Quote from: WERDNA on February 03, 2024, 06:45:53 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on February 03, 2024, 04:15:05 PM

Quote from: Brad on February 03, 2024, 04:07:14 PM

Quote from: pawsplay on February 03, 2024, 03:31:51 PM
So, yeah, you can sometimes view a work separately from the author in many respects. But you can't wholly ignore their word, their context. In this particular case, I think it's very, very difficult to argue that Tekumel doesn't reflect Barker's views as a neo-Nazi, pro-Aryan proponent of antiquated, classic views of "Western civilization."

And there it is...I thought it might take a couple years, looks like it just took one page of replies.

"Western Cicilization" as if it doesn't exist... Classic leftard twatwaffle.

I'm pretty sure there is no western civilization in Tekumel for the record; it nuked itself out of existence during WWIII many, many thousands of years ago. People don't even know what it is.

pawsplay wasn't talking about tekumel there, but I'm sure you already knew that.

Quote from: WERDNA on February 03, 2024, 06:45:53 PM
I'm pretty sure there is no western civilization in Tekumel for the record; it nuked itself out of existence during WWIII many, many thousands of years ago. People don't even know what it is.

I was talking about Barker's neo-Nazi views. There are different conceptions of civilization, and different views of European history. Part of the Nazi program involved appropriating historical, political, and philosophical sources, and using them to bolster the intellectual legitimacy of Nazism. In this case I am thinking of works like Spengler's Decline of the West, as an example of a pre-existing system that was recruited to support the Nazi claims to be the future of civilization. Spengler himself was resistant to the idea of strong racial essentialism, and was sidelined by the Nazis later in his career. Spengler is exactly the sort of person who would appeal to a neo-Nazi anti-Semite who writes fantasy novels about heroic SS soldiers and softball their noxious racial attitudes to make them seem more like intellectual and political realists.

If you look at it as a founding myth for something like Tekumel, we see the thousands-years star empire decline and all. On Tekumel, we see "young" new civilizations that have not yet reached their zenith and still like in a kind of ritualistic, sophisticated barbarism. While Tekumel borrows a lot of Meso-American motifs like the "flower war," limited metallurgy, and beastly hot weather, it also borrows heavily from Barker's other interests. He studied languages in India, and India of course is a fascination of the Nazis; the term Aryan refers to some affinities of ancient Indian culture. Later European writers conflated it with Indo-Persian cultural and racial identity. The term swastika itself comes from Sanskrit, and the symbol and its variations still appear in India; it comes to Nazism through an embrace of the Indo-European historical perspective, Orientalism, and European metaphysics and its fascination with Eastern religion. The swastika was adopted by fraternal European societies as having a secret and sacred sense; the Nazis in turn adopted it as representing fraternal societies. So Barker's fascination with India is both present in his Tekumel work, and germane to his pseudo-academic interest in Nazism.

Barker's depiction of the Tsolyani as a less advanced people, who harvest and use ancient technology without understanding it is consonant with certain classicist views of history. I'm not say classicism in general embraces such views, or that they are common in the 21st century; that is why I specifically mentioned outdated views of classicism in relation to his worldview, as reflected in his fictional Tekumel work and his involvement with the slightly less fictional Journal of Historical Review.

Quote from: jhkim on February 03, 2024, 10:21:56 PM

Quote from: Omega on February 03, 2024, 10:05:15 PM

Quote from: S'mon on February 02, 2024, 08:18:26 AM
I run FR without Time of Troubles, and usually without Harpers either. And generally distant non meddling gods. Seems to work.

Barker wrote for an actual neo-Nazi journal. This isn't a misunderstanding. OTOH no one ever saw anything Nazi in Tekumel before they were aware of this.

He did not, far as I know, write for a journal.

He submitted a sci-fi book to a supremacist publisher. And he knew what they were. We just dont know the why of it and the book itself is weirdly not what you'd expect.

He is listed as being part of the Editorial Advisory Committee for The Journal of Historical Review, which is explicitly about Holocaust denial. You can see the archive of their credit listing him (as "Phillip Barker PhD of Minneapolis, Minnesota") here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20210518162602/http://vho.org:80/GB/Journals/JHR/index.html

I do not see him listed as an author offhand among the journal articles, but I also don't see the complete archives.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking of.

Quote from: pawsplay on February 04, 2024, 04:56:21 AM

Quote from: WERDNA on February 03, 2024, 06:45:53 PM
I'm pretty sure there is no western civilization in Tekumel for the record; it nuked itself out of existence during WWIII many, many thousands of years ago. People don't even know what it is.

I was talking about Barker's neo-Nazi views. There are different conceptions of civilization, and different views of European history. Part of the Nazi program involved appropriating historical, political, and philosophical sources, and using them to bolster the intellectual legitimacy of Nazism. In this case I am thinking of works like Spengler's Decline of the West, as an example of a pre-existing system that was recruited to support the Nazi claims to be the future of civilization. Spengler himself was resistant to the idea of strong racial essentialism, and was sidelined by the Nazis later in his career. Spengler is exactly the sort of person who would appeal to a neo-Nazi anti-Semite who writes fantasy novels about heroic SS soldiers and softball their noxious racial attitudes to make them seem more like intellectual and political realists.

If you look at it as a founding myth for something like Tekumel, we see the thousands-years star empire decline and all. On Tekumel, we see "young" new civilizations that have not yet reached their zenith and still like in a kind of ritualistic, sophisticated barbarism. While Tekumel borrows a lot of Meso-American motifs like the "flower war," limited metallurgy, and beastly hot weather, it also borrows heavily from Barker's other interests. He studied languages in India, and India of course is a fascination of the Nazis; the term Aryan refers to some affinities of ancient Indian culture. Later European writers conflated it with Indo-Persian cultural and racial identity. The term swastika itself comes from Sanskrit, and the symbol and its variations still appear in India; it comes to Nazism through an embrace of the Indo-European historical perspective, Orientalism, and European metaphysics and its fascination with Eastern religion. The swastika was adopted by fraternal European societies as having a secret and sacred sense; the Nazis in turn adopted it as representing fraternal societies. So Barker's fascination with India is both present in his Tekumel work, and germane to his pseudo-academic interest in Nazism.

Barker's depiction of the Tsolyani as a less advanced people, who harvest and use ancient technology without understanding it is consonant with certain classicist views of history. I'm not say classicism in general embraces such views, or that they are common in the 21st century; that is why I specifically mentioned outdated views of classicism in relation to his worldview, as reflected in his fictional Tekumel work and his involvement with the slightly less fictional Journal of Historical Review.

So, folks, if you ever want to demonstrate to anyone the flaws in modern thinking, just use the post above.  It's the inversion of the scientific method encapsulated.  Normally, in investigating some premise, you would look at what the preponderance of the evidence is.  You'd look at a game system and see what themes and ideas dominate its construction and play.  It's very clear that, until he was outed, no one thought Tekumel was "nazi" in structure, presentation, or composition.  I'd be open to any evidence that someone spotted the "nazi" subtext before the great reveal, but I haven't seen anyone provide any.

Now we come to "modern" thought, as epitomized by the post above.  It starts from the conclusion ("Tekumel must be hiding nazi ideologies, because it was made by a neo-nazi") and then cherry-picks bits and pieces of "evidence" in order to establish the conclusion, without regard to counter-evidence or even the preponderance.  Look at what was claimed!  It boils down to three points:

• The Nazi's used the concept of historical decline of empire and the rise of new civilizations from the ashes as a justification for their rise to power.  Well, so have many other civilizations used that motif, including many non-Western ones.  And just about every fantasy RPG, simply because it offers a fertile ground for adventuring (remnants of the old to explore, little law to hinder you, etc.)  So not evidenc of nazi, unless you are set to see it.
• He uses Indian motifs.  The Nazis liked India and some of their motifs. This is as close to a straight-faced "Hitler drank water, so water is bad" argument as I've ever seen.  So any invocation of Indian motifs makes you a nazi?
• Some societies are more technologically advanced than others.  And Nazi historians pointed that out. No shit, Sherlock, because throughout history some societies have been technologically backwards living on the advances of their forbearers.  Every historian has pointed this out.  So another "Hitler drank water..." argument.

Now, it should come as no surprise that the same person arguing this way is one of our resident progressives.  Because this is how they think.  Conclusion first, then evidence afterwards.  Because, at the root of all progressive thought is narcissism.  It centers on the person, not the thing.  When I invoke Indian motifs, it's not neo-nazi, because I'm a good person.  When you invoke the same motifs, it's evidence of your neo-nazism, because you are a bad person.  I drink water because I am thirsty.  You drink it because of its association with Hitler!  Without knowing that MAR Barker was a neo-nazi, you could never have proven your point.  Once you have him categorized, suddenly you can see it all...

Archive this post!  It's the most blatant and instructive example of progressive "thinking" that has ever been posted here.  And it shows why it is useless to argue with them.  They don't even think in a logical manner.  Their conclusions come before their evidence.  It's also why the invasion of the liberal arts into the sciences has wrought so much damage in the sciences, but that's a discussion for elsewhere...

Quote from: Eirikrautha on February 04, 2024, 11:11:51 AM
I'd be open to any evidence that someone spotted the "nazi" subtext before the great reveal, but I haven't seen anyone provide any.

As I mentioned before, the treatment of the "inimicals" was always eyebrow-raising, but didn't have a lot of context to ascertain what the author was after.

Here's a review excerpt from someone who considered themselves a Tekumel fan:

Quote from: Endzeitgeist
Picture a super high-tech civilization spanning the stars, a true interstellar empire. They found this world, and it's poisonous and strange - red jungles, poisonous plants, hostile local civilizations. Undaunted, they start terraforming the place and wage war; humanity not only radically annihilates essentially the planet's previous flora and fauna and introduces their own, they also best the local civilizations and force them to retreat, beaten and battered. It is essentially an extreme form of colonialism that subjects the very nature of the planet to the whims of the colonizers.

I won't bother with further Internet archaeology but suffice it to say these themes have never been invisible. They just haven't been clearly situated with respect to the author's beliefs.

Quote from: pawsplay on February 04, 2024, 04:44:25 PM

Quote from: Eirikrautha on February 04, 2024, 11:11:51 AM
I'd be open to any evidence that someone spotted the "nazi" subtext before the great reveal, but I haven't seen anyone provide any.

As I mentioned before, the treatment of the "inimicals" was always eyebrow-raising, but didn't have a lot of context to ascertain what the author was after.

Here's a review excerpt from someone who considered themselves a Tekumel fan:

Quote from: Endzeitgeist
Picture a super high-tech civilization spanning the stars, a true interstellar empire. They found this world, and it's poisonous and strange - red jungles, poisonous plants, hostile local civilizations. Undaunted, they start terraforming the place and wage war; humanity not only radically annihilates essentially the planet's previous flora and fauna and introduces their own, they also best the local civilizations and force them to retreat, beaten and battered. It is essentially an extreme form of colonialism that subjects the very nature of the planet to the whims of the colonizers.

I won't bother with further Internet archaeology but suffice it to say these themes have never been invisible. They just haven't been clearly situated with respect to the author's beliefs.

Those themes describe every contact between cultures before the twentieth century, from the Romans to the Mayans to the Spanish.  The idea that the quote above establishes a unique "nazi" worldview is laughable, and only visible to you because of your delusions and ignorance.

But thanks for the reply.  Now I have both an example of modern thought and an example of historical ignorance to use.  How about Dunning-Kruger next?  I know you have it in you...

Quote from: Omega on February 03, 2024, 10:00:51 PM
Playing Devils not-advocate after playing devils advocate here.

Actually he apparently DID write and submit a sci-fi book to a neo Nazi publisher. Why? No one knows. But I read the book and its about as non-nazi as it can get while still having supposed nazis in it. I commented on it when this whole blowup happened. Barker is dead and we are never going to find out exactly what went down.

I don't like a lot of fiction, but one of my favorite books is Devil's Guard. The main character is a literal fucking Nazi. For people who don't know the book, the protagonist and some of his SS buddies join the French foreign legion to escape prosecution for war crimes at the tail end of WWII and they end up playing an instrumental part in the First Indochina War. The author passes it off as true, but there are a couple sequels that tend to make it clear it's mostly fiction, probably with some basis in actual truth. Regardless, does my liking this novel/war story/pseudo-biography/whatever make me a Nazi sympathizer simply because it's a cool book about war? Is the author a Nazi sympathizer because he wrote a book that paints some SS guys as being badass soldiers with some redeeming qualities?

This is all rhetorical, of course, because any sane person knows the right answer and any fucking lunatic will say whatever suits their agenda. If Barker was a real Nazi, he certainly sucked at it and didn't want anyone to know from what information has been revealed in this thread.

Just to point out the obvious that seems to be ignored - he was a Muslim and this sort of belief is not exactly uncommon among them.

Yeah, not all of them believe that, not even a majority, but it's still pretty common. The BBC just had a scandal about an employee like that.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on February 04, 2024, 05:38:48 PM
Those themes describe every contact between cultures before the twentieth century, from the Romans to the Mayans to the Spanish. 

That's definitely not true. The Romans famously preferred to let conquered people retain their own religion and often much of their own government, provided they paid taxes and furnished a few military auxiliaries. When the Spanish conquered Mexico, one of the first things they did was get the leadership to convert to Christianity, making the Emperor into a Spanish viceroy, and turning the vast majority of the Aztec nobility into Spanish lords. The natives of North America and Meso-America were not regarded as inhuman beings with whom harmony was impossible; the Roman church countenanced conquest, indenture, and slavery, as steps they were willing to tolerate in the Christianization and eventual assimilation of the native people. I have no idea how you acquired such a misunderstanding of those specific examples you chose.

The idea that native people are obstacles to settlement and had to be bodily and entirely destroyed is a notion that gained more popularity during the era of European colonialism. Barker's views are historically unusual, and are congruent with political and pseudo-intellectual patters somewhat popular from the 18th to early 20th centuries, finally grounding mostly to a halt with the defeat of the Germans and Japanese during WWII. Barker's views, as expressed in the game Tekumel, are more congruent with concepts like American "Manifest Destiny" and Nazi Lebensraum, not mainstream historical views, even during the height of colonialism, the global slave trade, and European adventurism.

"We can never live together, we must destroy their world to make room for ours," is a concept that fits in with Nazism. It does not fit in with the war culture of the Mayans, who placed a high value in the taking of captives as a measure of political and military might. The Mayans were a loosely connected group of political concentrations, who also dominated other similar, linguistically and religiously related nearby peoples. The idea of grafting a pseudo-Mayan civilization onto the narrative of an Old West pacification of the western territories, or the German cleansing of Europe to make way for German-speaking dominion, as Barker does in Tekumel, suggest a very peculiar attitude toward history.

One of the most prominent foes in Tekumel are the Ssú, the so-called Enemies of Man, and right now, I can't even tell you if their name is not some dumb joke about the Sioux.

Barker's Tekumel is not grounded in some neutral appreciation for history and empire, but in a specific ideological field that incorporates the idea of ascendant and decadent civilizations, the extermination of indigenous people to gain land for the settlers' race, and the concept of "great peoples" or empires as organism-like entities with their own particular attributes. These are distinctly views associated with colonialism, white supremacy, and the Nazis (among other ethnic chauvinists), not associated with mainstream views based in humanism, modern science, sociology, and other serious fields of academic study.

Tekumel is a game nestled in the mythological and historical tangle of the American West, the Congo, and 20th century Popland. Those themes were easier to ignore or to treat in a disinterested way. In part, this is because the fantasy and adventure fiction of the 20th century was also steeped in many of these same ideas, consciously and unconsciously. "Let's clear this area of monsters and build a fort and a town," isn't a theme unique to Tekumel, but many early D&D campaigns, and this is an expression of the motifs, though not necessarily the philosophy, of colonialism and settlerism. But with the revelations regarding Barker's completely proven relationship with active neo-Nazi organizations, those ideas can no longer be considered to un-examined biases or lionization, neutral depiction, or detached critique. No, these are clearly conscious notions that Barker was aware of and nurtured within his personal worldview. This is someone who believed we needed to renew Western civilization by punishing the Jews, who was a zealous Holocaust denier and so forth, and so forth. Given Barker's view of real world human difference, his Tekumel is a deliberate expression of the most deadly and racist notions of the 19th and 20th century.

Quote from: pawsplay on February 04, 2024, 10:08:56 PMThe idea that native people are obstacles to settlement and had to be bodily and entirely destroyed is a notion that gained more popularity during the era of European colonialism. Barker's views are historically unusual....

What about the Mesoamerican, Egyptian, Indian and Asian mythologies and cultures from which Barker took most of his inspiration? It seems like a contradiction to suggest Barker was using non-European cultures as inspiration for a world meant to convey what's being called a uniquely European attitude towards cultural conflict.

Quote from: pawsplay on February 04, 2024, 10:08:56 PM

Quote from: Eirikrautha on February 04, 2024, 05:38:48 PM
Those themes describe every contact between cultures before the twentieth century, from the Romans to the Mayans to the Spanish. 

That's definitely not true. The Romans famously preferred to let conquered people retain their own religion and often much of their own government, provided they paid taxes and furnished a few military auxiliaries. When the Spanish conquered Mexico, one of the first things they did was get the leadership to convert to Christianity, making the Emperor into a Spanish viceroy, and turning the vast majority of the Aztec nobility into Spanish lords. The natives of North America and Meso-America were not regarded as inhuman beings with whom harmony was impossible; the Roman church countenanced conquest, indenture, and slavery, as steps they were willing to tolerate in the Christianization and eventual assimilation of the native people. I have no idea how you acquired such a misunderstanding of those specific examples you chose.

The idea that native people are obstacles to settlement and had to be bodily and entirely destroyed is a notion that gained more popularity during the era of European colonialism. Barker's views are historically unusual, and are congruent with political and pseudo-intellectual patters somewhat popular from the 18th to early 20th centuries, finally grounding mostly to a halt with the defeat of the Germans and Japanese during WWII. Barker's views, as expressed in the game Tekumel, are more congruent with concepts like American "Manifest Destiny" and Nazi Lebensraum, not mainstream historical views, even during the height of colonialism, the global slave trade, and European adventurism.

"We can never live together, we must destroy their world to make room for ours," is a concept that fits in with Nazism. It does not fit in with the war culture of the Mayans, who placed a high value in the taking of captives as a measure of political and military might. The Mayans were a loosely connected group of political concentrations, who also dominated other similar, linguistically and religiously related nearby peoples. The idea of grafting a pseudo-Mayan civilization onto the narrative of an Old West pacification of the western territories, or the German cleansing of Europe to make way for German-speaking dominion, as Barker does in Tekumel, suggest a very peculiar attitude toward history.

One of the most prominent foes in Tekumel are the Ssú, the so-called Enemies of Man, and right now, I can't even tell you if their name is not some dumb joke about the Sioux.

Barker's Tekumel is not grounded in some neutral appreciation for history and empire, but in a specific ideological field that incorporates the idea of ascendant and decadent civilizations, the extermination of indigenous people to gain land for the settlers' race, and the concept of "great peoples" or empires as organism-like entities with their own particular attributes. These are distinctly views associated with colonialism, white supremacy, and the Nazis (among other ethnic chauvinists), not associated with mainstream views based in humanism, modern science, sociology, and other serious fields of academic study.

Tekumel is a game nestled in the mythological and historical tangle of the American West, the Congo, and 20th century Popland. Those themes were easier to ignore or to treat in a disinterested way. In part, this is because the fantasy and adventure fiction of the 20th century was also steeped in many of these same ideas, consciously and unconsciously. "Let's clear this area of monsters and build a fort and a town," isn't a theme unique to Tekumel, but many early D&D campaigns, and this is an expression of the motifs, though not necessarily the philosophy, of colonialism and settlerism. But with the revelations regarding Barker's completely proven relationship with active neo-Nazi organizations, those ideas can no longer be considered to un-examined biases or lionization, neutral depiction, or detached critique. No, these are clearly conscious notions that Barker was aware of and nurtured within his personal worldview. This is someone who believed we needed to renew Western civilization by punishing the Jews, who was a zealous Holocaust denier and so forth, and so forth. Given Barker's view of real world human difference, his Tekumel is a deliberate expression of the most deadly and racist notions of the 19th and 20th century.

We all know the North American Tribes were holding hands and singing cumbaya.
Same for the Aztecs here in México.
Genghis Kan was famous for his kindness towards the conquered peoples
Africa was a peaceful utopia without war, slavery etc until the arrival of the white devil.
Muslims conquered Europe by sending them love letters...

What is it with the woke and their total history illiteracy?

Quote from: pawsplay on February 04, 2024, 10:08:56 PM"We can never live together, we must destroy their world to make room for ours," is a concept that fits in with Nazism.

Nazism, Fascism, Communism, Native American warfare, pre-colonial African warfare... as a matter of fact, societies at "chiefdom" level of development are the MOST genocidal societies, historically. Nazi genocides may have been massive in absolute terms, but proportionally, chiefdoms were far more lethal.

Compared to chiefdom warfare, conquest and enslavement by proper states was an improvement.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on February 05, 2024, 01:20:01 AM
What is it with the woke and their total history illiteracy?

It doesn't fit their internalized narrative of "white man bad". It's actually hilariously racist to think about how all those poor brown people have always been oppressed and were never able to accomplish anything.

Speaking Aztecs, the only reason they got conquered by the Spanish is because of better tech. Anyone who doesn't think the Aztecs wouldn't have gotten on ships and taken over the Iberian peninsula if they had the means is a special kind of stupid.

Quote from: Brad on February 05, 2024, 10:13:27 AM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on February 05, 2024, 01:20:01 AM
What is it with the woke and their total history illiteracy?

It doesn't fit their internalized narrative of "white man bad". It's actually hilariously racist to think about how all those poor brown people have always been oppressed and were never able to accomplish anything.

Speaking Aztecs, the only reason they got conquered by the Spanish is because of better tech. Anyone who doesn't think the Aztecs wouldn't have gotten on ships and taken over the Iberian peninsula if they had the means is a special kind of stupid.

Nope, the REAL reason the Aztecs got trounced is that they were such a monstrous empire EVERYBODY else hated them, convinced Cortez there was much gold to be had in Tenochtitlan and helped him with warriors and manpower (they helped him build Carabelas to sail the lake!).

Quote from: GeekyBugle on February 05, 2024, 10:56:35 AM
Nope, the REAL reason the Aztecs got trounced is that they were such a monstrous empire EVERYBODY else hated them, convinced Cortez there was much gold to be had in Tenochtitlan and helped him with warriors and manpower (they helped him build Carabelas to sail the lake!).

How dare you imply indigenous brown people were bad.