"They told me it was something else."

[Umbran]

I think we have a chicken and egg problem here. The period of D&D's most rapid growth also was the period when the D&D scare first began, but like you, I don't find correlation here to indicate causation. It's just as easy - and in my opinion easier - to argue that the scare is being fed by D&D's rapid growth.

I think there's a problem of assuming that one strictly caused the other. I think it is just as easy, and in fact more reasonable, to assume there was a synergistic effect. Nature loves feedback loops.

D&D appears, some folks misunderstand, get scared, make noise. That raises visibility of D&D, more people buy it. Due to a couple of very visible events, the scared people get more scared, make more noise, and that continues to raise visibility, and visibility drives yet more sales.

The order of operations does not matter so much in a feedback loop - which comes first is academic. If you lack either element, the whole thing doesn't go nearly as far.

 

[1Mac]

The order of operations does not matter so much in a feedback loop - which comes first is academic. If you lack either element, the whole thing doesn't go nearly as far.

The open question is whether there was a strong feedback loop at play, or whether it was more like two opposing forces.

Celebrim's timeline seems like evidence that the scare didn't do much to sell DnD. One thing I've learned from my facile study in economics concerns trendlines: If you want to see if some event affects some social statistic, you look at how the data trended before the event, and how it trended afterwards. If the data shows, say, a stronger trend for growth before the event than after, it is a very strong (though not absolute) indication that the event does not cause stronger growth.

Basically, if the sales and popularity of DnD grew faster before the Great Scare than after, then it's likely that the Scare did not have a positive impact (you would have to compare it to the success of similar hobbies or fads to gain greater assurance). If it actually plateaus, or starts flagging, that's an even stronger indication.

 

[cdrcjsn]

Can't you look at the growth of D&D in other countries as a point of comparison? As far as I know, the great 80s scare was mostly a US thing.

 

[TarionzCousin]

When someone throws a nasty Type VI Balor at little ol' me I'm still scared!

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Heh, aside from the 700 Club, I still remember the worst thing that I ever heard a religico say about the game. It was from a monsignor of the Catholic church, local to the parochial school that I attended, direct superior to the priest who joined us all in the basement of the Unitarian church* for the game.

What he said was 'I hate hearing those damned war stories!'

The Auld Grump

* The basement at the Catholic church and school were taken up by a thrift store and bingo....

 

[Ulrick]

During the early 1990s, I got my dose of "D&D is Satanic" from my best friend's christian parents. My own parents were only concerned about the amount of books I was buying: it was TSR's heyday of producing a lot of stuff that my early teenage brain thought was so cool. But my best friend had to hide what little AD&D books he had--and this was 2nd Edition, when TSR "grew up" and got rid of a lot of the demonic/erotic artwork from their books. He had to keep things secret because he was afraid what his parents might do.

One summer, my best friend's mom discovered his small collection of books and miniatures while "cleaning" his room. She immediately rounded up the family, gathered up the D&D stuff, and took my friend out to an isolated spot outside of our town. They burned his books and miniatures in a ditch while they prayed for his soul.

It emotionally scarred him, I swear.

He tried to still play D&D with myself and our friends. But if his parents even suspected he was over at my place, they would round up the family to come get him. One time, my friend wasn't even there. But his parents sat outside for an hour until his older brother drove up to tell them he was at another friend's place. This happened 3-4 times before he just quit. Unfortunately, I think these were symptoms of other things that were going in the family. My mom even considered adopting my friend because things had gotten so bad.

Finally I confronted his parents and told them that I did not want to lose my best friend over a game. But it was only after I told them that I was getting rid of all my D&D books that they would let him hang out with me again. Of course I didn't throw away my books, but I didn't like lying either.

At the time I felt that I saw the dark side of christianity and it drove me away from that belief system.

Somewhere in becoming older (and hopefully wiser), I realized that not all christians behave this way. But I never want to be guilty of persecuting somebody over their belief systems... or over a game!

 

[Matchstick]

I was born in late '68 and started playing around '80 or so. I remember the scare, but I'm happy to say it never had any effect on myself or my friends. For my part my parents were encouraging: they bought books and dice and Dad and I even made a trip to one of the early GenCons! I don't know what checking they did, but they never expressed even a bit of concern, and it wasn't due to neglect, it was because they were smart people that weren't afraid to judge for themselves.

I'm sure I played over my school years with at least ten other kids from differing backgrounds and religions and I don't know of even one set of parents that was worried. I'm sure it happened, but the parents all handled concerns (as far as I know) without letting them get to us, so we never saw or heard anything.

My Dad died in 2008 and I'll always believe that he would have been one heck of a gamer if he'd have been born later. I think he always felt too old to participate. I wish now that I'd have seen that sooner and invited him to play.

 

[megamania]

In the early 80's I was asked to join a gaming group and declined since I had heard about DnD and how it really was a front for bad things. Later I was asked to join a Marvel Role Playing game group but I sat in on how Thor did She-hulk and that kinda thing I figured the idea of role playing games was bad.

Then the store owner talked to me about gaming a few years later. Said gaming is what you bring to it. If it is evil you bring to it then there you go. But if you are into story telling... it is what you make it out to be.

In the fall of 1989 I gave it a try and even though it was Ravenloft I found it was not evil. It was actually the opposite. It was about fighting evil.


So I understand getting the wrong idea but I also came to see thru the crap.


Others will too.

 

[GameDaddy]

When D&D first showed up, it was a very 'fringe' behavior. It was associated with anti-social groups, Satanists, mysogyny, drug use and so forth not by wild overreach, but because there were alot of groups for which that characterization fit perfectly well.

It was not! When D&D first showed up, it was adopted by smart people. Smart young people who were leaders in college, who were leaders in their community. I had GM'ed for more than four years before a stoner (For you kids, that's what we called drug abusers back in the day) even showed up for one of my games...

The people that were in my games back then, with the exception of two, went to college, became leaders in business, and in the military, started their own companies, were self-employed as craftsmen and home builders, became electronic and civil engineers, teachers, and civil servants as well.
Most of them raised families of their own...

For the record, the mainstream in 1977-79 was boring as hell. Their was a recession (of course). Their was a short revival of Disco. Hoolywood was busy making movies about drug lords, gunslingers, and pimps (just like they do now)... although Spielberg did do Star Wars and E.T. to break the trend of retarded movies being released. The early 80's was a Rennaissance of Fantasy and saw the full blooming of Science Fiction, Wargames was the hot geek movie of the week. The Cold War was still on full blast, The Gipper a former hollywood B movie actor was in charge of the government... The military was prepping for WWIII. Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles, and Eric Clapton were hot.

In truth, that stoner showed up after that movie Mazes and Monsters came out. Even he, turned out to be a competent business manager... (Who probably still tokes heavily on the side...)