On the Metafiller blog I happened across an interesting article that equates adventurers to a white-man's raciest power fantasy.
http://www.metafilter.com/76707/just-numbers-on-a-piece-of-paper
It was written on an article from somethingawful.com (http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/president-maverick-racist.php?page=1)
What do you think? Is this a product of the white man's agenda or is it instead just an illusion with a low DC to disbelieve?
Honestly, I can see the parallels. Dark skinned creatures vs the "good aligned" players (for the most part). However, I don't think it I write an encounter to be "O man lets see what whitey can get away with!", but instead I try to play on the fears that all humans have. The best example of this is the chimera. It's a fire-breathing monstrous creature with the of a lion, a snake for a tail, and the head of a goat erupting form it's spine. Humans fear this because lions are hunters and killers in our mind, the bite of snakes can lead to death, creatures of great size have hunted us in the past, and fire consumes all. We we are simply scared of what we fear. In general- we fear the unknown and the unusual. A red-skinned monstrosity with massive muscles, great fangs, wild eyes, and a bad temper who makes guttural roars at you is hardly a Jigaboo-esque racial stand in but is rather a combination of things we fear.
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There's a larger reason that D&D seems heavily rooted in racism.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.rediff.com/news/2003/jan/08lord.htm
I don't know though. I've have opportunity to play in quite a few games and I tend to see players ASK the "racial stereotypes" (orcs, goblins, ect) as to their motives. The only things I really see them jump and gank right off the bat are like things with supernatural "evil" alignments (demons/devils), things from the same faction that recently attacked them, or actual creature-type monsters. (Like a giant ass chimera breathing fire at them)
ReplyDeleteOh yeah- and Ben, I believe that people see what they want to see more than see what the author was intending when they read books. Sometimes what they intended is blatant but sometimes it's not. Take the Bible for example- there are a million ways different sects see different aspects of it. (Listen to that whole "oneness" debate...)
ReplyDeleteActually seeing what you want in Tolkien's work is pretty much how the article concludes. I actually go by what the character would do to determine how and when to attack something. Most are likely to use a combination of how much treasure they have, if they can win, and how bored they are.
ReplyDelete