Quote from: Shasarak;1137662Pointing out an Asian person called "Davis" is strange?

I don't see your point, so one of her parents is white, so what?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1137746The stereotype of goblins (and dwarves et al) bears superficial similarity to racist stereotypes of Jews. In Cornish folklore, even, some mine-dwelling friendly goblins are literally the ghosts of Jews. I'm pretty sure this has been discussed at length for years now.

So that got me thinking... how would Jews and goblins, dwarves, et al interact if they met?

From there, I got a goblin hero who is Jewish because his human mother was a Jew. He fights antisemitic teutonic werewolves.



The behavior of orcs bears more resemblance to historical raiders and tribal warfare than to poor people in cities.  Orcs don't draw on any stereotypes of African Americans. They draw on stereotypes of vikings and indigenous peoples.  Those are completely different things. If we're going to argue whether a depiction draws on stereotypes, then we need to at least get our references correct.

Also, "what do we do with the baby orcs?" long predates the woke mob. Tolkien did it first! D&D fans are not mindless consumers. We do analyze D&D's idiosyncrasies. Unfortunately, the woke mob has made it impossible to do so without devolving into flame wars.

True. Most poor people aren't criminals and most criminals are motivated more by greed than desperation. A rapist doesn't rape because he is poor and hungry. Orcs lack empathy for other intelligent beings, they want to advance themselves, and they don't mind hurting others to get what they want.

As has been pointed out in a few threads already, not-evil Orcs, Goblins, Ogres and Drow have existed in D&D going back at least to 2e if not even earlier. So the claims of both the pseduo-tradionalists and the identity-political critics are, as usual, ignorant of history. Usually because both are not particularly interested in either reading or reflection.

Neutral orcs are straight outta 1974-vintage OD&D.

Quote from: Rhiannon;1137751As has been pointed out in a few threads already, not-evil Orcs, Goblins, Ogres and Drow have existed in D&D going back at least to 2e if not even earlier. So the claims of both the pseduo-tradionalists and the identity-political critics are, as usual, ignorant of history. Usually because both are not particularly interested in either reading or reflection.

I don't see orcs as evil so much as no empathic, they are concerned about themselves, and how to advance themselves, each orc doesn't care about other orcs, they don't care about other individuals, they only care about themselves and getting what they want, othere individuals are either viewed as obstacles or as a means to getting what they want.

For each orc the universe revolves around themselves, other intelligent beings have no value to the other that as a means to getting what they want or as something to be eliminated when they get in the way of what that particular orc wants. Orcs don't do give and take, they aren't considerate of others if they don't have to be. It could be that they are simply born without empathetic feelings for others, there is just them and the rest of the universe and that is how they view society. If orcs cooperate it is based on fear, an orc leader has to be intimidating to all of his orc followers otherwise they will not follow and will fight to be leader. Orcs understand the value of cooperation, but only because it benefits them individually. To get ahead, they must cooperate with the orc tribe, and they don't challenge them leader because he is too dangerous to challenge until he is not! This is the psychology that motivates most orcs, and this psychology often results in evil actions, but they don't just do something in order to be evil.

The "critique" looks like a Motte and Bailey push. Oh, those small things that they're complaining about are okay, so let's give them that...

Quote from: Tom Kalbfus;1137750True. Most poor people aren't criminals and most criminals are motivated more by greed than desperation. A rapist doesn't rape because he is poor and hungry. Orcs lack empathy for other intelligent beings, they want to advance themselves, and they don't mind hurting others to get what they want.

A lot of people branded as criminals in the USA are victims of a corrupt justice system. This is a terrible analogy for orcs.

Quote from: Rhiannon;1137751As has been pointed out in a few threads already, not-evil Orcs, Goblins, Ogres and Drow have existed in D&D going back at least to 2e if not even earlier. So the claims of both the pseduo-tradionalists and the identity-political critics are, as usual, ignorant of history. Usually because both are not particularly interested in either reading or reflection.

Quote from: Tom Kalbfus;1137764I don't see orcs as evil so much as no empathic, they are concerned about themselves, and how to advance themselves, each orc doesn't care about other orcs, they don't care about other individuals, they only care about themselves and getting what they want, othere individuals are either viewed as obstacles or as a means to getting what they want.

For each orc the universe revolves around themselves, other intelligent beings have no value to the other that as a means to getting what they want or as something to be eliminated when they get in the way of what that particular orc wants. Orcs don't do give and take, they aren't considerate of others if they don't have to be. It could be that they are simply born without empathetic feelings for others, there is just them and the rest of the universe and that is how they view society. If orcs cooperate it is based on fear, an orc leader has to be intimidating to all of his orc followers otherwise they will not follow and will fight to be leader. Orcs understand the value of cooperation, but only because it benefits them individually. To get ahead, they must cooperate with the orc tribe, and they don't challenge them leader because he is too dangerous to challenge until he is not! This is the psychology that motivates most orcs, and this psychology often results in evil actions, but they don't just do something in order to be evil.

Orcs closely resemble European colonialists in that respect. Heck, the plot of the first two WarCraft games were that orcs were colonizers and conquistadors, even convincing disadvantaged natives to assist them in exchange for vengeance against their oppressors. In the third game and beyond, oddly enough, they become stereotypes of native american tribes placed in concentration camps by the evil racist humans.

Would you say that European colonizers were evil? They behaved pretty much exactly like orcs, murdering and raping their way across multiple continents. Indeed, every human group has done that at some point in their history.

I find it deeply fascinating how orcs switch between colonizers and victims of colonization depending on the perspective lens at the time. I'm pretty sure that there's deep symbolic meaning behind that, but I'm not sure exactly what it is. Or do I?

To paraphrase an infamously bad Doom fanfic: "No, John. You are the orcs."

I'd pin the Orcs more in line with Mongol raiders than the Euros.  The Euros at least made up justifications for the things they did, how they were advancing culture to the barbarians or saving souls and whatnot.  Orcs don't bother with that step.  Not that the end result was terribly different for the various places that got pillaged, but it's still significant for the purpose of characterization.

Quote from: Valatar;1137823I'd pin the Orcs more in line with Mongol raiders than the Euros.  The Euros at least made up justifications for the things they did, how they were advancing culture to the barbarians or saving souls and whatnot.  Orcs don't bother with that step.  Not that the end result was terribly different for the various places that got pillaged, but it's still significant for the purpose of characterization.

Also the Mongol Empire didn't last, they didn't build much or advance science.

The more people try to hang real world and historical aspects onto fictional creations, the less likely we'll have any allowable fictions in this bleak future of stupidity.  The answer to these questions about "are goblins and dwarves Jewish?" or "are orcs black people" isn't to search and dig for bits to pseudo-intellectually muse over. The answer is FUCK OFF ASSHOLE.

The hobby is the verge of yet another collapse. Start making your bets.

Quote from: FelixGamingX1;1137852The hobby is the verge of yet another collapse. Start making your bets.

It is? D&D is more popular than ever. Yeah, there's "Orcgate," but it probably is only occuring among a small segment of gamers.

Quote from: Mercurius;1137868It is? D&D is more popular than ever. Yeah, there's "Orcgate," but it probably is only occuring among a small segment of gamers.

Is it going to sustain that level of popularity, or is the bubble going to burst?

Quote from: Spinachcat;1137837The more people try to hang real world and historical aspects onto fictional creations, the less likely we'll have any allowable fictions in this bleak future of stupidity.  The answer to these questions about "are goblins and dwarves Jewish?" or "are orcs black people" isn't to search and dig for bits to pseudo-intellectually muse over. The answer is FUCK OFF ASSHOLE.

I think goblins and dwarves could certainly convert to Judaism or be born into that culture. I think that the biracial child of an interracial black/orc couple would be both orcish and black. I think that asking these questions in genuinely good faith can lead to a much richer media landscape.

For orcs to be considered people of color would require them to have experienced institutional racism at the hands of white colonizers, as "whiteness" and "person of color" only arose as identities due to a long and horrible history of colonialism. On planets where orcs were the colonizers, then this would produce comparable identities like "greeness" and "people not green."

What do you think?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1137746The behavior of orcs bears more resemblance to historical raiders and tribal warfare than to poor people in cities.  Orcs don't draw on any stereotypes of African Americans. They draw on stereotypes of vikings and indigenous peoples.  Those are completely different things. If we're going to argue whether a depiction draws on stereotypes, then we need to at least get our references correct.

Actually Orcs act more like european imperialists/colonists. They sweep into a region, lay ruin to the existing civilizations and enslave or kill the populace. The only thing slowing them down is that they war incessantly with eachother. In Greyhawk they literally have a mandate from god to lay waste to civilization and destroy or enslave all non-orcs.