D&D is slowly rethinking its assumptions about "race" -- which are largely derived from century-old literature and attitudes.
Let's take Orcs -- they're inherently evil and dumb. There's lots of evidence that Tolkein was caricaturizing Mongol warriors (https://tolkienland.wordpress.com/2018/01/21/tolkiens-squinteyed-orc-men/), focusing on details that Europeans found distasteful. Like when movie adaptors wanted to give orcs beaks, he was like "no no no, they have squinty eyes and broad, flat noses..." leaning on standard cultural descriptions of eastern invaders. These scary mongolian-adjacent evil-doers are the antagonists to the familar pastoral "shire" filled with quaint and adorable european farmers. Made perfect sense as antagonists in the old world. Today, they're a little harder to relate to.
It's one thing to have monsters like demons and vampires be "inherently evil", but it's another thing to describe humanoid races as having inherent built-in alignment. It doesn't make any sense in the real world, except for actual racists, who do think of "entire races" as inherently evil or dumb.
So, many RPGs are getting away from "race" and instead talking about "ancestry" or "peoples". Maybe you get +1 to bows because elven culture gave you a lot of practice -- not because elves have this in-born talent. Which follows how we're learning to talk about race in the real world. I much prefer the narrative that orcs have free will, and could choose to be good or evil -- but they tend to be evil because of specific factors in their world.
Here's a little snippet of Crawford tweets on this topic:
https://www.enworld.org/threads/wotcs-jeremy-crawford-on-d-d-races-going-forward.672716
Why is a distinction drawn between 'monsters' like demons and vampires, and the 'humanoid race' of orcs?
Would Tolkien not have said that they are, in fact, monsters due to their inherent evil?
Inherent evil? Well then let's Magic the gathering illegal too, because I don't like your ontology or identity politics. Also, monster as in the evil admixture of disparate things, ergo lost when applied reflexively to humans unless you were going for some MPD angle, buddy.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 17, 2020, 03:32:38 PM
Why is a distinction drawn between 'monsters' like demons and vampires, and the 'humanoid race' of orcs?
Would Tolkien not have said that they are, in fact, monsters due to their inherent evil?
Yeah, and setting them up so they're portrayable as unquestionably evil is part of the problem. One of the most potentially awful fantasy 'races' is zombies, if they're not done carefully (Discworld and iZombie get a pass.)
A friend of mine said that zombie fiction flourishes when the overbearing political mood is conservative and vampire fiction when it's liberal. Zombies = hordes of unwashed masses coming to take your stuff; vampires = glamorous men in formal suits and huge houses living off your blood.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 17, 2020, 03:32:38 PM
Why is a distinction drawn between 'monsters' like demons and vampires, and the 'humanoid race' of orcs?
Would Tolkien not have said that they are, in fact, monsters due to their inherent evil?
yeah, classic high-fantasy sets up a tension between
People (ie elves, dwarves, halflings, civilized others we relate to)
and
Non-People (ie monsters)
And this serves the kinds of stories we tell in D&D -- it's fun to slay dragons, and we don't necessarily get anything from pondering the socio-economic forces that makes skeletons want to shoot us with bows. The world is dangerous, the ADVENTURE is about navigating those dangers.
The issue, I think, comes from the way that certain monsters are coded as people. Especially because the things people say about Drow (for example) sometimes land pretty close to home for real-life people of color. In the Larp community, we're really struggling to undo generations of fantasy where "dark skin" is a signifier of a dark soul... Drow are not analogous to black people, but I've heard PoC say that they feel uncomfortable in spaces where the plot is focused on we white skinned heroes destroying those evil black-skinned elves. Especially when larpers get SUPER defensive about wearing black face makeup, and whitesplain"it's not racist, you are offended for no reason." I dunno, how many fantasy movies have black protagonists? (please don't mention Marlon Wayans in the D&D movie) Are we SURE that this has
nothing to do with our Othering of marginalized people?
and that's not to say you can't have orcs as antagonists
but maybe we should reserve "they're just inherently evil and it's a good person's duty to put them down" for things that explicitly aren't people.
Quote from: Nyborj the Priest on June 17, 2020, 03:46:59 PM
Zombies = hordes of unwashed masses coming to take your stuff; vampires = glamorous men in formal suits and huge houses living off your blood.
:lol: never thought about the economics of zombie fic versus vampire fic but I think you're spot on
reminds me of John William Polidori's vampire fiction, which explicitly codes vampires to signify Lord Byron, Arch Fuckboy and Sexual Predator of Europe.
Hmm.
Some good points to chew on.
As far as orcs, I personally never thought of them as anything other than explicitly non-human monsters. Like goblins, bugbears, kobolds etc. All humanoid but non human monsters. On the other hand.... in d&d, we have half orcs.... which invited the discussion.
On the side of those resistant to racial political discourse, the orc thing is used as an example of senseless hand-wringing, and it seems to be a powerful message for them. I wonder if it acts as a distraction from more immediate and meaningful debate than it actually helps.
I think I have a bias that RPGs were always an escape from the murkiness of real life. It feels like an attack on a comfortable refuge to drag the shitstorm of real life conflict into it.
But it's no biggie, I suppose, since players cant really be held hostage to the whims of any publisher, just shamed. And yknow... grow some skin if I dont like it.
This could all get quite fun. The last couple of forgotten ewalms pulp crap I went through had a whole heap of "good" drow. The direct implications were pretty much the usual nature/nurture jazz with the explicit idea that all you need to do to be "good" is abandon you're culture and personality and just pretend really hard that you are good until you just are.
I'd love to see someone do a deep dig in this whole area because you know how touchy some fantasy fans are about, well, everything.
At the least it needs a rewrite of the Chris rock but. I love dark elves, love dark elves but I Hate drow. Drow always looking for some credit for shit they supposed to do anyway. Etc.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 17, 2020, 05:30:26 PM
Hmm.
Some good points to chew on.
As far as orcs, I personally never thought of them as anything other than explicitly non-human monsters. Like goblins, bugbears, kobolds etc. All humanoid but non human monsters. On the other hand.... in d&d, we have half orcs.... which invited the discussion.
It's so weird though, when you really get down to it. Like in the Birthright D&D setting (in which the PCs rule one or more kingdoms), Goblins have kingdoms, a caste system, an economy, politics... many goblins are open to diplomacy. When the shit hits the fan, goblins may even team up with you against the more demonic foes. So what makes them monsters? The fact that they hate humans and elves? Well there's also a nation of Elves that are completely hostile to humans and dwarves -- and they are a much bigger threat to humanity than goblins. Why are they considered people, but the goblins are not? on some level, isn't it "one looks like us, the other doesn't"?
One of the things I think is powerful about aspirational fantasy like D&D is that it puts you in this seat where you're thinking about what it means to be a hero, to do the right thing (okay not all campaigns are about that, but the typical D&D game involves fighting evil and saving innocents). A lot of people talk about being a teenager who was
empowered by fantasy, it helped them explore ideas and discover themselves. So I think the fiction's values are important.
And not all fantasy has to be allegorical -- but storytelling/myth making naturally bundles up our current values and makes a statement about it. Tolkein's opinions about this are well known - he insists that his books are not about World War I, but universal human values. Frodo must walk into the Mordor of our hearts or whatever.
And to that end - the idea that "some people are just evil and that makes it okay to kill them" is not a great story for the year 2020.
I refuse to engage this shit in detail but most modern depictions of orcs are explicitly Black or Indigenous coded, especially Warcraft orcs, and POC getting into tabletop games for the first time with their new leftist friends are running full-stop into "this stuff that's black/indigenous coded in the media I know is suddenly PURE EVIL"
The older tabletop nerds here no doubt see Warcraft as the interloper, but Warcraft has more pop culture impact and is now the default for interpreting certain things. Orcs weren't pop culture outside of lotr (where they were anti-Asian yeah) until WoW happened and got as insanely huge as it did
So that's why this is happening and why "well I only ever thought of them as monsters" doesnt fucking matter, thank you thank you I will not answer questions go fucking google
When it comes to anything that is shown as a sentient race, I'm uncomfortable with framing them as evil in terms of their origins, rather than their actions.
Lets look at orcs, for example. Are orcs evil because they are orcs? Or are orcs "evil" because they follow a nomadic/raider lifestyle, which pits them against established settlements and pastoral groups? That then raises questions. What about orcs raised outside of that culture? Or orcs that reject raiding in favour of a similar settled, pastoral lifestyle? Why are orcs even raiding in the first place?
As some of you know, I'm DMing an Elder Scrolls themed RPG at the moment and if there is one thing the Elder Scrolls is great for, it's ignoring the idea that certain groups are inherently "evil". Hell, I'd say TES Orcs are far more sympathetic than Bretons, despite Bretons thinking of them like D&D Orcs in many cases. The Elder Scrolls doesn't flinch away from looking at the racism and religious bigotries that can drive conflict, but it's also quite good at making it clear that these are bigotries with little realistic basis. Why do the Orcs have a brutish clan culture, for example? Well probably because anytime an Orc leader tries to build up their civilisation, the Bretons come and burn it down. And "city orcs" are often treated with so much appalling racism they rarely ever integrate into Breton culture. So they go to the frozen wilds of Wrothgar, join the clans and...
(ignore the terrible writing of Reachmen and Maormer who, although at least portrayed as "human/elf" cultures, are also portrayed as unremittingly evil and antagonistic)
Even daedra are not inherently "evil", it's just they come from a place where they cannot die and time doesn't exist, and as a result their morality is abstract and strange and they don't place much value on creatures from the Mundus as anything beyond entertainment or tools as a consequence.
I get maybe not everyone wants to go in as deep on their worldbuilding or gaming. I like getting all sociological and political and my players seem to enjoy it as well. But reframing back onto actions, rather than inherent traits, is a good rule of thumb regardless.
On the other end of the scale to TES, there's a whole heap of crap like that thing Varg wrote in jail. When people remember about that kind of stuff they're going to be pissed. With a couple of accusations we could have #notallfantasyfans going by the end of summer.
Thing is, most of the appeal to D&D for a lot of people is it lets you enjoy a simplification in a complex world.
Orcs are evil because muhaha, same as chromatic dragons, etc. So you handle them in simple ways, and problem sorted. Then on Monday, you go back to that complex world where nothing is clear cut.
True, simplification is sometimes better. But slavers and cultists into human sacrifice are usually pretty non-complex (he says, thinking about his group who have done work for Great House Dres, the biggest slavers in Tamriel, before now). Or people who were given a chance to back down and refused, like the raiding orcs ate the last envoy sent to speak with them. Boom, problem solved.
Quote from: CramulusThe issue, I think, comes from the way that certain monsters are coded as people. Especially because the things people say about Drow (for example) sometimes land pretty close to home for real-life people of color. In the Larp community, we're really struggling to undo generations of fantasy where "dark skin" is a signifier of a dark soul... Drow are not analogous to black people, but I've heard PoC say that they feel uncomfortable in spaces where the plot is focused on we white skinned heroes destroying those evil black-skinned elves. Especially when larpers get SUPER defensive about wearing black face makeup, and whitesplain"it's not racist, you are offended for no reason." I dunno, how many fantasy movies have black protagonists? (please don't mention Marlon Wayans in the D&D movie) Are we SURE that this has nothing to do with our Othering of marginalized people?
One of the things I like the most about the Malazan series, other than when all the ridiculous subplots come crashing into each other, is that it rails
hard against this trope. The Malazans, as a multi-nation empire, have people of every possible race serving under their banner and, due to being situated in what could generously be called the tropics (don't talk to Erikson about maps, or timelines) is a lot of the characters are of Dal Honese extraction. Dal Hon would be roughly equivalent to the Zulu, in terms of environment and skin tone. A large subset of characters also come from the unnamed subcontinent called Seven Cities, which has so many Arabic overtones as to be ridiculous at times. Kalam and Quick Ben, two of the more noted characters from that region, are also described as very dark-skinned, but there are others, like Lostara Yil, who tend to be lighter but still quite tanned in comparison to non Dal Honese.
Metaphysically, Darkness is the first Hold, in elemental opposition to Chaos. The original inhabitants of the Hold of Darkness, the Tiste Andii, are among the more noble characters in the setting, perhaps personified by their leader, Anomander Rake. And though their intentions are often vague and saying too much would be spoilery, the rulers of the Warren of Shadow, Ammanas and Cotillion, are far from evil in a metaphysical sense, despite all the "shadow" associations that rulership of that plane grants them. If anything, light is evil in this setting, because the notions of purity that are associated with it breed zealousness, arrogance and distaste for outsiders.
Well I guess I need to go fucking read malazan stuff now cause that's legitimately interesting to me as a perpetually edgy person who is also not a fucking shitbag, great approach it sounds like
When you get an archaeologist/anthropologist writing the series, a lot of the usual fantasy assumptions get smashed hard. Just...don't mind the first book. It was literally his first novel ever. The prose is noticeably better from the second book onwards.
I've enjoyed stuff like "The Last ringbearer" or the "Orks" trilogy that examine the possibility that Tolkein's perspective was very biased. I ran a Fantasy setting for a long time that included humans believing that certain other races were evil, stupid, etc, by nature, but being wrong about it. Admittedly I did include some racial IQ modifiers, which in hindsight was probably not great.
I think physical differences are part of the fun of fantasy, ogres are obviously stronger than humans, but making anyone dumb or evil by default is lazy and exposes something the GM should probably look at a bit closer.
Hmm.
Is it implicit in this that creating a race that is more intelligent, or benevolent, inherently, than the regular humans is problematic as well?
No, I don't necessarily think so. The core thing here is to create a safe space for nonwhite players, so the specific thing we're talking about is racism in D&D that is essentially analogous to real world ~1940s racism: Othering people because they don't look like Europeans, or excluding them from 'civilization' because they're tribal and primitive.
Though if this cool-smart-good race is described as intelligent and benevolent because of their pure blood and superior breeding, then yeah, you're wandering into the kingdom of problematic fantasy.
Here's a better summary of the discussion:
https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2020/06/dd-wotc-announces-inclusivity-updates-to-orcs-drow-and-vistani.html
WotC's statement:
One of the explicit design goals of 5th edition D&D is to depict humanity in all its beautiful diversity by depicting characters who represent an array of ethnicities, gender identities, sexual orientations, and beliefs. We want everyone to feel at home around the game table and to see positive reflections of themselves within our products. "Human" in D&D means everyone, not just fantasy versions of northern Europeans, and the D&D community is now more diverse than it's ever been. Throughout the 50-year history of D&D, some of the peoples in the game—orcs and drow being two of the prime examples—have been characterized as monstrous and evil, using descriptions that are painfully reminiscent of how real-world ethnic groups have been and continue to be denigrated. That's just not right, and it's not something we believe in. Despite our conscious efforts to the contrary, we have allowed some of those old descriptions to reappear in the game. We recognize that to live our values, we have to do an even better job in handling these issues. If we make mistakes, our priority is to make things right.
We present orcs and drow in a new light in two of our most recent books, Eberron: Rising from the Last War and Explorer's Guide to Wildemount. In those books, orcs and drow are just as morally and culturally complex as other peoples. We will continue that approach in future books, portraying all the peoples of D&D in relatable ways and making it clear that they are as free as humans to decide who they are and what they do.
They talk about how they've added a sensitivity reader to the editorial team. And how the next printings of Curse of Strahd will remove some of the unfortunate Roma stereotypes from the Vistani characters.
And a new sourcebook coming later this year will incorporate these new attitudes:
Later this year, we will release a product (not yet announced) that offers a way for a player to customize their character's origin, including the option to change the ability score increases that come from being an elf, a dwarf, or one of D&D's many other playable folk. This option emphasizes that each person in the game is an individual with capabilities all their own.
I feel that last one isn't totally necessary. Which makes me smile because it hurts nothing and is guaranteed to make chuds shit their pants in public.
Also, it should make some builds more viable, which is cool.
Back when they were first designing Morrowind, they wanted to use "cultural backgrounds" as distinct from your character's appearance. So for example you could be a Bosmer with a Nord background, with all the Nord skill bonuses that would imply (though I don't know if it included the racial powers). The idea being raised among the Nords, of course you're going to know more about how to use axes and wear heavy armour, as per the Nords inclinations in that area.
I always felt that was a more elegant approach, and it's a shame it never got implemented. Hopefully that last option will be something along those lines.
Quote from: altered on June 18, 2020, 05:35:08 PM
I feel that last one isn't totally necessary. Which makes me smile because it hurts nothing and is guaranteed to make chuds shit their pants in public.
Also, it should make some builds more viable, which is cool.
There will be many, very niche, low quality crap videos about how this is not OK. Ravenloft people are, shall we say, odd. And low in number. Feels like a trial area to gauge reaction.
And fortunately, being morrowind, there must be a mod for that or very similar by now. Surely.
There isn't, but it would be easy to make one.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 18, 2020, 02:01:42 PM
Hmm.
Is it implicit in this that creating a race that is more intelligent, or benevolent, inherently, than the regular humans is problematic as well?
The stereotypes of Asians and Jews include higher intelligence. More benevolent might not be problematic but more intelligent definitely is.
Quote from: Pergamos on June 19, 2020, 07:50:57 AM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 18, 2020, 02:01:42 PM
Hmm.
Is it implicit in this that creating a race that is more intelligent, or benevolent, inherently, than the regular humans is problematic as well?
The stereotypes of Asians and Jews include higher intelligence. More benevolent might not be problematic but more intelligent definitely is.
Holy fuck :lulz:
Quote from: Pergamos on June 19, 2020, 07:50:57 AM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 18, 2020, 02:01:42 PM
Hmm.
Is it implicit in this that creating a race that is more intelligent, or benevolent, inherently, than the regular humans is problematic as well?
The stereotypes of Asians and Jews include higher intelligence. More benevolent might not be problematic but more intelligent definitely is.
Mmm. So if there are more intelligent races or species, the concomitant observation is that there are less intelligent ones, and that is problematic. I don't see how it would be less problematic from that standpoint to have implicitly malevolent races or species.
From the people that are calling WotC actions to be hand wringing, I have heard the arguement that there are actual humans of all races represented in the game without having them have a preordained alignment. Seeing some human race reflected in monsters, they say, is indicative of the accusers racism rather than the game/story itself. This seems reasonable, and I'm wondering if I'm missing something.
In the WotC announcement, they point that the portrayal of these monsters is painfully reminicent of the way actual human races have been portrayed historically. Is the only way to deal with this by getting rid of the concept of monsters? When there are actual human races represented in the game positively?
The obvious joke would be a game where the adventurers come across a troll in the woods, and the adventurers have to make a decision whether to strike a preemptive defensive posture, risking a microaggression against her, or bid the creature a pleasant morning. :lol:
The answer to your question is simple: look at TES.
Redguards exist, right? Dunmer exist, right? Both are considered highly in the context of the setting, right? So why would Orsimer be a racist caricature (if handled less well than Bethesda has done so far)?
Because of the coding. The same way that any eugenicist species in a scifi setting is automatically coded as Nazi Germany, certain traits make "this race/species our stand in for real world group A".
Want an on the nose example of that that's relevant to very recent events?
Goblins and house-elves in Harry Potter are unquestionably racist Jewish and Black caricatures. Harry Potter takes place in the real world, so there are Jewish and Black people.
But the coding is undeniable: goblins are greedy old bastards with long hair and big noses who control the world from within a banking system.
House elves are born-slaves who cannot remember not being enslaved and actually prefer the slave life.
These are ANCIENT racist caricatures. Putting a different name on them to tie them to a fantasy race does NOT separate them from their inherent racism.
More subtle attacks are involved with orcs in D&D, but consider momentarily:
Orc art tends to be of beefy, solemn looking hominids with skin that is darker than white person skin, and Black or Asian features.
Orcs are violent, dimwitted, steal everything they own, and are more a danger to each other than to the adventurers who slaughter them by the hundreds.
Orcs (or related goblinoids, especially hobgoblins) are described as having ape-like features, as being hairy, and are depicted with long monkey-like arms.
Mating with an orc is almost always rape, and always produces a tragic youth who doesn't know one or both of their parents, is dumb and is given to violence.
It's fucking racist.
I can see that there is truth in that.
We have created monstrous stereotypes for groups of people throughout history.
So when we portray monsters of various types, it automatically conjures up these associations with the peoples that have been painted in that way.
So now it is being said that we should not have monsters of that type, even if the story explicitly deconstructs that image by simultaneously portraying the actual peoples previously depicted in that way in a more realistic and nuanced way.
I don't think I buy it, but I can understand it.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 19, 2020, 10:18:29 PM
I can see that there is truth in that.
We have created monstrous stereotypes for groups of people throughout history.
So when we portray monsters of various types, it automatically conjures up these associations with the peoples that have been painted in that way.
So now it is being said that we should not have monsters of that type, even if the story explicitly deconstructs that image by simultaneously portraying the actual peoples previously depicted in that way in a more realistic and nuanced way.
I don't think I buy it, but I can understand it.
Here's the kicker:
These separate species are called races. Races. So there is an implicit assumption that they are analogous to real-world human races. (And in the earliest iterations of the "race" concept of high fantasy, with Tolkien, that was indeed PRECISELY the intent.) Now, when it comes to the human race, tell me the last time you saw an explicitly black human PC in a D&D game. Not in official WotC art, as a character someone played. Or hell, even a step further, as an NPC that the DM created rather than taking from a sourcebook.
Never?
Then the closest your game had to representation for PoC was orcs.
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on June 19, 2020, 10:18:29 PM
I can see that there is truth in that.
We have created monstrous stereotypes for groups of people throughout history.
So when we portray monsters of various types, it automatically conjures up these associations with the peoples that have been painted in that way.
So now it is being said that we should not have monsters of that type, even if the story explicitly deconstructs that image by simultaneously portraying the actual peoples previously depicted in that way in a more realistic and nuanced way.
I don't think I buy it, but I can understand it.
I may be wrong, but I'm not seeing that at all.
What I'm seeing is the statement that those races will be portrayed in more nuanced and realistic ways. I mean, shit, they managed to do a better job with tieflings - literally people with demonic blood flowing through them - then they have done with orcs.
It's pretty easy, too. Throw some of the blame back onto society, a few historical wars and perhaps some religion into the mix (the "bad" orc gods ate all the "good" ones, so only orc tribes who worshipped the evil ones had access to divine magic) and you've already got a far more nuanced reason why there are historical tensions and bad orc tribal leaders keep rising to the top that don't rely on the inherent evil of your enemies as an explanation.
They do this all the time with most human nation histories, it won't take much work.
To be clear, I agree with Cain. I just don't think that getting rid of evil monsters that are racially coded altogether would even be a bad thing, and explained why.
I have no issue with the compromise Cain offers, I don't even think it's "first steps" or whatever. I just consider it about equivalent to doing away with the idea of always-evil sentient races altogether and instead presenting every sentient species they same way they do player races and species intended as neutral NPCs. The only difference is what part you prioritize: lore or anti-racism.
I was using monster, I guess, to mean inherently evil.
Hmm. So it seems to be tying sentience to inherent evil that is the problem, because all monstrous portrayals of inherent evil have, at some point in history, been applied to a racial group.
Is that accurate assessment?
Basically, yeah. There are a couple exceptions: if you have a "god of evil", say, Satan, and his minions are these things, call them demons, those can be always evil because they literally represent the concept itself.
And let's be clear here, they actually do a good fucking job of this usually. Illithids don't map closely to any real world group at all, are totally inhuman, and aren't even pure evil: they're fleeing something from the far future and doing their best to survive in a world that is hostile to them and cannot understand them. Most aberrant sentient beings (neoga excepted since they're basically coded as space-spider Arabs... bad look folks) do a pretty good fucking job of being legitimately monstrous without being inherently evil, in fact.
I would go so far as to say that orcs (EDIT: actually most goblinoids in general) are almost entirely unique in how shitty and racist they are. But you can't fix the problem with orcs without in the process fixing the fact that the system allows natural sentient beings (I.e. not avatars or minions of Evil Itself) to be Always Evil.
Huh.
So. I dont think I'm willing to give up that concept.
Is it morally wrong to accept stories that have that?
It seems like a valuable concept to have in literature and culture as a precautionary tail of how shitty it(society or self) is if we let ourselves be evil.
Now, I can understand trying to avoid certain depictions and not wanting to be attached to actual groups of people....
I wonder what features of orcs would have to be changed to be safe from association with black humans? (That is who it is attached to, I'm assuming)
Why have a race be genetically predisposed to evil when you can have a fucking cult or something? The latter is far more valuable because it doesn't treat some people as inherently evil due to the circumstances of their birth; they chose to become a part of something evil and can walk away from it any time they want. There is NO value in genetic evil. What the fuck, dude?
The Illithids and my own creation, the Tultu do "genetically "evil"" better by not being inherently evil but having such alien biology that their basic survival depends on things other species find abhorrent. Some might have to struggle with what it means to value all life even as they destroy it to live, some will become sociopaths, but there's no correlation between genetics and morality being made... so it works as a useful fucking sentient monster archetype. There is, by contrast, literally no value in "from birth, these people want to murder because they want to". Again, what the fuck?
And to be clear, my tultu are far more evil than illithids, because for them horrible violence, ESPECIALLY dismemberment, is literally foreplay. It's like humans undressing for them. Because they reproduce by cutting pieces of themselves off and gluing the parts of different individuals together. They grow in size and power by self harm: a new "mouth" (hard to describe the biology, a mouth for a tultu is like a tentacle with a biological chainsaw and a sphincter to siphon the resultant mush into a digestive gullet) grows from any cuts in their flesh past the cuticle. They have all basic organs (including brains and hearts and such) reproduced at every node where multiple mouths meet, so they get smarter and stronger and more resilient as they regenerate from damage.
So they literally treat violence against all other species as doing them a favor initially, then view them as weak and unworthy when they can't regrow lost limbs. They are space-nazis in essence, except their world view doesn't come from "doing evil" but from biological realities that other species don't share.
They even have a later split in the species where their horrible worldview is recognized and disdained by a subset of their own that force the bulk of their species into another dimension. Because they aren't biologically incapable of recognizing that they are doing wrong, because that would be the point where it starts to become a bit shitty.
Well.... I totally agree with the value of the more nuanced gradations of evil like ilithids. They're probably the most interesting race in dnd that I am aware of. It's a fascinating philosophical concept that I savor.
But there's nothing more viscerally fearful than a group that is just evil. They just choose to be. All of them. Every single one. That's the worst possible thing.
And it's what you destroy. Like you get baby jesus bucks for killing them. There's no moral qualm.
They're a moral absolute that acts as a cautionary point of reference. You don't be a monster.
Now we shouldn't paint people as monsters. That's totally clear.
But there will be portrayals of monstrous archetypes that are evil by choice. But they will be tied to groups of people by the shitheads of our past. ... so.
I need to think about it more...
Evil by choice is not genetically evil.
Orcs are portrayed as genetically evil, for all intents and purposes.
The groups you are looking for are political parties, cults and "affinity groups" to use a term that is wrong but paints the correct picture (e.g. there is a mundane book so horrid that reading it to completion drives the reader to commit acts of violence).
Being born evil due to what you are beyond your control is a BAD trope. Fuck, I personally know good sociopaths, who have chosen to be good people and correct themselves when they are fucking up. They are neurologically incapable of feeling empathy, they choose to act good because it's the right thing to do.
There is no such thing as born evil.
And any perpetuation of that idea both gives terrible people a cop out "oh you can't blame me I was BORN a fascist" AND will be used as an explanation for why their victims deserve bigotry. That last one MAYBE sounds far fetched, until you look at how many people in their late 20s to mid 30s are explaining the ENTIRE FUCKING WORLD in terms of motherfucking Harry Potter.
A really good analog to real-life monsters is an evil thought that, once you have it, either drags you into it or forces you to stand against it. No organization is necessary, the thought alone is so terrible that you have to fight it at all costs or join it. If you need organizations in your evil, it can self-organize like ants: a ton of people all have similar ideas and go to similar places and they KNOW each other by that haunted look in the eye, the dumb grin on the face, and they end up just silently working together.
This thought could have many kinds of sources, or you could have it be some kind of demented glitch in reality breaking brains all at once all of the sudden. (Pontypool shows what that might look like in terms of the suddenness and degree.)
This is an analog to fascism. Once you have the pieces of fascism in your head and become aware of it as a complete entity that exists, you either are okay with that being a possible thing or you become on guard against it.
So, the argument is:
There is no such thing as born evil in the real world.
And it is wrong to imagine it, because some people will insist it is real.
Edit: rereading this, my description sounds flip, which is not my intent....
Quote from: altered on June 20, 2020, 01:04:50 AM
A really good analog to real-life monsters is an evil thought that, once you have it, either drags you into it or forces you to stand against it. No organization is necessary, the thought alone is so terrible that you have to fight it at all costs or join it. If you need organizations in your evil, it can self-organize like ants: a ton of people all have similar ideas and go to similar places and they KNOW each other by that haunted look in the eye, the dumb grin on the face, and they end up just silently working together.
This thought could have many kinds of sources, or you could have it be some kind of demented glitch in reality breaking brains all at once all of the sudden. (Pontypool shows what that might look like in terms of the suddenness and degree.)
This is an analog to fascism. Once you have the pieces of fascism in your head and become aware of it as a complete entity that exists, you either are okay with that being a possible thing or you become on guard against it.
Chaotic Evil: A motorcycle gang. They ride into town and burn your house down and fuck your dog and slap your auntie. But then they leave, because they HAVE TO. Or they kill each other once they've been into the sterno.
Lawful Evil: The insurance company that says you aren't covered for motorcycle gangs. Also the bank that forecloses on the ruins, and the developer that puts up a fleabag tenement on the spot and rents a bit back to you at reasonable rates.
Neutral Evil: The guy who smiles at all of the above, agrees that the policy didn't have that coverage for his house, and then puts 20 pounds of arsenic down the well.
Evil is as evil does. Nobody wants to think about that. So, orcs. You can pretend that all the townsfolk are cheerful idiots and the bad guys are nice and two dimensional, if that's what makes your Saturday game better.
If you think that orcs are a racist stereotype, then I kind of have to question which human race has pig's noses and tusks.
When we sit down to game, it typically involves a million screaming bad guys and maybe the elephant of despair. It doesn't matter WHO those bad guys are, because the point is they're BAD GUYS and you are a GOOD GUY and you can tell the difference because the good guys have
the improved critical feat shiny armor.
ON THE OTHER HAND AND IT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED: Undead are just differently mortal. This is obviously a stereotype of Charlton Heston, and you should all be ashamed of yourself.
And those people who will insist it is real have the influence and power to kill people.
It's not just your response reading as flippant, it's the dismissiveness of the extent and magnitude of those real world effects. I'm fucking dying out here in real fucking life. I had to beg and plead with total strangers for no more than two hundred dollars earlier today, which will keep me fed and housed for two more nights. I can't get a job because I have no permanent address, I can't get a permanent address without money, I can't get money without work, the circle goes.
Do you know why?
My disability is fake. Because it's half trauma and half mental illness, with enough room for a sleep disorder besides.
I can just get a job if I want to. Which is lies and deceit if you assume I'm NOT disabled.
Shelters can help me. Except I'm trans, and they aren't required to do so anymore (and rarely fucking did in the past, and when they did, they gave me new fucking trauma in the process).
I can just apply for govt assistance. Except it barely exists, does fuck all almost everywhere it does, and requires a permanent address and healthcare history to receive the one kind that isn't useless (disability).
If people are telling these lies about a white disabled lesbian trans woman who can suck it up and go boy mode for a month or so at a time — stop for a second, and imagine if I was black. Imagine if I was black and there were people saying I was naturally violent (whoops there are hello transphobia), naturally stupid, born a criminal, unable to feel pain (look into healthcare racism, there's literally a statistical modifier you can apply to fix racism in healthcare because of how universal it is), looking for handouts, and generally unworthy of being considered human.
That reality you just imagined, reading all of that? That is real. It just isn't real for /me/.
Do not dismiss the real world effects of fiction. There are more examples of fiction doing terrible things to our world than there are of the opposite.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion has been known to be fictitious for almost as long as it's existed and here we are, with people insisting it's real.
Varg Vikernes, the neo-Nazi black metal musician who stabbed his band mate 24 times for being gay and burned down double digit numbers of churches and has been since caught stockpiling firearms for a race war in France? Yeah, he was partially inspired by Lord of the Rings.
Ask how many white supremacists were radicalized in part because of Fight Club and Catcher in the Rye, you'll get a surprisingly high number of "oh, me" answers.
Lord of the Flies is the example given against anarchism by the Fox News crowd when it was an explicit, said-by-the-author indictment of spoiled private schooled British boys and the society that created them.
The Punisher and cops. If you aren't aware of how insane this one is, go look it up: this is a case where even a clear message AFTER people are radicalizing on an ambiguous fictional piece isn't enough.
The fact that QAnon even fucking exists. Look up the "mole kids". I'm not fucking joking. If you don't agree with the next paragraph before you google, go look that shit up and read it again.
Fiction shouldn't affect real life, in an ideal world we could tell any story and know it is just a story. In the real world, it's becoming increasingly obvious that fiction that reaches a certain number of people has a duty to speak a clear message.
EDIT: I'm going to give Howl a separate response.
So, it took a lot of digging in my history to find, but there's a pair of articles that explains EXACTLY how orcs are racist, and how we might go about fixing that.
Normally, I'd give you a personal write up. Unfortunately, I am hardly in a place to discuss shit in the personally-painful way that we do in these parts with you, Howl, because you're good at hitting nerves and I just cannot take it right now. That's not your fault, it's just a statement of fact. Sorry.
Also, this is well researched and well sourced stuff, and it does a better job than I could in explaining it. (Unfortunately, it often reads worse than fucking academia, but there's only so much I can do.)
https://jamesmendezhodes.com/blog/2019/1/13/orcs-britons-and-the-martial-race-myth-part-i-a-species-built-for-racial-terror
https://jamesmendezhodes.com/blog/2019/6/30/orcs-britons-and-the-martial-race-myth-part-ii-theyre-not-human
Bluntly put: it's not unsourced and it's not simple political correctness, there is a factual basis to the statement of orcs being racist. Not just Tolkien's orcs, where they were even CREATED INTENTIONALLY as racist caricatures, but in the case of most modern fantasy orcs as well.
I've given examples of why in this thread. Either they weren't enough for you or you missed them. Regardless, it isn't pure bullshit, and the articles have more receipts to bring to the table than I can collect in my current state.
A quick note, both to show how bad my brain is right now that it took me this long after having posted these things and read both of those articles for the third time, and as an actual suggestion if you just want some shit to beat the fuck out of:
Take your orcs and make them obsessed with racial purity and power dynamics and eternal war. They're low life street fighting gangsters in major cities, but on their home turf they're the Evil Empire. They like number codes a lot and talk a lot of bullshit about non-orcs coming to rape their women and steal from them. Maybe they have a characteristic battle cry or hand gesture.
Yes, that's right. Make your orcs obvious neo-Nazis. Now it's not so racist.
I thought D&D were going some interesting places with Obould Many-Arrows, though it's unfortunate he was depicted as an exceptional individual. I also have no idea if they retconned that with 5e...probably, given status quo is king in the Forgotten Realms.
One way of looking at it - imagine any real world massacre of native americans. Now imagine that instead of native americans, they are orcs. How much needed to change?
Lots of stuff about the native americans change - their religion, their visual apperance, their culture... they still remain a tribal culture with warriors. But the human's opinions about those orcs? their discussions about why it's okay to subjugate them and take over? none of that changes at all. Practically everything that humans say about orcs in a D&D campaign could have been a real world attitude about native americans.
D&D is constantly reinventing itself... it basically releases the same ideas over and over again, but with a contemporary coat of paint. So we have to ask ourselves, in the year 2020, what do we mean when we talk about a struggle between good and evil? And if the evil you're slaying is a dragon, demons, skeletons, vampires, whatever, then sure--we're good, they're evil, let's do the mash (it was a graveyard smash).
But if our campaign's antagonists are people (and orcs are people - unlike skeletons, they have a culture and religion and all that jazz) - we need a different story than "they are just born evil, and they have low intelligence scores, it's okay to kill them."
Like, many D&D campaigns are accidentally about "what if racism & genocide was good, actually? what if there was a world where genocide was moral? wouldn't it be fun?"
So, from 1d4chan of all places, I discovered this: https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Ondonti
Lawful good, pacifist orcs.