Malic said:
OK, but if we need any more posts we'd better start a new thread, OK?
Eh, this thread's a poll with little debate so there's not much we can disrupt here.
Still, let's use sblock code so we don't take up much space and people who don't want to participate don't have to read it. (Just quote it to see the code if you don't know how it works.
) Let's keep comments about halflings or whatever in plain view, though.
[sblock]
Malic said:
If there is only one matriarchal race/culture in the standard setting, and it is evil, this does have undertones of 'Rule by women is bad' and 'women with power are evil'. This is because 100% of the examples in the world are evil.
One evil race among who knows how many is an exception and as such indicative of nothing.
Now, I don't say it can't be a sexist statement ('cause absence of evidence is not evidence of absence) - we can't know an author's intent, after all, we can only try to form an opinion based on the data available, which may or may not mesh with the author's. I'm just saying that there's not enough evidence to support a theory of sexism.
Now what makes more sense...
Sexism or:
1. A bored author looking to present his PCs with something different. More to the point...
2. The author creating a race that are elves, except that they are 180° from normal elves in many ways. (Obviously, inverting
everything would have been silly.) Elves are fair creatures of light - drow are dark-skinned. Elves are good - drow are evil. Elves' thinkers are mages - drows' are clerics. Just about any society in D&D is ruled by men - drow are ruled by women. Elves live in living woods - drow live in dead stone. Elves live in harmony with nature - drow have weapons and armor created by weird underdark radiation. Elves have fluffy pets - drow have icky spiders.
Malic said:
The exact same argument goes for 'colour' ...
It's not necessarily racist to have dumb or evil black-skinned beings. But if *all* of the black-skinned beings, or the only major group of them, is dumb or evil, it's definitely leaning that way.
No offense, but this argument has so many holes that I don't even know where to start.
Finding apparent trends in randomness is a popular mistake. Not weighing the similarities against the differences is even more popular.
First, 'black' people are not black - they are more brown-skinned.
Second, 'black' people have dark hair and dark eyes- drow have white hair and red eyes.
Third, the racist stereotypes against 'black' people don't usually say they are 'evil'.
Fourth, a racist stereotype is that 'black' people aren't as intelligent as 'white' people - but drow are highly intelligent.
Fifth, wild elves (which are of good alignment) have dark brown skin. So there is not only another dark-skinned race, but a dark-skinned race whose skin color is much closer to 'black' people's and that happens to be good.
Sixth, other evil humanoid races aren't usually black-skinned. Duergar are gray, derro are pale blue. Even orcs and goblinoids are like green or orange.
Seventh, a racist stereotype is that 'black' people are muscular - drow are physically frail.
I could go on but suffice to say, the theory that drow are like they are is because of racism against blacks doesn't hold up well once you begin to think it through.
Cheers, mate.
[/sblock] But if you want to start a new thread, go ahead - I'll follow.
