Quoteabout the "white-centric racism" of a game born in VII Century India, diffused in Persia via the Silk Road, and then in North Africa and Europe by Islamic invaders.

Although chess is derived from Aryan-Asiatic boardgames, the current ruleset and piece-set originates from XV-century Italy.

Quote from: Wicked Woodpecker of West on February 27, 2021, 09:39:12 AM

Quoteabout the "white-centric racism" of a game born in VII Century India, diffused in Persia via the Silk Road, and then in North Africa and Europe by Islamic invaders.

Although chess is derived from Aryan-Asiatic boardgames, the current ruleset and piece-set originates from XV-century Italy.

True (and finalised in the XIX Century), but the "White moves first" rule goes back to the original "Chaturanga" as played in India in the VII Century. Furthermore,it is believed that "White and Black" simply referred to the uniforms of opposing armies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaturanga#Rules

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on February 26, 2021, 09:22:40 PM
Are they complaining about demons and evil spirits being racist yet?

Then they haven't gotten as bad as RPGNet.

I need to look at that thread in the same way I need to scratch a mosquito bite, but link seems to be broken

Quote from: Reckall on February 27, 2021, 08:56:58 AM
Let's not forget that we do live in times when asking "Are chess racists? In the game the White always moves first!" is considered a serious question.

https://www.rt.com/sport/493243-anatoly-karpov-chess-racism/

The funny^H^H^H^H^H interesting thing is how this kind of "concern" only underlines a Western white-centric view of the World. No one, for example, asks "Is Go a racist game?" because in Go *Black* always plays first. It also underlines how this specific occurrence of holy indignation is based on ignorance (as "holy indignation" often is) about the "white-centric racism" of a game born in VII Century India, diffused in Persia via the Silk Road, and then in North Africa and Europe by Islamic invaders.

But the above is called "research and analysis". It is also called "using your  head" - and thus a futile counter to thisk kind of madness.

BTW

Exhibit #1 in the "potential problematic issues" list:

- Nipples in chain mail bikinis

I.e. Not "chain mail bikinis" (!) in the first place. It tells you all you need to know right there. 🙄

I'll be damned. Good point. I hadn't thought of it that way.

Quote from: Marchand on February 27, 2021, 10:22:35 AM

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on February 26, 2021, 09:22:40 PM
Are they complaining about demons and evil spirits being racist yet?

Then they haven't gotten as bad as RPGNet.

I need to look at that thread in the same way I need to scratch a mosquito bite, but link seems to be broken

There is a spurious " at the end. Here you go:

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/evil-species-problems-and-demons-or-other-evil-spirits.877853/page-3

(But, listen to me: you don't need to read that thread. Really. Don't make my mistake. Life is short.)

QuoteTrue (and finalised in the XIX Century), but the "White moves first" rule goes back to the original "Chaturanga" as played in India in the VII Century. Furthermore,it is believed that "White and Black" simply referred to the uniforms of opposing armies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaturanga#Rules

Thanks for clarification.

Quote from: Reckall on February 27, 2021, 11:50:16 AM

Quote from: Marchand on February 27, 2021, 10:22:35 AM

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on February 26, 2021, 09:22:40 PM
Are they complaining about demons and evil spirits being racist yet?

Then they haven't gotten as bad as RPGNet.

I need to look at that thread in the same way I need to scratch a mosquito bite, but link seems to be broken

There is a spurious " at the end. Here you go:

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/evil-species-problems-and-demons-or-other-evil-spirits.877853/page-3

(But, listen to me: you don't need to read that thread. Really. Don't make my mistake. Life is short.)

What the fuck? Demons are a feature of every religion throughout history, including African and Asian. They aren't racist.

Case in point: the kishi. A hyena demon from Angola that pretends to be a man so that it can seduce and eat (Angolan) women. It's basically an Angolan incubus/ogre.

What racist woke nutjub is seriously going to argue that, and similar stories from around the world, is racist when it was created by ethnic Angolans and so forth centuries before colonization?

These idiots need to learn about cultures other than their own.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on February 27, 2021, 01:09:19 PM
These idiots need to learn about cultures other than their own.

Amen and Awomen

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on February 27, 2021, 01:09:19 PM

Quote from: Reckall on February 27, 2021, 11:50:16 AM

Quote from: Marchand on February 27, 2021, 10:22:35 AM

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on February 26, 2021, 09:22:40 PM
Are they complaining about demons and evil spirits being racist yet?

Then they haven't gotten as bad as RPGNet.

I need to look at that thread in the same way I need to scratch a mosquito bite, but link seems to be broken

There is a spurious " at the end. Here you go:

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/evil-species-problems-and-demons-or-other-evil-spirits.877853/page-3

(But, listen to me: you don't need to read that thread. Really. Don't make my mistake. Life is short.)

What the fuck? Demons are a feature of every religion throughout history, including African and Asian. They aren't racist.

Case in point: the kishi. A hyena demon from Angola that pretends to be a man so that it can seduce and eat (Angolan) women. It's basically an Angolan incubus/ogre.

What racist woke nutjub is seriously going to argue that, and similar stories from around the world, is racist when it was created by ethnic Angolans and so forth centuries before colonization?

These idiots need to learn about cultures other than their own.

One of the great ironies about "wokism" isn't it's essentially a group of American elites trying to impose their own cultural frames of reference upon anyone and everyone.

Though let's not overexaggerate. There is clearly left-turn there, but only what two people seriously debated about demons being evil as problematic in WOKE sense.
Most other centred either on philosophical ramblings about possibility of essential evil, or whether "always evil" beings are satisfying from narrative perspective (and tbh they were not for many people - almost every EVIL race or monster get some subversive adaptation in fiction or RPG long time before current SJW trend

Quote from: Shasarak on February 26, 2021, 06:47:21 PM
Why are RPG designers particularly susceptible to being infected by the Wokeism virus?

Is it because creative thinking inhibits your critical thinking?

Having seen this all before. Just not as bad, usually. Some thoughts.

1: Money: Either they themselves, or if a company, marketing then, is convinced this is the golden gate to riches undreamed. A vast untapped market and how dare you say otherwise!

2: To get rid of the competition. Time and again with each iteration of this stupid over the decades I've heard of, or first hand seen, companies big and small, designers big and small, try to, and fairly often, succeed, in weaponizing this to take down a notch or two, or outright try to destroy the competition. Up to and including secretly funding and even leading on these cults from within.

3: Infected: These cults are increasingly persuasive and I've seen just how frighteningly fast they can turn a person into another "believer".

4: Deranged from the start: Have not seen this one till this new 2010 iteration. But we are seeing alot of sociopaths getting into gaming and the gaming biz who are, or close enough to, insane. And its in every corner of entertainment. Not just RPGs.

At some point last year I deleted my account there in favour of other sites that apply a more even-handed moderation policy - be that banning political-flavoured discussion equally,  or allowing it equally. 

Too much of the moderation commentary comes with an unnecessary level of condescension or snarkiness. The forums are heading towards the same unpleasant vibe as rpg.net - although they still have some way to go before they are that bad.

Quote from: TJS on February 27, 2021, 04:46:11 PM
One of the great ironies about "wokism" isn't it's essentially a group of American elites trying to impose their own cultural frames of reference upon anyone and everyone.

Exactly. And with American strongly underlined. In another forum I got a warning for a post about climate change because "it was 'political'". I pointed out my bafflement, because here in Italy the debate about climate change is scientific, not political - to the point that the Italian Navy considers climate change a given, is actively financing research missions to better understand the phenomena (which could even determine "actually it is not so bad" - but on scientific terms) and even publishing the results online. (*)

But, no, climate change is a political topic, you unwashed non-American, and the thread was closed. Oooook...

(*) If you are curious, here is sample. The intro is in Italian but the research summary is in English:
https://www.marina.difesa.it/noi-siamo-la-marina/pilastro-logistico/scientifici/idrografico/Documents/Nord/II%203180.pdf

Quote from: Reckall on February 28, 2021, 08:29:10 AM
..........But, no, climate change is a political topic, you unwashed non-American, and the thread was closed. Oooook....

Climate change as a concept has been politicised and weaponised to the point that it is now impossible to find or have genuine debate on the theory or potential impact.  Quite common now to see  "Denier" being used as a term of abuse when questioning the zealots about their claims.

Quote from: robh on February 28, 2021, 09:36:07 AM
Climate change as a concept has been politicised and weaponised to the point that it is now impossible to find or have genuine debate on the theory or potential impact.  Quite common now to see  "Denier" being used as a term of abuse when questioning the zealots about their claims.

What I can say is that right here, in Italy, we have a bi-partisan government. One of the first things that they did was to create an "Ecological transition" ministry (immediately dubbed "the Greta ministry") with bi-partisan support. It, actually, should be an improved version of a previous ministry, built "according to what we learned in the last ten years" (which, as I wrote, could also mean "Well, scientific evidence shows that Greta is a bit too much panicky"). And we are still far behind from other European countries - exp. the Scandinavian ones.

Do we have some social enclave of alt-Right burned outs? Sure. This is a free country. They are free to blather while the rest is free to move on.

Of course you can always try to politicise science. We just saw a big example thanks to the US and other countries, where, of all things, masks and social distancing were politicised - with the fine results we all can see.