Quote from: jeff37923;1090942Since you obviously didn't read my statement that you quoted the first time, here it is again. I'll even bold the relevant part.



EDIT: I will just add this. You were wrong and saw something there that wasn't. If you man up and admit your mistake, it'll be a lot easier for you in the long run.

It was rhetorical.

Quote from: richaje;1090867Individual writers and editors are perfectly entitled to believe and say that. Chaosium has always been an ideologically diverse group from gun-toting hippie shamans to Mormon elders, libertarian lawyers, and chain-smoking French communists. My goal as Creative Director is to produce stuff that I think makes cool and interesting stories. Some of that may lean left, some of that may lean right, some of that may lean upside down and inside out.

Lean right? Who are they since most have died, or only get trotted out when you need a figure head.  It was very nice that you admitted some (and no doubt the majority) of your staff believe MON to be racist and and given the left believe that if you write a racist product you are a racist did any of your left leaning staff  have the courage  to say that to Larry DiTillio? Given your ok with staff publicly stating that MON is racist would you be ok with a staff member who voted for Trump saying publicly that the groups in A Cold Fire were a reference to the sort of people who support Trump?

Quote from: ThatChrisGuy;1090955Dude, it's Cthulu.  Any mortal enemies you face are ultimately irrelevant.

Dude, that would have more impact if you could spell Cthulhu correctly.

Quote from: Gagarth;1091044Lean right? Who are they since most have died, or only get trotted out when you need a figure head.  It was very nice that you admitted some (and no doubt the majority) of your staff believe MON to be racist and and given the left believe that if you write a racist product you are a racist did any of your left leaning staff  have the courage  to say that to Larry DiTillio.

Racist? I don't consider Larry's book to be racist. I consider it a masterpiece - his second best RPG work. I think that his treatment of various ethnic groups - although true to the old Pulp genre - did not age well, especially given our international audience. But hey, you can make up your own mind - Larry had read the new edition of Masks (admittedly without all the art) before he wrote his wonderful prologue to the book.

But it seems to me that you want to hold Chaosium up to the same ideological litmus tests that your hard-left mirror reflections do.

Quote from: Gagarth;1091044Given your ok with staff publicly stating that MON is racist would you be ok with a staff member who voted for Trump saying publicly that the groups in A Cold Fire were a reference to the sort of people who support Trump?

Chaosium staff shat on the original Masks campaign? LOL. What's next, bitching that rolling 2D10s is too patriarchal?

Gagarth, the answer to your question is very simple. Spend your money on other products with other companies.

I've been a CoC GM for decades, having run hundreds of convention games, but I'm done.

All the Lovecraftian investigation you want can be gained through non-Chaosium sources.

Quote from: richaje;1091064Racist? I don't consider Larry's book to be racist. I consider it a masterpiece - his second best RPG work. I think that his treatment of various ethnic groups - although true to the old Pulp genre - did not age well, especially given our international audience. But hey, you can make up your own mind - Larry had read the new edition of Masks (admittedly without all the art) before he wrote his wonderful prologue to the book.

But it seems to me that you want to hold Chaosium up to the same ideological litmus tests that your hard-left mirror reflections do.

I didn't state that it was you that believed that MON was racist and you already stated yourself that some of your staff believe that MON was so why are trying to dodge that with this? They think it was racist and is still racist despite the woke rewrite.



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Quote from: richaje;1091064But it seems to me that you want to hold Chaosium up to the same ideological litmus tests that your hard-left mirror reflections do.

No I am not.  I want game companies who have ideological litmus tests for their products to own up to them and New Chaosium is obviously such a company.

Quote from: richaje;1091064But hey, you can make up your own mind - Larry had read the new edition of Masks (admittedly without all the art) before he wrote his wonderful prologue to the book.

Given the current climate of deplatforming, unpersonning and  witch-hunts do you really think he would have said anything?

How is MON "racist"?

Does it have actual racist elements incorporated into it? Or not Woke enough as a product? If it is the second than the staff at Chaosium is a special breed of stupid as far as I'm concerned. If as a developer one is going to hold a product made so many years ago to today standards then your asking to be called out for your stupidity. Even more so when as a company they are trying to pander to a demographic who has been shown to make a lot of noise to get what they want. Yet will not spend the money on more diverse and inclusive product. Sort of like how Marvel comics with both inside are being cancelled right and left.

I reacted when the Chaosium channel on Youtube promoted the new starter set. In part two, with some blonde actress named Jess (probably not even a Lovecraft reader or Keeper herself), I pointed out the stupidity of devoting time to bash Lovecraft for his racism, calling his personal views "distasteful and archaic" in a 2:45 long video meant to promote the starter box for a game based on said author's works. It's more or less like saying "Hey, buy our new shiny product based on Lovecraft's works. By the way, he was a racist prick!". Naturally, Chaosium closed the commentary section for that video part of the series (part 2). I find it quite distasteful to speak ill of a dead author that provides you with a paycheck today. I find it even more distasteful having a man of the early 1900s whos personal views you loathe as a cashcow.

We can even find a similar statement in the 24-page Book 2 of the Starter set (page 4):

"In spite of Lovecraft's distasteful racism and outdated personal views, we can find inspiration for gaming in his fictional creations."

I sometimes wonder what Lovecraft would think of Chaosium's authors if he had lived today? Maybe he would have written one or two of them a scathing letter? Maybe explaining the cat's name in Rats in the Walls properly for instance?

"What a boy he was! I watched him grow from a tiny black handful to one of the most fascinating & understanding creatures I've ever seen. He used to talk in a genuine language of varied intonations--a special tone for every different meaning. There was even a special "prrr'p" for the smell of roast chestnuts, on which he dotes. He used to play ball with me--kicking a large rubber sphere back at me from half across the room with all four feet as he lay on the floor. And on summer evenings in the twilight he would prove his kinship to the elfin things of shadow by racing across the lawn on nameless errands, darting into the blackness of the shrubbery now & then, & occasionally leaping at me from ambush & then bounding away again into invisibility before I could catch him."

H. P. Lovecraft to Harry O. Fischer, 10 Jan 1937, quoted in H. P. Lovecraft: A Biography 40

Talk about a bunch of hypocrites. Make money of Lovecraft while bashing him for his personal views. Oh well get woke go broke.

Quote from: Gagarth;1091838I didn't state that it was you that believed that MON was racist and you already stated yourself that some of your staff believe that MON was so why are trying to dodge that with this? They think it was racist and is still racist despite the woke rewrite.



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I find this Lynne Hardy person a bit intriguing. Why was she brought into the Chaosium fold? She doesn't even like horror movies according to the Chaosium website:

"Lynne doesn't like horror films much as they're far too scary, but she is rather fond of tea and fountain pens."

So we have a female writer/line editor who finds horror movies too scary, currently writing a Call of Cthulhu campaign called "Children of fear". That seems like a brilliant choice. I mean, the least you could expect a Call of Cthulhu-writer to be, is a horror fan. Well, being fond of tea and fountain pens sure must be a credit at Chaosium.

I was very unaware of those quotes in Chaosium's books. It is pathetic a company is happy to profit from Lovecraft while disgracing him.

More reasons to spend your money elsewhere.

Chaosium owns nothing of the Lovecraft IP. Zero. Nada. None. They are shitting on something they never created and never paid for, but what makes their company exist.

I absolutely never thought I'd see the day where I abandoned Chaosium or promoting CoC to new players.

Lovecraft was a complex and troubled person in life. He was a wonderful writer with an wondrous imagination, a friend to many, and part of a corresponding group of writers (that included REH, CAS, and others) that created the genres of horror and heroic fantasy as we know it. He also wrote things that were racist, and anti-Semitic, and probably misogynistic as well. His fear of the "Other" - of foreigners, Jews, etc. "infecting" the "body of old stock" definitely influenced his writing, and can be seen in things like Shadows Over Innsmouth, the Horror at Red Hook, and the Thing on the Doorstep. But these were also major anxieties of his time, shared by many others - Lovecraft's horror is many of the deep fears of the modern world (and includes the fear that not only is there no benevolent God but that the "gods" are outright malevolent and hate us). Lovecraft's cosmos is a howling abyss and none dare stare too long into it without becoming a monster.

I don't think it is possible to formulate this better than the HPLS has, I am just going to cite them with 100% agreement:

It is true that Lovecraft wrote some offensively racist things and held some very regrettably racist views. It is also true that his opinions changed over the course of his life, and the ugly things he said in his youth were somewhat mellowed by age and experience. But he's been dead a long time, and there's nothing we can do to change him. We can only recognize his flaws, and enjoy those parts of his work that do appeal to us: his fantastical imagination and worlds of ancient mystery. The HPLHS does not subscribe to Lovecraft's racial, political or sociological views, and does not support or promote them in any way.
http://www.hplhs.org/faq.php

We are in full agreement with the HPLHS (who are great folk and have done amazing work). This should hardly be a controversial stance.

A last comment from me - we don't have ideological purity tests to work with Chaosium. If you create good work that sells (or that we are convinced has sufficient artistic merit that it will sell in the future) and that aesthetically fits with our other lines (all in my subjective opinion), you are welcome in Casa Chaosium. At the end of the day, the only real test is whether your work can make it in the free market in which we operate. But then again, I am a free market capitalist who is a partner in a successful for-profit corporation. Or as America's wisest pre-med/pre-law student once put it:

[video=youtube_share;6PYb_anBMus]https://youtu.be/6PYb_anBMus[/youtube]

Quote from: richaje;1091987Lovecraft was a complex and troubled person in life. He was a wonderful writer with an wondrous imagination, a friend to many, and part of a corresponding group of writers (that included REH, CAS, and others) that created the genres of horror and heroic fantasy as we know it. He also wrote things that were racist, and anti-Semitic, and probably misogynistic as well. His fear of the "Other" - of foreigners, Jews, etc. "infecting" the "body of old stock" definitely influenced his writing, and can be seen in things like Shadows Over Innsmouth, the Horror at Red Hook, and the Thing on the Doorstep. But these were also major anxieties of his time, shared by many others - Lovecraft's horror is many of the deep fears of the modern world (and includes the fear that not only is there no benevolent God but that the "gods" are outright malevolent and hate us). Lovecraft's cosmos is a howling abyss and none dare stare too long into it without becoming a monster.

I don't think it is possible to formulate this better than the HPLS has, I am just going to cite them with 100% agreement:

It is true that Lovecraft wrote some offensively racist things and held some very regrettably racist views. It is also true that his opinions changed over the course of his life, and the ugly things he said in his youth were somewhat mellowed by age and experience. But he's been dead a long time, and there's nothing we can do to change him. We can only recognize his flaws, and enjoy those parts of his work that do appeal to us: his fantastical imagination and worlds of ancient mystery. The HPLHS does not subscribe to Lovecraft's racial, political or sociological views, and does not support or promote them in any way.
http://www.hplhs.org/faq.php

We are in full agreement with the HPLHS (who are great folk and have done amazing work). This should hardly be a controversial stance.

Well, it's one thing to acknowledge that he was a flawed, troubled man with a great fear of the unknown, sloppily called xenophobia. It's another thing to make him sound like some racist, frothing freak that Chaosium feels the need to bring up from time to time, when he didn't differ all that much from other people back then. He just put things on paper that other people, maybe your grandfathers and greatgrandfathers, felt.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1091948I absolutely never thought I'd see the day where I abandoned Chaosium or promoting CoC to new players.

I never really played or ran COC yet even I am beginning to feel the same way. One can't even use Trail of Cthulhu as Pelgrane Press is worse and seems fully wanting to embracing their wokeness.

What gets me is that yes he was racist so were a bunch of people in Lovecrafts time. Unlike Chaosium who tries act like the era in which HPL was alive was simply just another version of 2019.