Quote from: jhkim;480555My two points here are:

1) I know the stories the he published well.  
2) I know he claimed that he did not consciously engage in symbolism or allegory.  

I am choosing to take #2 as a truthful statement.  If that is true, the symbolism and allegory in his works must have been subconscious.  I will allow that there is also the option that he lied about consciously engaging in symbolism.

So it's easier to assume you have psychic powers than it is to admit you might just be reading into it things that weren't there.

Gotcha.

Seriously?  Is this some kind of pansy-ass "Oh, no!  We can't possibly say anything bad about anyone, because calling anyone anything bad is too cruel for words!"  

Fuck that.  

I will call someone an asshole if I think they are an asshole.  I will call someone a racist if I think they are a racist.  It doesn't matter to me if they are living or dead.  You can cry all you want about how nasty I am.

Quote from: jhkim;480558Seriously?  Is this some kind of pansy-ass "Oh, no!  We can't possibly say anything bad about anyone, because calling anyone anything bad is too cruel for words!"  

Fuck that.  

I will call someone an asshole if I think they are an asshole.  I will call someone a racist if I think they are a racist.  It doesn't matter to me if they are living or dead.  You can cry all you want about how nasty I am.

That is so far from the point you can't even see it with the Hubble.

Quote from: jhkim;480558I will call someone an asshole if I think they are an asshole.

You mean like saying Mr. Gray is a teenage douchebag who needs to work out his insecurities about race instead of projecting his brainfarts on the D&D game?
That's fine by me.

Quote from: CRKrueger;480505Ba dum bum.  Are you here all week?  

So Stormfront uses a perversion of RPGs to promote racist ideas, and...what, exactly?  What's your point, simply that they do so?

So Stormfront uses misrepresentation of the science of genetics to promote racist ideas, so...what exactly?  What's your point, simply that they do so?

What arguments are you trying to make about RPGs then if I am missing what you are trying to say?

I am not making any arguments about RPGs.  I am pointing out that elements exist in RPGs that allow certain real world ideas to be expressed more easily than other types of games.

Which somehow gets translated into "All RPGs are inherently racist".  Talk about sophistry.  And in order for the message and messenger to be truly and utterly discredited, you yourself engage in the guilt by association that has been almost at the center of this whole manufactured outrage less than a dozen posts ago.

QuoteHowever, when it comes to discussion, I never thought the end justifies  the means.  If someone's making a flawed argument, I've never jumped to  someone's aid simply because they shared my leanings in any respect.  I  try very hard not to construct "gotcha" arguments or drive-by  soundbites.  I consider those the tools of the enemy, those who would  obscure truth to gain advantage (and those people exist on both side of  any aisle).

Simply put, you're using those tools now, which causes me to think less of you.  Sorry bro, that's just the way it is.

So, I am discussing something people appear to be highly uncomfortable with, and I am marked as 'the enemy' now?  All manner of arguments have been invented whole cloth and attributed to me because...?  That's the part I don't get, really.  It's controversial now to point out that certain aspects of RPGs more easily lend themselves to analogues from reality than boardgames?  

I understand Sigmund's point, the guy makes pretty broad strokes with his little 'discovery', and that is where he goes completely off the rails.  But to crucify people for suggesting there are elements of RPGs that facilitate any number of correlations is just bizarre.  To categorically deny these things could ever possibly exist even moreso.

Benoist likes to make hay with the original post, and the TSR guidelines thing up there, but furiously demanding that any real world attitudes are solely and entirely brought to the table by the participants because there is absolutely nothing about RPGs that could ever ease the transition is just a purity test from another angle.

But clearly I stepped into the Two Minutes of Hate instead.

Quote from: jhkim;4805552) I know he claimed that he did not consciously engage in symbolism or allegory.

and creating an Absolute Good and Absolute Evil in his stories is neither.

Quote from: jhkim;480555I will allow that there is also the option that he lied about consciously engaging in symbolism.

You also might want to allow for the option that you're wrong and being a snarky fuck when anyone suggests as much.

Quote from: jhkim;480558Seriously?  Is this some kind of pansy-ass "Oh, no!  We can't possibly say anything bad about anyone, because calling anyone anything bad is too cruel for words!"

No, it's more like you being called on being full of shit when you pull the usual crap of believing that because you read racism into something it must be there, and the original author is fooling himself if he doesn't think that's why he wrote something.

Quote from: jhkim;480558Fuck that.

Nah, more like fuck you.

Quote from: jhkim;480558I will call someone a racist if I think they are a racist.  It doesn't matter to me if they are living or dead.

Apparently it also doesn't matter whether or not they are a racist.  Oh yeah, because anyone who doesn't admit they are a racist is automatically one, right?  

Quote from: jhkim;480558You can cry all you want about how nasty I am.

More like laugh at how pathetically stereotypical.

Quote from: StormBringer;480563I am not making any arguments about RPGs.  I am pointing out that elements exist in RPGs that allow certain real world ideas to be expressed more easily than other types of games.

So a medium that allows you to create fantasy races and cultures could be used by racists to create racist fantasy races and cultures...and that's it?  That's your whole point?



In other news...

"The sky is blue, water is wet, women have secrets...Who gives a fuck?"

OK, I'm satisfied we're at the agree to disagree stage regarding Tolkien.  

Out of curiousity, does anyone agree with me that Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, and Edgar Rice Burroughs were racists?  Or do people think that I'm also just crazy reading racism into their writing as well?

Quote from: jhkim;480568OK, I'm satisfied we're at the agree to disagree stage regarding Tolkien.  

Out of curiousity, does anyone agree with me that Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, and Edgar Rice Burroughs were racists?  Or do people think that I'm also just crazy reading racism into their writing as well?

I only really read Lovecraft out of that group. I think he definitely had a lot of racist assumptions in his writing, but I also think he was very much a product of his time. It has been many years since I've read Lovecraft extensively, so I would certainly be open to revising my position if it turns out my memory doesn't match what he actually wrote.

With the kind of stuff Lovecraft wrote though it is, as I remember it, much more explicit and clear than what we were discussing ealier.

Quote from: jhkim;480568OK, I'm satisfied we're at the agree to disagree stage regarding Tolkien.  

Out of curiousity, does anyone agree with me that Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, and Edgar Rice Burroughs were racists?  Or do people think that I'm also just crazy reading racism into their writing as well?

Robert E. Howard is about as racist as you can possibly expect for 1930's middle-of-nowhere Texas, which is to say, ridiculously so.  HP Lovecraft isn't as bad, but definitely racist.  Burroughs I have no clue about, I've never read any of his collected letters, as I have with the others.

Quote from: CRKrueger;480570Robert E. Howard is about as racist as you can possibly expect for 1930's middle-of-nowhere Texas, which is to say, ridiculously so.  HP Lovecraft isn't as bad, but definitely racist.  Burroughs I have no clue about, I've never read any of his collected letters, as I have with the others.

I think it is the other way. I'm not comfortable with the racism in howard, but I think it is mostly minor enough that you can over look it. There are a few shining examples of racism, like the african guards that held him prisoner. There was some on the Queen of the Black Coast, but you can take it as a sign of the times.

Lovecraft on the other hand wrote a whole story where the terrifying conclusion was finding out about how the girl had a black ancestor or something. There was also the poem he wrote called, N______.

Quote from: Cranewings;480572Lovecraft on the other hand wrote a whole story where the terrifying conclusion was finding out about how the girl had a black ancestor or something. There was also the poem he wrote called, N______.

I didn't know about that poem (always avoided reading poems by lovecraft because I heard they were terrible).

Quote from: CRKrueger;480567So a medium that allows you to create fantasy races and cultures could be used by racists to create racist fantasy races and cultures...and that's it?  That's your whole point?

Ok, hold on.  You just spent a considerable number of posts claiming that was absolutely impossible.
This part, right here:
"So a medium that allows you to create fantasy races and culture..."

You just spent a good deal of time an effort to debunk that exact notion.  That it was utterly and completely something the players brought to the table.  That there is absolutely nothing in RPGs that could facilitate it.  It is just as easy to introduce racist elements to a game of Monopoly.

 

Quote from: CRKrueger;480324Correct.  The game has absolutely nothing to do with it.

So, which is it?

Then again, I suspect it was just to bring up the strawman you wanted to defeat:

Quote from: CRKrueger;480324The game  is as responsible for racism as the science of genetics is.

I think I see the problem.  This is an argument exactly no one was making.

Quote from: StormBringer;480578I think I see the problem.  This is an argument exactly no one was making.

Yeah, except that's totally what the OP is actually saying:

Quote from: Mr. GrayAs I designed my setting for Hinterlands, I struggled with a key problem regarding all the typical genocidal bullshit in fantasy gaming. Here I am, building a setting and populating it with stuff for characters to kill. It's very difficult to get around that in a D&D setting, because fantasy gaming is so tightly integrated with the killing.

(…)

My problem with the whole setup is that the reason for all the ultraviolence is rarely explored in any depth. Simply put: why do these monsters need to die? Okay, so they're Evil. D&D has an alignment system that categorizes everyone into three, five, or nine (depending on which edition you play) convenient morality boxes like "Lawful" or "Chaotic Evil." We're told that every orc is Evil, and that's sufficient excuse to kill every last one, including their women and children, without guilt. We're also told that they have chieftains, tribes, and settlements. Their "lairs" are described in loving detail, showing how the community lives and eats. But they're all Evil, so leave none alive.

So it all stinks to me of a kind of privileged, colonial, expansionist, genocidal viewpoint that makes my stomach turn. And I've played this way for decades and mostly just looked the other way or found various rationalizations and justifications for it.

"So it all stinks to me of a kind of privileged, colonial, expansionist, genocidal viewpoint that makes my stomach turn."

What is "it" here? The setup of the game. The "mindless killing" and the alignment setup and the "orcs are Evil". The way the game describes monsters. The game itself.

Have you even read this? Put on some glasses for fuck's sakes.

Quote from: Benoist;480582Yeah, except that's totally what the OP is actually saying:

Then maybe you should take that up with him.

Quote"So it all stinks to me of a kind of privileged, colonial, expansionist, genocidal viewpoint that makes my stomach turn."

What is "it" here? The setup of the game. The "mindless killing" and the alignment setup and the "orcs are Evil". The way the game describes monsters. The game itself.

Have you even read this? Put on some glasses for fuck's sakes.

Have you seen anyone else make this argument?  And how is that saying that D&D is responsible for racism? Put some glasses on for fuck's sake.  

Also, wasn't the primary complaint that the original guy was reading too much into things?

"So it all stinks to me of a kind of privileged, colonial, expansionist, genocidal viewpoint that makes my stomach turn."
When did "to me" come to mean "a general statement that applies to every single person on the planet without recourse"?