D&D 5E The word ‘Race’

[variant]

I was going to respond to this argument, but I decided against it.

 

[Hriston]

Yeah, well, my dwarves have Scottish accents and my lizardmen speak draconic with a Cajun accent. If I could do a French accent worth a damn, I'd probably have the elves speak that way.

People like my accents.

No offense intended, but I absolutely abhor the Scottish dwarf. It gives me bad flashbacks to the Hobbit movies. It totally breaks immersion for me for a member of a fantasy race to have a regional accent that has nothing to do with the constructed history of the world in which that race exists. Of course this isn't as bad as putting dwarves in kilts and having them play bagpipes as well. You get the idea.

But the dwarves in the Hobbit have Old Norse names in connection with the northern land of Dale and the humans they live among. It would have made way more sense for the dwarves and the men of laketown to have had a shared Scandinavian culture if there had to be a real world cultural analog, but no, Peter Jackson had to have Scottish dwarves. I don't even know where this comes from.

As far as making the game fun, I'm sure your accents are very charming, so I have no objections on that count.

EDIT: I blame Poul Anderson, and R. A. Salvatore for copying him!

 

[Leatherhead]

But let me ask this. If there is nothing in D&D that is exclusionary, and we've had forty ish years and millions of players, why are D&D players still overwhelmingly white males?

Well, lets run down the list:
The early adopters of D&D are mostly old white guys, and a significant number of them are still around.
The Anti-religious stigma of D&D stunted minority growth for quite some time, if it's been 40 years for you, it's probably been 20 years for them.
D&D is very easy to produce. If an area has interest in it, then it is easy to create a "local flavor" which will tilt numbers away from D&D in those markets, like what happened in Japan.
And probably the biggest reason, it's an archaic hobby that caters to people who have lots of disposable income and time. Look at who has the money in the world right now. Then look at who among those people are into, and has time for, "dead-tree" entertainment. Not a very big list, and minorities are heavily weighted out of it.

It's also worth noting that if every possible exclusionary thing was removed from D&D tomorrow morning (which is impossible, but just roll with it), it would take a very long time to "correct" these figures. Heck, it may never actually reach the point where it evens out.

 

[Celtavian]

No offense intended, but I absolutely abhor the Scottish dwarf. It gives me bad flashbacks to the Hobbit movies. It totally breaks immersion for me for a member of a fantasy race to have a regional accent that has nothing to do with the constructed history of the world in which that race exists. Of course this isn't as bad as putting dwarves in kilts and having them play bagpipes as well. You get the idea.

But the dwarves in the Hobbit have Old Norse names in connection with the northern land of Dale and the humans they live among. It would have made way more sense for the dwarves and the men of laketown to have had a shared Scandinavian culture if there had to be a real world cultural analog, but no, Peter Jackson had to have Scottish dwarves. I don't even know where this comes from.

As far as making the game fun, I'm sure your accents are very charming, so I have no objections on that count.

EDIT: I blame Poul Anderson, and R. A. Salvatore for copying him!

So much rightness here. I did not like Peter Jackson's dwarves. Dwarves are more stoic and fatalistic, not humorous and boisterous.

 

[mflayermonk]

If there is nothing in D&D that is exclusionary, and we've had forty ish years and millions of players, why are D&D players still overwhelmingly white males?

I have no idea. I'm interested to know what you find out. I would say for me, it was my peer group that got me involved.

 

[Celtavian]

I've been in enough casinos to know that lots of women play poker. And lots of women watch sports as well. And neither activity is particularly leaning in any direction when it comes to ethnicity.

Would you say that sports fans are predominantly white males?

We're not talking casinos. We're talking poker nights a your buddies house. A night where the males get together to have what they consider "male" fun. As far as professional poker demographics, go check that out. Predominantly white and Asian male, by like a huge margin at the top of the game. There are some prominent lady poker players, but they are heavily outnumbered by males.

Yes. Sports fans are predominately white males for many American sports such as the NFL, MLB, and NBA (probably the highest number of black fans). In a country that is still listed as 79% white with European countries being even whiter than America, that is not surprising. Black males make up 6% (blacks in total are 12%, Asians 4%) of the population. You probably have a growing base of Hispanic sports fans interested in something other than soccer due to time spent in America. But due to demographics of America including economic demographics, the majority of sports fans are white males. Is it as big a majority as gamers? No.

America is where D&D started. America was more white back when the game started. Of course it's going to take time to grow amongst other cultural groups where the educated, nerdy guy isn't as prominent as it is amongst whites. Asians are well represented worldwide when it comes to video games, not so much TTRPGs like D&D.

I know very few black or Hispanic guys that have any interest in playing D&D. The few black guys I did play D&D with, one guy for a long, long time, was definitely a loner and not a nerd. No one that saw the guy would think in anyway he was nerd. He could go from hanging with his buddies scoring chicks to sitting around the gaming table playing an elf warrior easily. He tended not to talk of D&D with any of his other black buddies because they had no interest and thought it was weird. Then again I had quite a few white friends that thought this way as well and kept their D&D play undercover, so their non-D&D playing friends wouldn't give them a hard time and they wouldn't lose points with women. Back in the early days of D&D, women did not look favorably upon D&D players. It was more a habit they tolerated in their male companion like video games, excessive drinking, and any other activity males tend to engage in that females tend not to find appealing.

Fortunately for this younger generation, that is all changing. I've never seen so many females taking up gaming as a hobby. Being a gamer nerd is as cool as I've ever seen it. Comic books are being made into mainstream movies with a wider audience. That's good for the younger generation who should eventually start to display different demographics amongst gamers...I hope. Though I did read on some gaming blogs (video gaming mostly) that some female gamers were being threatened and given a hard time by male gamers using the anonymity of the Internet to rage on them. It was known as Gamergate. It sounded like typical male trolls slamming someone anonymously. Males mostly ignore this trash. A female often can't ignore stalkers or violent threats because a male can harm them badly without a weapon. It represents a real danger and feeling of being threatened.

There's lot of cultural stereotypes and behaviors amongst socially awkward gamers that create a sort of exclusivity when it comes to females. It's worse than sports or a lot of other activities, even though those can be exclusive as well. It used to be worse amongst the older generation. It's been improving with younger generations of people generally across the board. That has to occur naturally. Forcing such changes is next to impossible.

Little changes like changing the word "race" isn't going to change anything. Never heard a person complain about race as a term, though I did get complaints from my buddies on occasion about the lack of black humanoid races, especially elves given the drow are the primary dark-skinned elf in D&D. He did love to play drow. When I was younger I was concerned about ruining verisimilitude by mixing dark-skinned elves into the game given the source material when I was younger (twenty plus years ago) being a Tolkien fan. As I got older I came to see his viewpoint and allowed him to play whatever he enjoyed and found a way to justify it in the context of the world.

Suffice it to say that changing gamer demographics is a slow process. Companies like WotC and Pathfinder are already on it including more prominent female characters, more diverse racial choices amongst humanoids, and just being a younger group socially trained to be more sensitive and accepting of differences. As far as actually attracting a large group of female or ethnic D&D players, I don't know. There are other reasons besides being exclusionary that makes them go "Why the hell do I want to play that weird game?" that changing game tropes might not help.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I've been in enough casinos to know that lots of women play poker. And lots of women watch sports as well. And neither activity is particularly leaning in any direction when it comes to ethnicity.

Would you say that sports fans are predominantly white males?

Just based on population makeup, yes, absolutely.

I think there have been some exclusionary aspects to the game at different points. Seems far, far less now than earlier on.

But the biggest factor to why the hobby appealed to predominantly white males is probably because of the stigma. White males were the largest demographic and therefore had the largest number of people willing to play a game like this, and then to stick with it despite the stigma and the "nerd" aspect.

But I can't really see how any of this is really relevant to the use of the word "race" to describe what manner of being a player character is.

 

[Mephista]

I don't like these sorts of characterizations of non-humans. I don't use non-human types as stand-ins for any real-world ethnic groups. If you meet a bugbear in one of my games, he's much more likely to resemble, in terms of speech and behaviour, a member of the dominant human society to which he lives in proximity, albeit a rather boorish and aggressive one, than he is a member of a foreign human culture. This sort of thing smacks horribly of the Jar Jar Binks and Trade Federation stereotypes that marred the Star Wars prequels. It's just a lazy way to characterize non-humans that's both offensive and, ironically, dehumanizing of both the character and the real-world culture that is thus being exploited.

All fantasy is, in some way, a metaphor or symbol for parts of the human condition. Being crass and over the top with the associations is just as bad, if not worse, than trying to bleach all the associations out. *shrugs* But the metaphor remains irregardless of your feelings by the very nature of fantasy works.

And what's wrong with a chainmail bikini? I dated a girl in college that was really into belly dancing, and she had a costume that featured a chainmail bikini. It was a really cool 6-in-1 pattern, too--she had spent a lot of money to have it custom made. Point is, it was awesome.

Is this a serious question? What's wrong is that its unrealistic for someone to actually wear in combat, and deliberately used to turn a woman (in the post above) into a fetish object for the male gaze. The post in question was deliberately used to demean and objectify a female character out of some sense of trying to piss off others out of a misguided sense of self-superiority and sexist entitlement.

There is plenty that is exclusionary. Gaming (video, TTRPG, or the like) is the equivalent of poker night or working on cars or any other traditionally male activity. For a long time it's been a chance for males to congregate without any of the concerns that occur when females enter the arena (flirting, having to change your language, feeling the need to impress the girl, etc.) It's one of those activities where you get together with a group of like-minded gamer nerds with no holds barred.

This is only true because the culture in those situations is exceedingly toxic. Check out Feminist Frequency if you don't believe me. There are active cultural pressures to exclude others who might be interested in gaming. The writings of D&D and similar games have been repeatedly offensive to women and people of color. With more cultural diversity, we are actually seeing a far greater upswing in female and non-white gamers.

Here's the not-surprising thing. You make an effort to include others, and they show up.

No one bothers males that like to get together to work on cars, drink and play poker, or play some sport together. Not sure why people are surprised that males like going into the cave when gaming with each other.

The problem is that you're ignoring the fact that there are women who love working on cars, playing poker, and playing sports, even with the guys. D&D has female players, and if it makes an effort to be more open to them, the player base will grow. That's a good thing for all involved.

I don't think D&D in and of itself was exclusionary. For whatever reason nerdy white guys were the primary audience for many years and I imagine still are. I always chocked that up to gaming being one of the many outlet males choose for creative, competitive, and social interaction for people maybe not so inclined to poker nights, sports, or other traditionally male activities.

Yes, yes it was exclusionary. Dwarven females in early games were specifically writen to huddle in kitchens in fright and cry. The only matriarchal society in the game generally is the drow. The overwhelming majority of games take place using the Middle Age European as a default, with an overwhelming number of white characters being the default. Those who had non-white skin were invariably monsters. That's kind of exclusionary. Anyone who wanted to game had to deal with a game based around white male power fantasies. Is it any surprise the game was predominantly played by white males when it was designed that way?

I'm sure the writers weren't being offensive (at least not on purpose). Its not like research on this stuff is readily available and saturated in the media like it is now. That's the thing with progress. Now, we're moving away into much more multi-cultural welcoming areas, and that's a good thing. With the hobby struggling, anything to bring in new gamers is welcome.

We're not talking casinos. We're talking poker nights a your buddies house. A night where the males get together to have what they consider "male" fun. As far as professional poker demographics, go check that out. Predominantly white and Asian male, by like a huge margin at the top of the game. There are some prominent lady poker players, but they are heavily outnumbered by males.

That has more to do with a predominantly patriarchal culture. Plus, when would most non-white people have the resources to dedicate to becoming professional poker players?

Celtavian, so-called "traditional male games" are only that because there's an active . Were you aware that women's sports actually has as large of a viewing as men's sports, but they're actually being deliberately sidelined in favor of more men sports despite viewership being roughly equal? That a lot of the viewership directly relates to the "assumption" that women must do the cooking and cleaning, even when they are a primary breadwinner? Being a woman in our society is not easy. Would the women rather sit down and watch a game and just let the others do the work? Hell yes.

Surveys show that white men show less and less interest in playing or reading of protagonists that match their race and gender, while women and other ethnicities show a greater importance of media showcasing women and non-white leads.

Fortunately for this younger generation, that is all changing. I've never seen so many females taking up gaming as a hobby. Being a gamer nerd is as cool as I've ever seen it. Comic books are being made into mainstream movies with a wider audience. That's good for the younger generation who should eventually start to display different demographics amongst gamers...I hope.

Probably because so many of our current adult hood were closet geeks, but now can share it with our kids. The internet and spread of information is a lovely thing.

Though I did read on some gaming blogs (video gaming mostly) that some female gamers were being threatened and given a hard time by male gamers using the anonymity of the Internet to rage on them. It was known as Gamergate. It sounded like typical male trolls slamming someone anonymously. Males mostly ignore this trash. A female often can't ignore stalkers or violent threats because a male can harm them badly without a weapon. It represents a real danger and feeling of being threatened.

Oh gods. Gamergate is so, so much worse than that. The gaters weren't slamming people. They were actively attacking them. We're talking about claling the police and SWAT on them, delivering bomb threats to businesses that allowed female game designers to speak, harassing not only the women themselves, but attacking their friends and family. They've lost their jobs, friends, and more because of this bullcrap. Their accounts were hacked, "games" that involved beating up pictures of famous women gamers were circulated, DOS attacks were launched, money stolen, fake accounts to try and get people to think they were someone else. Threats of rape and murder were common.

Gamergate went out of its way to physically, socially, financially, and business-related attack any one that represented a female view when it came to games. And not just video games, but table top game writers and novel authors. It was so bad that the FBI classified gamergate as an active hate group and is searching out its members for hate crimes and acts of terrorism.

Think about that for a minute. Gaming culture has its own KKK for non-white male members. Is it any wonder women aren't consider a majority in gaming when their very lives and wellbeing are at stake?

And that doesn't touch on the fact that, in gaming, a lot of the higher positions are a boys-only club were women are often deliberately excluded based solely on gender.

 

[epithet]

I get so tired of the "chainmail bikinis are bad" garbage. Yes, unequivocally, a chainmail bikini is worthless as armor. It is in the same category as the single pauldron and one oversized bracer being called "half plate" and the weightlifting belt + fluffy boots being called "studded leather." It's in the same vein as 300 bare-chested "Spartans."

This is a fantasy game, not an exercise in historical reenactment. If I want to play a character that looks like Jason Momoa and doesn't even own a shirt, much less wear any sort of practical armor, that's ok. It's equally ok for my wife to play a character that looks like Rhonda Rousey and wears a chainmail bikini. It's also completely ok if either of us wants to play the other character.

In fantasy art, the women in the chainmail bikinis are usually the ones who are as strong as the male heroes, and can pile up as many orc heads as anyone else. A woman in a chainmail bikini isn't a victim, she's a hero. I'm sick and tired of this ridiculous attitude that it's ok for Schwarzenegger to swing a sword while 3/4 nekkid, but a chainmail bikini is terribad. Sure, some folks play hideous or disfigured characters, but other want to play a fantasy hero that doesn't just kick mountains of butt, but looks amazing while doing it. It's goddamn fantasy.

 

[epithet]

Gamergate was its own thing. That was a hideous "Lord of the Flies" moment where the worst elements of human nature arose in a perfect storm of internet anonymity and mob mentality.

It was a revealing and disturbing look into the psyche of a part of our culture, and absolutely should be something from which we take lessons and heed warnings. Nevertheless, let's be careful about painting behavior you find somewhat disagreeable with that soiled brush. Just as in politics it is counterproductive to try to label your opponent a "nazi," it is counterproductive to try to label someone who doesn't share your perspective on gaming-related social issues a "gamergate troll."