D&D General The Rakshasa and Genie Problem

[jmartkdr2]

I mean, it's half-there given that he does say that they are often bad stereotypes of it. It's part of the problem of having them and not having an Arab culture: you get the ridiculously stereotyped version. But again, I think OP was being fairly generous with the question and I think it's a good discussion to have. We should work through these feelings and ideas, because I think it helps us understand better.

I want to pick this bit out: it can be a stereotyped version, but it doesn't have to be, even if it's just one monster.

 

[Voadam]

I think this is the part I don't quite agree with. When I think this through with European or Christian culture for example, it doesn't quite pan out. For instance suppose you have a setting that is all China or all Aztec, and for whatever reason, decide to include biblical demons in your campaign. There are no Europeans or Middle Easterners in the game, but if the demons appeared vaguely European or Middle Eastern culturally, I would just see that as remnants of the tropes origin, not commentary on Christians, middle eastern people or Europeans. Or take a werewolf. Suppose you had a campaign world that was just Asian. And granted those would have shapeshifting humanoids like werewolves themselves, but say you decided to use a European style werewolf. And the werewolf was vaguely Euoprean in look and culture. That would be a little odd (since Europeans don't exist in the setting). But I would understand the reason the GM or the game did that, was not because it was a commentary on Europeans but because it just grabbed the trope with its familiar trappings and used it. And probably there is at least a way to do that and not make it incongruous (such as have werewolves have their own culture within the setting and it just happens to resemble medieval Europe---again I wouldn't see that as commentary on Europeans, just a product of the monster having a source in real world folklore, and the GM trying to make them recognizable)

That is one way to take in such representations but also not the only way.

If there was a Chinese fantasy thing with bestial monster werewolves looking American it could be taken as the European origin of the Hollywood werewolf but it would not be unreasonable to see a linkage of the concepts of monstrous and American as a possible artistic message of its own.

It is understandable to look at the only representation of a culture/ethnicity/race in a creative work, see it linked to negative stuff, and be offput by that being the predominant representation.

In core D&D genies are the most obviously Arabic connection in the game, and genies in core D&D are most prominent for the cruel slave-owning Lawful Evil Efreeti of the City of Brass. Fiery evil alt devils are the biggest representation of Arabic stuff.

D&D settings have had a bunch of Arabic elements, particularly in the 2e era with Al-Qadim, a couple big Kingdoms in core FR, the Backlunish people and nations in Greyhawk, and Birthright and BECMI Mystara having their own fantasy Arab analogues. Eberron has a little bit of a North African/Middle East vibe to one of their elven cultures. But core D&D it is mostly only genies and mostly the LE City of Brass Efreeti.

So in core D&D you have evil Arab devil villains and you can contrast them with Crusading Knight Christian fantasy analogue good protagonist paladins and clerics.

You can take that as not saying anything about Arabs, as not a big deal, or as a problematic thing.

There definitely seems room to feel different ways about these sorts of issues.

 

[Micah Sweet]

That is one way to take in such representations but also not the only way.

If there was a Chinese fantasy thing with bestial monster werewolves looking American it could be taken as the European origin of the Hollywood werewolf but it would not be unreasonable to see a linkage of the concepts of monstrous and American as a possible artistic message of its own.

It is understandable to look at the only representation of a culture/ethnicity/race in a creative work, see it linked to negative stuff, and be offput by that being the predominant representation.

In core D&D genies are the most obviously Arabic connection in the game, and genies in core D&D are most prominent for the cruel slave-owning Lawful Evil Efreeti of the City of Brass. Fiery evil alt devils are the biggest representation of Arabic stuff.

D&D settings have had a bunch of Arabic elements, particularly in the 2e era with Al-Qadim, a couple big Kingdoms in core FR, the Backlunish people and nations in Greyhawk, and Birthright and BECMI Mystara having their own fantasy Arab analogues. Eberron has a little bit of a North African/Middle East vibe to one of their elven cultures. But core D&D it is mostly only genies and mostly the LE City of Brass Efreeti.

So in core D&D you have evil Arab devil villains and you can contrast them with Crusading Knight Christian fantasy analogue good protagonist paladins and clerics.

You can take that as not saying anything about Arabs, as not a big deal, or as a problematic thing.

There definitely seems room to feel different ways about these sorts of issues.

For sure. Which is why I think the solution is to make changes if you have a problem with it, and be ok with other people not changing it if they don't.

 

[Helldritch]

Dear @Voadam,
Your analysis is wrong. The efreets are not the only Arabic presence in D&D. The Djinn, Marid and Dao are quite insulted by your lack of respect of their presence in the MM and to a lesser degree the DMG with the ring of Djinn summoning. How rude of you.

Also, the Djinn are the opposite of the efreet. They are noble spirit working against the efreets in a war that has raged since the dawn of time.

This mean that the Arabic culture is represented with good and bad examples. And the bad are bad in their culture too. So the depiction is quite accurate up to a certain point as there are bit more nuances than what I have pointed out. And no efreets were ever meant to represent the Arabic people.

 

[TheSword]

Where things can be taken in one of two ways, I personally don’t think a single mention most things should be taken as indicative of a world view. The Lords of Dust having South Asian influences is not indicative of anything.

Now if repeated South Asian influences are synonymous with evil, multiple kingdoms are wicked or evil and the writer doesn’t break the connection that not European = evil, then we have a problem.

An example of roguish Vistani collaborating with a vampire, fair enough. Clans of Vistani roaming the multiverse dragging people into the mists, spitting and cursing…. Probably not so good.

Is something a one off? In which case let’s give it the benefit of the doubt, and assume there isn’t some malign motive.

 

[Remathilis]

In core D&D genies are the most obviously Arabic connection in the game, and genies in core D&D are most prominent for the cruel slave-owning Lawful Evil Efreeti of the City of Brass. Fiery evil alt devils are the biggest representation of Arabic stuff.

As others have pointed out, the efreet are one type of genie, with djinn being the other most common type. Chaotic Good djinn.

The most prominent Norse connection to D&D are fire and frost giants. Care to state your thoughts on that?

D&D settings have had a bunch of Arabic elements, particularly in the 2e era with Al-Qadim, a couple big Kingdoms in core FR, the Backlunish people and nations in Greyhawk, and Birthright and BECMI Mystara having their own fantasy Arab analogues. Eberron has a little bit of a North African/Middle East vibe to one of their elven cultures. But core D&D it is mostly only genies and mostly the LE City of Brass Efreeti.

Now wait a second, Core D&D isn't a setting. It's explicitly supposed to colored an contextualized by the settings you named. If you want the Core D&D game to have a default setting like Golarion, that can be done. But don't criticize D&D for it's lack of nuance when you've just named several examples of nuance.

So in core D&D you have evil Arab devil villains and you can contrast them with Crusading Knight Christian fantasy analogue good protagonist paladins and clerics.

That analogy is so tortured the Geneva conventions want to have a word with you.

 

[Bedrockgames]

That is one way to take in such representations but also not the only way.



It is understandable to look at the only representation of a culture/ethnicity/race in a creative work, see it linked to negative stuff, and be offput by that being the predominant representation.

In core D&D genies are the most obviously Arabic connection in the game, and genies in core D&D are most prominent for the cruel slave-owning Lawful Evil Efreeti of the City of Brass. Fiery evil alt devils are the biggest representation of Arabic stuff.

D&D settings have had a bunch of Arabic elements, particularly in the 2e era with Al-Qadim, a couple big Kingdoms in core FR, the Backlunish people and nations in Greyhawk, and Birthright and BECMI Mystara having their own fantasy Arab analogues. Eberron has a little bit of a North African/Middle East vibe to one of their elven cultures. But core D&D it is mostly only genies and mostly the LE City of Brass Efreeti.

So in core D&D you have evil Arab devil villains and you can contrast them with Crusading Knight Christian fantasy analogue good protagonist paladins and clerics.

You can take that as not saying anything about Arabs, as not a big deal, or as a problematic thing.

There definitely seems room to feel different ways about these sorts of issues.

Except Genies in D&D have long had different alignments depending on the types. Efreet are just one type of genie in AD&D. Pretty sure 3E was similar. Can't speak to 5E. Now those types aren't necessarily accurate depictions of the types found in Arabic folklore, but there is a difference in AD&D between a Djinni and a Dao (the former is Chaotic Good and the latter is Chaotic Evil), a Jann or an Efreeti are far more complicated as well. One of the reasons to make them ferocious is because they grant wishes and resent doing so. It makes them more interesting to deal with from a game point of view. But there are lots of differently aligned Genie in the game, not just Efreet.

And the city of Brass is prominent not to promote negative stereotypes of Arabic culture, but because evil is almost always more compelling and interesting in a game than good. I believe the Djinni had the Court of Ice and Steel. I think people were just generally less interested in chaotic air elemental cities than fiery and evil Efreet cities. Who can blame them: evil is more fun from a gaming point of view. Game books need villains and antagonists to deal with.

If there was a Chinese fantasy thing with bestial monster werewolves looking American it could be taken as the European origin of the Hollywood werewolf but it would not be unreasonable to see a linkage of the concepts of monstrous and American as a possible artistic message of its own.

And sometimes it is. But the point I was making, is I take it on a case by case basis. I don't think it is automatically bad when they have an American-style monster, with stereotypically negative american traits. There is a hopping vampire film that brings in a western style vampire for instance. It may, for fun have had western or European traits as a villain (it has been a while since I have seen it), but I also remember thinking at the time that all of that was mainly just for flavor. I would contrast a movie like that, against one where there is a clear nationalist message using the trope to make a political point. Very different and I think it would be ashame to lose the former because someone might employ the trope similarly to make the latter (and I even want the latter to exist, because that too can be entertaining). I can watch a movie made in China with a nationalist message, and be entertained by it, while also understanding there is propaganda there. I think what is more important than controlling tropes, is giving people the tools to control their reaction to media. The power of imagery, tropes, and types of media do fade over time with exposure (propoganda posters for example don't have the potency they once had because we understand how they are trying to manipulate------but tweets do have power because it is a new medium and we are grappling with what they really mean and how they influence us). Also allowing for a range of expressions of tropes is important I think.

And I consider what the overall intent and message is in the context of what is happening. I think that is the kind of layering these discussions tend to lead us away from (where a thing is simply bad because it has X and Y and X and Y could be interpreted as Z). My point is more about not leaping to conclusions, forming a considered opinion about art slowly without being reactionary. Sometimes there is a bad message in art. I just think we've reached a point where it isn't particularly tenable for gaming. Tropes are considered infected with badness, there are rules governing the polite use of tropes and ideas, and those rules are based almost entirely on optics, not on the actual intention and meaning of the work. I think this is all very well intended. But i just can't escape the feeling it is misguided and untimely pretty unhealthy for us. I know, just for me personally, I started enjoying making things again when I gave this kind of thinking less power over how I function creatively.

 

[Alzrius]

And the city of Brass is prominent not to promote negative stereotypes of Arabic culture, but because evil is almost always more compelling and interesting in a game than good. I believe the Djinni had the Court of Ice and Steel.

Don't forget that the marids had their City of Glass on the Elemental Plane of Water, which got some expanded coverage in AD&D 2E's The Vortex of Madness and Other Planar Perils (affiliate link).

 

[Bedrockgames]

So in core D&D you have evil Arab devil villains and you can contrast them with Crusading Knight Christian fantasy analogue good protagonist paladins and clerics.

I don't get this at all. First, there are good arabic genies too. But this is also comparing a class option with monsters. Monsters cover more cultural terrain because they can: there is space for it in the monster manual and players could be traveling all over the world. I think the move with paladins has been to make them more open to different cultures, so I think you could make them from virtually any D&D culture at this point, but even if not, most settings that have a middle east, will also have new classes covering that culture. If playing characters from 'not the middle east' is an option and all of the available class options are evil stereotypes, fair enough, that is certainly a potential issue. But if they are a mix of noble and not so noble character classes like you have for the standard ones in the PHB, I don't se an issue. Perhaps the core book could use more options so you can have those to draw on when you build your world: I am all for that. I don't see an issue with a section on classes from different fantasy cultures that aren't just European based, because most GMs probably have lots of those in their settings at this point. So it would be useful.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

And the city of Brass is prominent not to promote negative stereotypes of Arabic culture, but because evil is almost always more compelling and interesting in a game than good. I believe the Djinni had the Court of Ice and Steel. I think people were just generally less interested in chaotic air elemental cities than fiery and evil Efreet cities. Who can blame them: evil is more fun from a gaming point of view. Game books need villains and antagonists to deal with.

This is a good point and one I feel that will be a headache for WotC if it decides to spend more time on presenting Good versions of various creatures. There's just less use for them. That's why we have tons of information on the Demon Lords and Archdevils and unique celestials have barely appeared since 3.5's Book of Exalted Deeds.