Quote from: Slambo;1120294As much as i love anime, i dont think you can call "capeshit" pseudo-intellectual in a way anime is not. There are good examples of that in all mediums.

True, but the issue of pseudo-intellectualism and smug unwarranted self-importance seems to be a much bigger problem in the Marvel and DC fandoms in the past several years overall.

Plus, thanks to the popularity of the MCU, the capeshit fans are often far more insufferable and pretentious in my book.

Wow, i just realize how off topic we got.

On the subject of decolonization in RPGs i actually have no idea what people mean by decolonization besides maybe return to pre-industrial times.

Quote from: Slambo;1120301I actually have no idea what people mean by decolonization besides maybe return to pre-industrial times.

"Colonization" is the term used in SJ advocacy for the act of one culture dominating another by force, so "decolonization" is any social movement aimed at undoing the effects of such domination. Restoration of fading languages, preference for original cultural names over those assigned by others (e.g. "Inuit" or "Innu" vs. "Eskimo/Esquimaux"), study of the works of art and history of the dominated people over the dominators', all the way up to outright violent overthrow of a regime, reclamation of dispossessed geographical territory and expulsion of "non-native" inhabitants -- all fall under the rubric of "decolonization".

In itself this certainly has no shortage of dramatic conflict potential, so it's as fit a topic for RPGs as any other. In practice, most "decolonization" movements are undermined by the tendency to be extremely selective about which examples of intercultural domination are "wrong" and which not, and by the fatal desire to "eat one's cake and have it too" when it comes to keeping the benefits of "colonization" while rejecting the undesired elements. ("All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?")

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1120306"Colonization" is the term used in SJ advocacy for the act of one culture dominating another by force, so "decolonization" is any social movement aimed at undoing the effects of such domination. Restoration of fading languages, preference for original cultural names over those assigned by others (e.g. "Inuit" or "Innu" vs. "Eskimo/Esquimaux"), study of the works of art and history of the dominated people over the dominators', all the way up to outright violent overthrow of a regime, reclamation of dispossessed geographical territory and expulsion of "non-native" inhabitants -- all fall under the rubric of "decolonization".

In itself this certainly has no shortage of dramatic conflict potential, so it's as fit a topic for RPGs as any other. In practice, most "decolonization" movements are undermined by the tendency to be extremely selective about which examples of intercultural domination are "wrong" and which not, and by the fatal desire to "eat one's cake and have it too" when it comes to keeping the benefits of "colonization" while rejecting the undesired elements. ("All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?")

Yep. It's just more attempts by the SJW left to divide and conquer. This one's a bit more esoteric and tends to fly under the radar.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1120306("All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?")

Isn't this what makes the whole thing utterly retarded? Western "colonization" has produced the most technologically advanced society to ever exist, but SURELY all those tribes in Africa were on the verge of an industrial revolution right before they got sold into slavery! The whole thing is a joke.

Reminds me of this scene from CB4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5Ng0LyWUjY

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1120306In itself this certainly has no shortage of dramatic conflict potential, so it's as fit a topic for RPGs as any other. In practice, most "decolonization" movements are undermined by the tendency to be extremely selective about which examples of intercultural domination are "wrong" and which not, and by the fatal desire to "eat one's cake and have it too" when it comes to keeping the benefits of "colonization" while rejecting the undesired elements. ("All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?")

Yup, and with it comes a truckload of cognitive dissonance. "They would have totally adapted all the values we like anyway if the Romans didn't get involved".

The whole philosophy is a farce. It's just an organized excuse to be hateful pricks and smash stuff.

Quote from: Doc Sammy;1120254I honestly do not care about morality

Unless you have complete bodily detachment and don't care what happens to you I don't think that's accurate. Even a sociopath would care about what happens to them, and for that, it requires a set of structured moral laws for at least the society around them even if they don't value any of the moral underpinnings.
I guess a more accurate statement would be "I don't care about following any sort of morality".

I mean you can't be a capitalist without valuing independence and personal responsibility. Unless you mean you're a consumerist which doesn't require the preceding two values, nor free-market capitalism really. Consumerism works fine under (theoretical) luxury socialism.

Okay, it doesnt sound so bad wheb you put it that way. So it must be something in the way its practiced. From what i saw looking at examples, it seems like theres often an effort to go for flipping the opressed to the oppressor. That imo could make a good campain if you dont mind becoming evil

Quote from: SlamboI actually have no idea what people mean by decolonization besides maybe return to pre-industrial times.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1120306"Colonization" is the term used in SJ advocacy for the act of one culture dominating another by force, so "decolonization" is any social movement aimed at undoing the effects of such domination. Restoration of fading languages, preference for original cultural names over those assigned by others (e.g. "Inuit" or "Innu" vs. "Eskimo/Esquimaux"), study of the works of art and history of the dominated people over the dominators', all the way up to outright violent overthrow of a regime, reclamation of dispossessed geographical territory and expulsion of "non-native" inhabitants -- all fall under the rubric of "decolonization".

So, I just got back from a three-week work trip to South Korea, and there de-colonization is generally part of a conservative, nationalist agenda. For those who don't know, Korea was taken over by Japan in 1910 and officially made a Japanese colony. My father was a child during Japanese rule, and he had to speak and read Japanese in school, according to their curriculum. So post-WWII, the conservative nationalist agenda has often been about eliminating Japanese influence -- including yes, restoration of Korean (Hangul) as the official language, restoration of Korean names, and similar. So it isn't just a modern SJW thing.

I think it tends to be a matter of perspective. Of course, with successive waves of invasions, there is plenty of grey area in who is the colonizer -- but I think any social definition always has grey areas.

In RPGs, I think colonizers can be excellent villains. In many fantasy games, the monsters are on the fringes. i.e. The PCs go out into the wilds to find and fight evil monsters, and then go back to civilization to recover and re-equip and such. That pattern means that the monsters aren't all that threatening. Whereas if the monsters are actually in the process of taking over civilization, and control large territory, then they are a more serious threat that has to be countered.

Actually, a couple of my recent campaigns have featured more monster-dominant settings. I ran a D&D campaign where dragons were conquering the surface world - that was my post-apocalyptic "Dawn of Fire" game where surviving humans were heading into dungeons to find a safe place to live. I also ran a Call of Cthulhu campaign which was set in an alternate 1940s after a world-spanning war with the Deep Ones, and there was still overt Deep-One-controlled territory.

Another one bites the dust over Lovecraft. Lol. "STOP TALKING ABOUT HISTORY AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!"

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/ruemere-receives-a-%F0%9F%92%80-permanent-ban.858314/

Quote from: jhkim;1120313So, I just got back from a three-week work trip to South Korea, and there de-colonization is generally part of a conservative, nationalist agenda.

A good example of the complexities of such issues.

The reason I attribute it to SJ advocacy in particular is because SJ advocates tend to use the term as the explanation for any kind of perceived power disparity between cultures, whereas traditionalists or conservatives tend to limit its use solely to cases of actual military or political hegemony rather than cultural popularity or comparative economic value.  Hollywood's influence over worldwide pop culture, for example, is considered "colonization" in SJ advocacy, despite the fact that there isn't a country in the world whose people are required by law to go see those movies.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1120309Unless you have complete bodily detachment and don't care what happens to you I don't think that's accurate. Even a sociopath would care about what happens to them, and for that, it requires a set of structured moral laws for at least the society around them even if they don't value any of the moral underpinnings.
I guess a more accurate statement would be "I don't care about following any sort of morality".

I mean you can't be a capitalist without valuing independence and personal responsibility. Unless you mean you're a consumerist which doesn't require the preceding two values, nor free-market capitalism really. Consumerism works fine under (theoretical) luxury socialism.

I suppose I should clarify...

I do not believe in dogmatic morality, the kind of morals that are espoused by both the Marxists and SJW's on the Left and the Abrahamic fundamentalists on the Right.

I have my own personal morals, but they are largely antithetical to both Marxist intersectional morality and traditionalist Judeo-Christian morality as well.

I am a capitalist, a centrist, a hedonist, a Greco-Roman polytheist, and a sadist. I support the ideology of capitalism because it is the only modern ideology that is somewhat compatible with my personal beliefs and views.

As for the uproar over colonialism, I think it's mostly overblown nonsense, no different than the uproar over "D&D promoting Satanism" that was en vogue during the 80's.

Personally, I had an idea for a game that turns the anti-colonialist narrative on its head. A scenario where the colonizers are the good guys and the indigenous tribals are the villains.

I'm imagining either a horror scenario in the vein of "The Hills Have Eyes" or an adventure campaign that is a fantasy parallel of the Aztec Empire's downfall.

The latter scenario would be really good, because you could have a different group of indigenous people as allies of the heroes, much like how the Tlaxcala helped the Spaniards fight the Aztecs.

Quote from: Slambo;1120310From what i saw looking at examples, it seems like there's often an effort to go for flipping the oppressed to the oppressor.

That is, indeed, one of the pitfalls. Human nature unfortunately tends to the vindictive, and everyone has an interest in representing themselves as the target of aggression rather than its practitioner, thereby representing their opponents as "deserving" of complete erasure and disenfranchisement. (I have no objection, for example, to adding courses to an education curriculum which study the art and literature of various indigenous peoples worldwide. I just object to the idea that the study of Shakespeare should be retired in their favour.)

In an RPG, such conflicts are most likely to be physical and martial, both in what sets up the original domination (cf. Alexander the Great or the Romans) and in what's done to push back against it (guerrilla rebellion campaigns). One possible way to examine a more even-handed version of such conflicts is to make them geopolitical and economic, like the struggle over the anti-agathic/space-navigation spice melange in Dune (or its real world inspiration, the oil-rich nations of the Middle East): possessing an absolutely vital resource for the rest of the known world makes you either the king of the world or its slave, depending on what's done about it.

Quote from: Antiquation!;1120316Another one bites the dust over Lovecraft. Lol. "STOP TALKING ABOUT HISTORY AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!"

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/ruemere-receives-a-%F0%9F%92%80-permanent-ban.858314/

Thanks for posting this.

Every so often  wonder whether things has calmed down over there, and wonder if I should have asked for my account to be Permabanned.

Nope, say anything rational but outside of party lines and you're out of there.

Quote from: ponta1010;1120324Thanks for posting this.

Every so often  wonder whether things has calmed down over there, and wonder if I should have asked for my account to be Permabanned.

Nope, say anything rational but outside of party lines and you're out of there.

Indeed. I thought for sure I was going to get perma'd for complaining openly about the moderation, but as it so happened the thread just got closed (after they banned several others for complaining and hurting their fee-fees, of course). I figure they let me skate due to already having gotten their taste of blood for the day. I'm still waiting for the perfect opportunity to burn that account...

Quote from: Doc Sammy;1120235Personally, I am very pro-Israel. Despite some of their more questionable policies, they are far better than the opposition and are the closest thing that the Middle East has to a functional Western democracy. Most SJW's hate Israel with a burning passion, which is something they share in common with most white supremacists.

Israel is based as fuck. Let's be honest, any nation that can get both Antifa and Neo-Nazis to utterly seethe is kind of awesome when you think about it.

If the Israel-Palestine debate is an issue of colonialism, then I am a proud colonialist!

I got no problem at all with pro-Israel folks, as long as they aren't hypocrites or Jewish particularists who only allow room for Jewish ethnostates. As long as they don't get up to that kind of slimy shit, they're fine by me.

I couldn't give less of a fuck about democracies in west Asia, though. ZFG.

I disagree that SJWs hate Israel. IME, this is mostly a GOPer fantasy.