's "Irilian" series in White Dwarf #42-47. White Dwarf #43 (1983):

The Irilians' views of demihumans are stereotyped and are generally the worst possible… dwarves [are] 'money-grubbing and miserly'. Perhaps because both the money-lender/bankers in Irilian are dwarves, they are especially disliked; occupying much the same position as Jews did in Medieval Europe, tolerated (barely) most of the time and otherwise persecuted.​

I think Collerton gets it spot on here. He wasn't the first to make a connection between dwarves and Jews – Tolkien and others also did so. But unlike Tolkien, Collerton's dwarves are not innately greedy, rather it's a false stereotype imposed upon them.

 

[VelvetViolet]

I had a personal liking for the orcs in Warcraft 1 and 2. Not because they were an "evil race" (which is debatable), but because they were fantasy conquistadors and their culture had more depth than typical depictions of orcs. They had multiple religious schools of thought (e.g. necrolytes vs warlocks), internal politics and schisms, a multitude of clans with different subcultures, they made alliances with persecuted minorities on Azeroth like the goblins and trolls, etc. I was disappointed when WC3 retconned them to peaceful Native American stereotypes that were corrupted by those nasty demons and therefore weren't responsible for their many war crimes. (Before you mention it, my enjoyment is permanently ruined by #blizzardgate.)

 

[Tonguez]

This was Elizabethan England, imagine England in the 9th Century! And 'Local Authority' was just a code word for 'the guy with a sword that nobody else wants to argue with'. Throughout most of the Medieval period large percentages of land in Europe were also 'wasteland', just forests, wetlands, etc. that was very lightly inhabited, if at all, and often completely outside the remit of any authority. In earlier periods these areas were the RULE, not the exception..

I think one thing a lot of people forget when discussing the power of medieval nobles is that the Lords were as terrified of the peasantry as the peasantry were of the nobles.
There were a whole series of peasant revolts occuring usually due to unfair taxes.

Prior to the 10th century laws were about folk rights - enforced by the clan/tribe/village/(guild) - and Privilege granted by Nobility. The Church also had its role in enforcing rules on the Parish.
Things were small scale, the peasants relied on the Lord for protection and the Lord was reliant on the peasantry for labour and supply of goods, a noble knew that his own wealth and survival often depended on keeping the common folk happy too

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think one thing a lot of people forget when discussing the power of medieval nobles is that the Lords were as terrified of the peasantry as the peasantry were of the nobles.
There were a whole series of peasant revolts occuring usually due to unfair taxes.

Prior to the 10th century laws were about folk rights - enforced by the clan/tribe/village/(guild) - and Privilege granted by Nobility. The Church also had its role in enforcing rules on the Parish.
Things were small scale, the peasants relied on the Lord for protection and the Lord was reliant on the peasantry for labour and supply of goods, a noble knew that his own wealth and survival often depended on keeping the common folk happy too

Yeah, my impression was always that it was rather less unequal than one might imagine. I mean, yes, the lord was technically in charge of many things, 'owned' an estate, etc. but he couldn't really kick people around too much. The whole thing was relied on by the community, many people ate at that table, etc.

Anyway, you really have to remember that 97% figure. That's medieval agriculture, in general, 97 of 100 people must be agricultural workers to make it function. So all the soldiers, knights, etc. etc. etc. the whole nobility, was just a small fraction of the other 3%, because it also included many townspeople, craftspeople, tradesmen, etc. The upper classes didn't matter at all to normal folks, because they basically didn't exist.

 

[VelvetViolet]

I don’t want to bring in politics, but I’d like to note that people’s approach to the “evil races” debate depends on their existing biases.

1. One group thinks that fictional species can be coded with traits reminiscent of real world ethnic stereotypes/caricatures, whether intentionally or subconsciously, and that this can potentially become offensive.
2. One group thinks that it’s categorically impossible for fantasy to be racist because it’s fantasy, even if a fictional species is heavily coded in way that should be impossible to ignore. Anyone who sees this coding is therefore a racist. (E.g. the Terra Formars comic codes Martian cockroach people with numerous stereotypes of black people, such as spiral hair, athleticism, holding guns sideways, wearing bling, phallic symbols, rape symbolism, etc along with having a couple named Eva and Adolf, depicting an engineered perfect human as a Nazi Aryan stereotype stud, tons of seemingly extreme right-wing social commentary… but fans insist that this doesn’t exist.)
3. One group is prone to overreaching and seeing coding even where there is none, neither intentionally or subconsciously planted by the creator. This reinforces the beliefs of group #2. (E.g. someone wrote an article arguing that the aliens and predators from the movie franchises of the same name are anti-black caricatures.)
4. One group thinks that it’s impossible for a fictional species to have evolved in such a way that peaceful coexistence with humans is impossible, and that any depiction of such is inherently racist towards real minorities. This reinforces the beliefs of group #2. (E.g. that notoriously controversial Extra Credits video.)
5. One group just doesn’t want to think too hard about their elf-games and categorically rejects any attempt to insert what they perceive as “political correctness.”
6. One group thinks that any kind of coding is inherently offensive. (E.g. someone wrote an article arguing that dwarves being coded as Scottish Jews is inherently offensive even though dwarves are normally characterized as heroes and even as an unfairly persecuted minority.)
7. Etc

I have seen all of these positions argued at some point and I can provide receipts. There are nonsensical leaps of logic in most of these positions. It makes discussions very frustrating.

Like, there’s basically only two takes on HPL’s fish people: they’re either irredeemably evil monsters that must be exterminated to protect our pure human bloodlines (and our women!), or they’re a persecuted minority who looks weird but are otherwise normal people. There’s no nuance here, and in neither case do they feel like aliens.