A topic that has recently arisen again is the issue of problematic material in early Dungeons & Dragons. If you aren't familiar with the most recent controversy, the thread (about Gary Gygax and sexism) is here. That said, this is a topic that continues to re-occur. Sometimes it is about the continuing use of certain material in Dungeons & Dragons- whether the material is problematic (republishing legacy material), or whether the material should be updated (using older material in newer books, such as drow and orcs and alignment), and sometimes questions regarding use of outside material in the game itself (such as conversations about an updated 'Appendix N' or incorporation of Lovecraftian elements).
Many of these discussions involve questions as to whether that material is itself offensive in some way, or whether that material comes from an artist (an author) who has views that are offensive. Notably, there is a recurrent conversation in both D&D and the greater sci-fi and fantasy community regarding H.P. Lovecraft, the Cthulhu mythos, and the presence of same in D&D (Great Old Ones, Appendix N, etc.) as well as wider popular culture. More recently, the discussions have centered around the fact that many of the people, including but not limited to Gygax, who created early D&D are certainly sexist by today's standards. Along with those conversations are the necessary discussions about the ways in which the materials produced at that time can reflect those biases.
I think that these are useful conversations to have! Albeit difficult. But I also think it would be helpful and illuminating to look at these issues in the context of other controversies and see if they help illuminate why there issues can be both contentious and nuanced. I have made my opinion clear about Gygax- I think it is inarguable that he is sexist by today's standards, and I think that he continued with those beliefs well past the point they should have changed, as I quoted him from the 2000s making comments about how females just don't engage with games like, you know, guys do. But I also love early D&D. So I'm putting this out as an examination of how we deal with these issues. How we can discuss problematic faves. It's a reworked blast from the past.
Please note that I am not prescribing any particular opinions, and simply posting some thoughts that I continue to wrestle with. Please do not use this post as a launching point to write about anti-inclusive content. Enworld's Faq is here: Terms and rules There is a section titled, "Keep it inclusive". Thank you!
I'm going to go through the following sections in my post; as usual, I will name the sections according to whatever bizarre reference happens to be going through my head at the time.
A. An examination of the issue using the Potterverse as an example
B. An overview of the offensive and/or problematic nature of people, and artists
C. A discussion of the general issues of separating art and artists (text and author)
D. Thoughts on why individual and collection action matters, and why it doesn't
E. Concluding opinions on the relevance to D&D and Gygax
A. Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes; that way, when you criticize them, you are a mile away and you have their shoes.
From approximately 2000 on, the Potterverse was fantasy. Yes, yes, Tolkien, the Lord of the Rings movies, and all that. But I hope that I don't need to go into a long digression about how the Harry Potter books were the lingua franca of fantasy for a new generation. There were the books, which were devoured by kids and adults alike. The blockbuster movies. An entire theme park in Orlando. Video games. The Potterverse, for many people, came to define substantial parts of what they thought of as fantasy. It had wizards and wands and monsters, oh my! And it all came from J.K. Rowling. A writer who was seen by many as a hero. I don't think I need to clarify why this is important to D&D- while there are many reasons that D&D has blossomed in the last ten years or so, having a whole generation of kids raised up that love to read and that love fantasy certainly didn't hurt D&D.
...and then came 2020. Well, there had been some glimmers before then, but 2020 was when the controversy that shook a lot of the community happened. I am not going to cover it in detail (you can google JK Rowling Controversy if you'd like), but Rowling has been embroiled in an endless series of issues regarding her continued statements regarding gender and trans issues, which culminated in the publication of a book (Trouble Blood) that has a plotline that certainly staked a position- and it was not one friendly to the transgender community.
So given this background, the controversy seems clear. If you are trans, or a trans ally, it is difficult to countenance the harm being done by Rowling. And this applies to a number of arguments we often go though- you can't say that it isn't present in any of her works given that she wrote a whole book premised on the idea of promoting her thoughts. You can't say that she is utterly typical for the time, given the number of people (including most of the stars of her films and other authors like Stephen King) who have spoken out against her. You can't say that she isn't causing harm, given that she is the popular face of a movement that is against equality. So a lot of people are struggling with this, especially fans of the Potterverse. And we see this in all sorts of discussions; we see that JK Rowling is marginalized from most Potterverse releases, announcements about projects will stress that she was not involved and/or discuss Warner Bros.' position on inclusivity. But that makes it difficult for many people to know what, if anything, they should be doing. If there is a new videogame about Harry Potter, can they buy it? A lot of people that aren't Rowling worked on it, and it doesn't have her viewpoint ... but is it still supporting her? Can they go to a theme park with Harry Potter stuff? What if they go to the theme park, but don't go to the Harry Potter part?
....it gets complicated, because the artist who created a work that is loved is flawed. And Rowling is flawed, as are most people. As are most artists.
I will briefly mention that this issue seems to keep popping up in both the culture as a whole, but also D&D and RPGs. We have people from the past that were influential on D&D, and controversies regarding people involved in the industry today. The arguments over Gygax are not identical to those over Rowling (Gygax is dead, he is not creating or profiting from D&D, and his views were more "of his time" and personal), but they certainly rhyme.
B. If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan.
People .... people suck. That is a general truism. Even the best of them. Mother Teresa? Might want to research that. Dr. Seuss... you really don't want to know. Your friend Jake? Cheated on his first wife. And so on. No one is perfect- it's just that the more famous the person, the more likely we are to have documented instances of them being .... imperfect. Take H.P. Lovecraft- the reason we know he was an odious racist was because, unlike the millions upon millions of odious racists at the time, he wrote about his beliefs! And why did he do that, and why are those writings saved? Because he's a writer.
Picasso? Terrible to women. Wagner? Racist. Hemingway? Chauvinist and racist. Burroughs (W.S.)? Degenerate junkie that killed his wife. I could keep going on, but you get it by now. I remember talking to a friend once, who said that they could never listen to David Bowie again because they had read a biography of Bowie and learned that Bowie had slept with underage girls in the 70s. I remember that my first thought was- if you're going to rule out music produced by rock musicians in the 60s and 70s who engaged in intercourse with underage groupies, you're not going to be listening to the classic rock station anymore. My second thought- Led Zeppelin was his favorite band, and I sure hoped he never wanted to learn about them. It's like the person who remarks that they are shocked to discover casual misogyny or racism in a 1980s teen film- were you never paying attention? If you rule out antisemitism and racism and misogyny (not to mention homophobia or transphobia or dislike of other religions), there are going to be very few artists left from the past. The only question is whether it has been documented, and (perhaps) how severe it might be.
And all of this is before we even get into the issue what should matter in terms of offensive behavior on the part of the artist. For example, H.P. Lovecraft was a virulent racist, and wrote about it. But it does not appear that he ever acted on his racism in a criminal manner, or that his writings were used as propaganda to hurt people, or that he participated in discrimination or lynching (!!) or other racist acts of his time. How would that compare to a Burroughs (shot wife) or Roman Polanski (sexual assault) or a Michael Jackson (ahem) or a Picasso (repeatedly abused women) or even an Anne Perry (best-selling writer who killed someone when she was a teenager)?
...actions, words, views ... current and past, they all make up a mélange of indistinct issues that are difficult to parse. Even talking about it can be fraught ... Well, sure, that author was a racist, but he was just a typical racist for the time! Or, I know that the person spent all of his spare time running over orphans with combine harvester, but it's not reflected in his paintings!
C. The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.
"The author is dead," is a rallying cry that is known to any college student who has taken a critical theory course. Personally, I am a strong believer in it- when it comes to criticism. And yet ... it is difficult to separate the text from the author, the art from the artist. The entire concept of the director as auteur that championed directors like Hitchcock and the French New Wave speaks to that- there is something necessary and individual about specific artists. No one would confuse a Wes Anderson film with a Stanley Kubrick one, for instance. Dostoyevsky is not Tolstoy, and Hemingway is not Henry Miller.
...and yet, to ascribe everything in a text to the author is the way of madness. In some cases, that is because the work is collaborative- music is not just a single artist, but also the producers ... not to mention the other musicians that might be playing; movies have cinematographers, and sound designers, and editors, and costume designers, and numerous others who put their own individual touches into the film in addition to the director. But even when it is the work of an individual- a painting, or a book, it can still be madness to read the sins of the author into the work. Picasso was a terrible misogynist, which is sometimes reflected in his paintings, yet Guernica (to use one example) is free of Picasso's misogyny.
But the issue often goes deeper than that. Good art often provokes, offends, or at a minimum shocks the people of their time. We celebrate Lenny Bruce not for his tragically short life, or even funny humor, but because he demanded that his art be heard despite official censorship. Burroughs (W.S.) had his book, Naked Lunch, banned in much of the United States for its explicit content, including homosexuality, yet it is often considered one of the best works of the 20th century. While it seems quaint today, Rites of Spring caused outrage and protests (if not quite causing the riot that some state happened) when it was first performed. I note this only because it is easy to be outraged and demand the removal of things you don't agree with because they offend the orthodoxy (whatever that might be) of the time, but it is never clear what that propriety might be- certainly we can't definitively state what it will be in the future.
Finally, the text/author issue can always run into the "Air Supply problem". Let me explain- once, a long time ago, I had a group of friends ... snarky, snarky friends. And every now and then, we would listen to Air Supply ("I'm all out love" etc.) because we thought it was hilarious. We enjoyed Air Supply ... but in an ironic fashion. We would talk about how, "Air Supply is the greatest band ever," and "They should re-name the Grammies, the Airies" and so on. One of our friends, Jason, would always listen to Air Supply with us. Over a course of several months, we began to realize something with growing horror. Jason loved Air Supply. Jason wasn't enjoying Air Supply ironically ... quelle horreur ... Jason was just loving them! Jason was making his love for Air Supply, out of nothing at all! Air Supply was the one that he loved ...
Ugh, anyway, the Air Supply problem is just a version of Poe's Law. Sarcasm, parody, irony, black humor, and so on ... many times, a text will mean the opposite of what it appears to mean on the surface. For that matter, sometimes art will traffic in problematic tropes in order to dispel them; is American History X a racist, or anti-racist film? Is Fight Club fascist or a send-up of hypermasculinity? Does Tropic Thunder traffic in blackface and ableist tropes for jokes, or mock the way Hollywood and actors exploit these tropes (or both)? Is Spinal Tap misogynistic (Big Bottoms) or mocking misogyny in rock music? Is Showgirls a masterpiece of self-aware parody that forces the viewer to confront the sins of capitalism, or leering misogynistic trash? And what do you do with Blazing Saddles? I don't have the answers to those questions, but they are worth asking.
And the reason that those questions are worth asking is because you often end up with a fundamental divide. There are those for whom the only measure that matters is the offense caused. For others, the proper measure is the intent to cause offense. The author's intent ... the text itself ... these are often intertwined within these conversations. Any work that employs satire, irony, or sarcasm in a proper and correct fashion requires that some portion of the audience be confused, or even hurt, by the work. Because ambiguity is not a bug, but the central feature of any work that plays with or invokes satire and irony. Simply put, the possibility that the audience can misunderstand the message is necessary to the proper conveyance of the message. This ambiguity is not a bug - it is the distinguishing feature.
D. There’s an old Chinese proverb: "Lies are like tigers, they are bad." I guess it’s more poetic in Mandarin.
A while back, I used to give to a particular charity. A friend asked me about it, saying, "Why do you give to that charity, Snarf? There are so many other more important things to give to!" And while I understood what they were saying, it didn't matter. This charity was important to me. And if I didn't do something, who would?
There is a great show called The Good Place and if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. It is rare to get so much philosophy in your sitcom. Anyway, one issue that they broached (without too many spoilers) is the interconnectedness of morality. Essentially, if we are on the hook, by our connections, for every possible bad thing ... then because the world is so inter-connected, we can't exist in the world without doing immoral acts. Too high-level? Okay, think of all the electronics you have purchased. Your iPhone or Android device. Your computer. Monitor. TV. Now, imagine being responsible for all the labor practices of not just the company that made it, but also all the subcontractors, and their subcontractors .... and so on. But wait, there's more! The shipping companies that brought it to you. The mining that got the rare elements for certain parts. The plastic bits that end up in the ocean (they don't get recycled). The oil companies that get the oil to make the plastic bits ... it gets overwhelming quickly. Every time you make the decision to purchase a cell phone, are you doing evil?
And it applies, in much the same way, when discussing some of the issues for the art and the artists. Do you want to show how much you disagree with Rowling's pubic stance by not purchasing the latest Harry Potter videogame? Well, what about the developers that made the game? If the company that is actually making the game inclusive, should they be punished because the original author has views you don't agree with? Should you boycott Batman because it contains both references to HP Lovecraft (Arkham) and has a storied connection to Frank Miller (who has issues of his own)?
That's where we get into the issue of individual and collective action. In this world, we want positive change to happen. And given that we live in a capitalist society, the best way to do that, many times, is to vote with our wallets. To not buy things we disapprove of, and to purchase things we approve of; moreover, to tell companies what we are doing. "I am not buying your products because they demean (this group)." The problem is that we are all hypocrites to greater or lesser degrees. We will campaign for the environment while driving an SUV or flying in a plane. We will bemoan the use of plastic bags in a store while remaining blissfully unaware of the uselessness of so-called recycling of plastic for the many, many plastic containers that hold the food we just bought. We will talk about this director or that singer being objectionable, solely because we aren't aware of what other artists have done.
.... and that's okay. In the end, we can only do what we believe to be right and correct. The perfect is the enemy of the good, and trying to be better in some things doesn't require being the best at everything. It does, at times, require patience for the way that other people view the issues.
There are Harry Potter fans that still like the Potterverse while not appreciating Rowling, while there are those that cannot separate the two. There are those that can still love listening to Billie Jean or Thriller, while not appreciating what Michael Jackson did - and those that can't listen to his music at all. There are people that can still read and appreciate Mists of Avalon, and others that are unable to.
No approach is incorrect. Well, except those that would argue that because they like something, they are going to die on the hill of defending the author. It's one thing to say that you enjoy the spare prose of Hemmingway (a style I clearly do not aspire to), it's another to say that he was a moral exemplar in life because you like his writing.
E. Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion man.
D&D was created from a specific place and time- 70s America. Because of that, early D&D necessarily contains artifacts that are of its time; whether it is the "cheesecake" art that made the game less welcoming to women, or the causal exoticism of the other (such as descriptions of cannibals and savages in certain areas), or the gender-based maximum ability scores. Today, D&D (and 5e) incorporates a much wider range of influences while retaining links to the past of the game. We continue to struggle with what aspects of D&D are necessary to maintain that continuity (to make it "D&D") and what aspects are necessary to throw into the dustbin of history.
I've observed this play out in four different "types" of debates here which I would contrast, but which all have similarities and are tied into the VERY LONG PROLOGUE above. The first is on "race" in D&D (or the continuing use of alignment, or should we kill orcs, etc.). The second is on the continuing use of Cthulhu tropes, but would apply to the continued use of anything that was derived from a questionable source. The third debate that keeps returning is regarding the continued presence of legacy products in D&D- as we see because of their presence on DriveThruRPG. The fourth, and most recent debate, is about the honest assessment of the people, such as Gygax, who first made D&D. I think that it is worth examining all four issues, because they are different and arguably call for different approaches.
1. For race we had the issue that while it was not intended to be offensive at the beginning, it is increasingly seen as anachronistic. I would say that, IMO, D&D has traditionally been very inclusive in terms of making humanity a monolithic single race. That said, even the term "race" can easily rankle today, and combining it with static bonuses and the like (all of a "race" is the same) can reinforce stereotypes, however unwittingly. I can understand a desire to move away from that term and game usage, and changing it to species is certainly something that shouldn't be controversial.
(I would add that while I am using 'race' as a proxy, this applies to all the conversations about the desirability of certain aspects of D&D, like alignment, or killing humanoids, that have a history with the game but are increasingly viewed unfavorably.)
As a general rule, it is my opinion that the game can, and should, evolve when it comes to the rules of the game. People can do whatever they want to in their own games, of course, and always play past editions if that's what they really want ... but the idea that "we've always done this, so we must always do this," usually is a poor argument, and would mean that we would still be playing with cheesecake art and gendered ability maximums. Change is a part of life, and I think that everyone wants D&D to live.
2. On the other hand, I would disagree with those who would argue for removing any possible reference to the Cthulhu mythos, root and branch, from D&D as I have seen argued before. Not only because it would cause interminable squabbles as to what it is (what aberrations and other aspects of cosmic horror are we to remove?), but also because there are times when you can remove the creation from the creator; are we to edit the movie Apocalypse Now because it contains a snippet of Die Walkure and Wagner could be a nasty piece of work?
As a general rule, it is my opinion that if the problem is because there has been some incorporation at some point, and the original creator is 'problematic,' but the actual material within the game is fine, I wouldn't worry about it. Everyone has a different tolerance for things, and I cannot speak for everyone, but I prefer to focus on the actual material used in play and ensuring that it is of the highest quality.
3. Then there are the recurrent conversations about the legacy material in D&D. We've seen this with, inter alia, Oriental Adventures, GAZ10, and many other older works. This renewed emphasis comes primarily because these works are now available; as hard as it might be for some people to believe, for long periods of time (both pre-internet, and before WOTC agreed to allow their catalog to be available) you simply couldn't just get a digital copy of these works.
As a general rule, it is my opinion that for legacy products you provide an appropriate disclaimer, and otherwise let it be. Products are, for better and for worse, a product of their time. If a product is to be re-released (to 5e, for example), then it should be updated. But otherwise, people should see the original just like it was, and marvel at it in much the same way that people might be perusing youtube and stumble on Into the Night by Benny Mardones and say to themselves, "What ... the ... actual .... H... E.... DOUBLE HOCKEY STICKS?????"
4. Finally, there is the "Gygax" debate. What do you do when something you love (OD&D, AD&D, Greyhawk) were created by someone that had attitudes that were, at best, of his time? Well, I can't speak for everyone. For me, I think the only proper thing to do is to acknowledge it. Yes, Gygax had views that were misogynistic, and he continued to state those views into the 2000s. There is also evidence in the material- from the harlots table, to the Good Wife, to the gendered ability caps... it's there. This is a matter of historical fact, and sunlight is the best disinfectant. We can, and should, acknowledge these things. Importantly, by acknowledging these things, and being aware of them, you can then approach the material with better judgment. I still run AD&D on occasion, but when I do I make sure not to incorporate some of the elements that I believe shouldn't be in there- like the gendered ability caps, or the harlot table. And while I love my old books, I also know that the cheesecake art isn't welcoming to female gamers and I make sure to use a neutral rules system for the table for reference that doesn't include that. Most importantly, I try to make sure that I can separate my love of the work with the historically accurate criticism of the person; when people say that Gygax had some sexist attitudes, I recognize that this is a statement that isn't about me, and doesn't attack me as a person. I can still appreciate the things that I loved about those early D&D books while still understanding that they had issues. In short, it's a problematic fave. But I certainly won't defend sexist tropes just because I happen to like the 1e illusionist and arcane rules debates.
In short, I think that these conversations are hard, but necessary, and there isn't a categorical imperative on most of these issues. We should be striving to be better, but cognizant of the complexity of these issues. But hey, maybe I'm wrong.
This is where I'm throwing it out for discussion. Please keep the discussion focused on D&D.
Many of these discussions involve questions as to whether that material is itself offensive in some way, or whether that material comes from an artist (an author) who has views that are offensive. Notably, there is a recurrent conversation in both D&D and the greater sci-fi and fantasy community regarding H.P. Lovecraft, the Cthulhu mythos, and the presence of same in D&D (Great Old Ones, Appendix N, etc.) as well as wider popular culture. More recently, the discussions have centered around the fact that many of the people, including but not limited to Gygax, who created early D&D are certainly sexist by today's standards. Along with those conversations are the necessary discussions about the ways in which the materials produced at that time can reflect those biases.
I think that these are useful conversations to have! Albeit difficult. But I also think it would be helpful and illuminating to look at these issues in the context of other controversies and see if they help illuminate why there issues can be both contentious and nuanced. I have made my opinion clear about Gygax- I think it is inarguable that he is sexist by today's standards, and I think that he continued with those beliefs well past the point they should have changed, as I quoted him from the 2000s making comments about how females just don't engage with games like, you know, guys do. But I also love early D&D. So I'm putting this out as an examination of how we deal with these issues. How we can discuss problematic faves. It's a reworked blast from the past.
Please note that I am not prescribing any particular opinions, and simply posting some thoughts that I continue to wrestle with. Please do not use this post as a launching point to write about anti-inclusive content. Enworld's Faq is here: Terms and rules There is a section titled, "Keep it inclusive". Thank you!
I'm going to go through the following sections in my post; as usual, I will name the sections according to whatever bizarre reference happens to be going through my head at the time.
A. An examination of the issue using the Potterverse as an example
B. An overview of the offensive and/or problematic nature of people, and artists
C. A discussion of the general issues of separating art and artists (text and author)
D. Thoughts on why individual and collection action matters, and why it doesn't
E. Concluding opinions on the relevance to D&D and Gygax
A. Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes; that way, when you criticize them, you are a mile away and you have their shoes.
From approximately 2000 on, the Potterverse was fantasy. Yes, yes, Tolkien, the Lord of the Rings movies, and all that. But I hope that I don't need to go into a long digression about how the Harry Potter books were the lingua franca of fantasy for a new generation. There were the books, which were devoured by kids and adults alike. The blockbuster movies. An entire theme park in Orlando. Video games. The Potterverse, for many people, came to define substantial parts of what they thought of as fantasy. It had wizards and wands and monsters, oh my! And it all came from J.K. Rowling. A writer who was seen by many as a hero. I don't think I need to clarify why this is important to D&D- while there are many reasons that D&D has blossomed in the last ten years or so, having a whole generation of kids raised up that love to read and that love fantasy certainly didn't hurt D&D.
...and then came 2020. Well, there had been some glimmers before then, but 2020 was when the controversy that shook a lot of the community happened. I am not going to cover it in detail (you can google JK Rowling Controversy if you'd like), but Rowling has been embroiled in an endless series of issues regarding her continued statements regarding gender and trans issues, which culminated in the publication of a book (Trouble Blood) that has a plotline that certainly staked a position- and it was not one friendly to the transgender community.
So given this background, the controversy seems clear. If you are trans, or a trans ally, it is difficult to countenance the harm being done by Rowling. And this applies to a number of arguments we often go though- you can't say that it isn't present in any of her works given that she wrote a whole book premised on the idea of promoting her thoughts. You can't say that she is utterly typical for the time, given the number of people (including most of the stars of her films and other authors like Stephen King) who have spoken out against her. You can't say that she isn't causing harm, given that she is the popular face of a movement that is against equality. So a lot of people are struggling with this, especially fans of the Potterverse. And we see this in all sorts of discussions; we see that JK Rowling is marginalized from most Potterverse releases, announcements about projects will stress that she was not involved and/or discuss Warner Bros.' position on inclusivity. But that makes it difficult for many people to know what, if anything, they should be doing. If there is a new videogame about Harry Potter, can they buy it? A lot of people that aren't Rowling worked on it, and it doesn't have her viewpoint ... but is it still supporting her? Can they go to a theme park with Harry Potter stuff? What if they go to the theme park, but don't go to the Harry Potter part?
....it gets complicated, because the artist who created a work that is loved is flawed. And Rowling is flawed, as are most people. As are most artists.
I will briefly mention that this issue seems to keep popping up in both the culture as a whole, but also D&D and RPGs. We have people from the past that were influential on D&D, and controversies regarding people involved in the industry today. The arguments over Gygax are not identical to those over Rowling (Gygax is dead, he is not creating or profiting from D&D, and his views were more "of his time" and personal), but they certainly rhyme.
B. If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan.
People .... people suck. That is a general truism. Even the best of them. Mother Teresa? Might want to research that. Dr. Seuss... you really don't want to know. Your friend Jake? Cheated on his first wife. And so on. No one is perfect- it's just that the more famous the person, the more likely we are to have documented instances of them being .... imperfect. Take H.P. Lovecraft- the reason we know he was an odious racist was because, unlike the millions upon millions of odious racists at the time, he wrote about his beliefs! And why did he do that, and why are those writings saved? Because he's a writer.
Picasso? Terrible to women. Wagner? Racist. Hemingway? Chauvinist and racist. Burroughs (W.S.)? Degenerate junkie that killed his wife. I could keep going on, but you get it by now. I remember talking to a friend once, who said that they could never listen to David Bowie again because they had read a biography of Bowie and learned that Bowie had slept with underage girls in the 70s. I remember that my first thought was- if you're going to rule out music produced by rock musicians in the 60s and 70s who engaged in intercourse with underage groupies, you're not going to be listening to the classic rock station anymore. My second thought- Led Zeppelin was his favorite band, and I sure hoped he never wanted to learn about them. It's like the person who remarks that they are shocked to discover casual misogyny or racism in a 1980s teen film- were you never paying attention? If you rule out antisemitism and racism and misogyny (not to mention homophobia or transphobia or dislike of other religions), there are going to be very few artists left from the past. The only question is whether it has been documented, and (perhaps) how severe it might be.
And all of this is before we even get into the issue what should matter in terms of offensive behavior on the part of the artist. For example, H.P. Lovecraft was a virulent racist, and wrote about it. But it does not appear that he ever acted on his racism in a criminal manner, or that his writings were used as propaganda to hurt people, or that he participated in discrimination or lynching (!!) or other racist acts of his time. How would that compare to a Burroughs (shot wife) or Roman Polanski (sexual assault) or a Michael Jackson (ahem) or a Picasso (repeatedly abused women) or even an Anne Perry (best-selling writer who killed someone when she was a teenager)?
...actions, words, views ... current and past, they all make up a mélange of indistinct issues that are difficult to parse. Even talking about it can be fraught ... Well, sure, that author was a racist, but he was just a typical racist for the time! Or, I know that the person spent all of his spare time running over orphans with combine harvester, but it's not reflected in his paintings!
C. The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.
"The author is dead," is a rallying cry that is known to any college student who has taken a critical theory course. Personally, I am a strong believer in it- when it comes to criticism. And yet ... it is difficult to separate the text from the author, the art from the artist. The entire concept of the director as auteur that championed directors like Hitchcock and the French New Wave speaks to that- there is something necessary and individual about specific artists. No one would confuse a Wes Anderson film with a Stanley Kubrick one, for instance. Dostoyevsky is not Tolstoy, and Hemingway is not Henry Miller.
...and yet, to ascribe everything in a text to the author is the way of madness. In some cases, that is because the work is collaborative- music is not just a single artist, but also the producers ... not to mention the other musicians that might be playing; movies have cinematographers, and sound designers, and editors, and costume designers, and numerous others who put their own individual touches into the film in addition to the director. But even when it is the work of an individual- a painting, or a book, it can still be madness to read the sins of the author into the work. Picasso was a terrible misogynist, which is sometimes reflected in his paintings, yet Guernica (to use one example) is free of Picasso's misogyny.
But the issue often goes deeper than that. Good art often provokes, offends, or at a minimum shocks the people of their time. We celebrate Lenny Bruce not for his tragically short life, or even funny humor, but because he demanded that his art be heard despite official censorship. Burroughs (W.S.) had his book, Naked Lunch, banned in much of the United States for its explicit content, including homosexuality, yet it is often considered one of the best works of the 20th century. While it seems quaint today, Rites of Spring caused outrage and protests (if not quite causing the riot that some state happened) when it was first performed. I note this only because it is easy to be outraged and demand the removal of things you don't agree with because they offend the orthodoxy (whatever that might be) of the time, but it is never clear what that propriety might be- certainly we can't definitively state what it will be in the future.
Finally, the text/author issue can always run into the "Air Supply problem". Let me explain- once, a long time ago, I had a group of friends ... snarky, snarky friends. And every now and then, we would listen to Air Supply ("I'm all out love" etc.) because we thought it was hilarious. We enjoyed Air Supply ... but in an ironic fashion. We would talk about how, "Air Supply is the greatest band ever," and "They should re-name the Grammies, the Airies" and so on. One of our friends, Jason, would always listen to Air Supply with us. Over a course of several months, we began to realize something with growing horror. Jason loved Air Supply. Jason wasn't enjoying Air Supply ironically ... quelle horreur ... Jason was just loving them! Jason was making his love for Air Supply, out of nothing at all! Air Supply was the one that he loved ...
Ugh, anyway, the Air Supply problem is just a version of Poe's Law. Sarcasm, parody, irony, black humor, and so on ... many times, a text will mean the opposite of what it appears to mean on the surface. For that matter, sometimes art will traffic in problematic tropes in order to dispel them; is American History X a racist, or anti-racist film? Is Fight Club fascist or a send-up of hypermasculinity? Does Tropic Thunder traffic in blackface and ableist tropes for jokes, or mock the way Hollywood and actors exploit these tropes (or both)? Is Spinal Tap misogynistic (Big Bottoms) or mocking misogyny in rock music? Is Showgirls a masterpiece of self-aware parody that forces the viewer to confront the sins of capitalism, or leering misogynistic trash? And what do you do with Blazing Saddles? I don't have the answers to those questions, but they are worth asking.
And the reason that those questions are worth asking is because you often end up with a fundamental divide. There are those for whom the only measure that matters is the offense caused. For others, the proper measure is the intent to cause offense. The author's intent ... the text itself ... these are often intertwined within these conversations. Any work that employs satire, irony, or sarcasm in a proper and correct fashion requires that some portion of the audience be confused, or even hurt, by the work. Because ambiguity is not a bug, but the central feature of any work that plays with or invokes satire and irony. Simply put, the possibility that the audience can misunderstand the message is necessary to the proper conveyance of the message. This ambiguity is not a bug - it is the distinguishing feature.
D. There’s an old Chinese proverb: "Lies are like tigers, they are bad." I guess it’s more poetic in Mandarin.
A while back, I used to give to a particular charity. A friend asked me about it, saying, "Why do you give to that charity, Snarf? There are so many other more important things to give to!" And while I understood what they were saying, it didn't matter. This charity was important to me. And if I didn't do something, who would?
There is a great show called The Good Place and if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. It is rare to get so much philosophy in your sitcom. Anyway, one issue that they broached (without too many spoilers) is the interconnectedness of morality. Essentially, if we are on the hook, by our connections, for every possible bad thing ... then because the world is so inter-connected, we can't exist in the world without doing immoral acts. Too high-level? Okay, think of all the electronics you have purchased. Your iPhone or Android device. Your computer. Monitor. TV. Now, imagine being responsible for all the labor practices of not just the company that made it, but also all the subcontractors, and their subcontractors .... and so on. But wait, there's more! The shipping companies that brought it to you. The mining that got the rare elements for certain parts. The plastic bits that end up in the ocean (they don't get recycled). The oil companies that get the oil to make the plastic bits ... it gets overwhelming quickly. Every time you make the decision to purchase a cell phone, are you doing evil?
And it applies, in much the same way, when discussing some of the issues for the art and the artists. Do you want to show how much you disagree with Rowling's pubic stance by not purchasing the latest Harry Potter videogame? Well, what about the developers that made the game? If the company that is actually making the game inclusive, should they be punished because the original author has views you don't agree with? Should you boycott Batman because it contains both references to HP Lovecraft (Arkham) and has a storied connection to Frank Miller (who has issues of his own)?
That's where we get into the issue of individual and collective action. In this world, we want positive change to happen. And given that we live in a capitalist society, the best way to do that, many times, is to vote with our wallets. To not buy things we disapprove of, and to purchase things we approve of; moreover, to tell companies what we are doing. "I am not buying your products because they demean (this group)." The problem is that we are all hypocrites to greater or lesser degrees. We will campaign for the environment while driving an SUV or flying in a plane. We will bemoan the use of plastic bags in a store while remaining blissfully unaware of the uselessness of so-called recycling of plastic for the many, many plastic containers that hold the food we just bought. We will talk about this director or that singer being objectionable, solely because we aren't aware of what other artists have done.
.... and that's okay. In the end, we can only do what we believe to be right and correct. The perfect is the enemy of the good, and trying to be better in some things doesn't require being the best at everything. It does, at times, require patience for the way that other people view the issues.
There are Harry Potter fans that still like the Potterverse while not appreciating Rowling, while there are those that cannot separate the two. There are those that can still love listening to Billie Jean or Thriller, while not appreciating what Michael Jackson did - and those that can't listen to his music at all. There are people that can still read and appreciate Mists of Avalon, and others that are unable to.
No approach is incorrect. Well, except those that would argue that because they like something, they are going to die on the hill of defending the author. It's one thing to say that you enjoy the spare prose of Hemmingway (a style I clearly do not aspire to), it's another to say that he was a moral exemplar in life because you like his writing.
E. Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion man.
D&D was created from a specific place and time- 70s America. Because of that, early D&D necessarily contains artifacts that are of its time; whether it is the "cheesecake" art that made the game less welcoming to women, or the causal exoticism of the other (such as descriptions of cannibals and savages in certain areas), or the gender-based maximum ability scores. Today, D&D (and 5e) incorporates a much wider range of influences while retaining links to the past of the game. We continue to struggle with what aspects of D&D are necessary to maintain that continuity (to make it "D&D") and what aspects are necessary to throw into the dustbin of history.
I've observed this play out in four different "types" of debates here which I would contrast, but which all have similarities and are tied into the VERY LONG PROLOGUE above. The first is on "race" in D&D (or the continuing use of alignment, or should we kill orcs, etc.). The second is on the continuing use of Cthulhu tropes, but would apply to the continued use of anything that was derived from a questionable source. The third debate that keeps returning is regarding the continued presence of legacy products in D&D- as we see because of their presence on DriveThruRPG. The fourth, and most recent debate, is about the honest assessment of the people, such as Gygax, who first made D&D. I think that it is worth examining all four issues, because they are different and arguably call for different approaches.
1. For race we had the issue that while it was not intended to be offensive at the beginning, it is increasingly seen as anachronistic. I would say that, IMO, D&D has traditionally been very inclusive in terms of making humanity a monolithic single race. That said, even the term "race" can easily rankle today, and combining it with static bonuses and the like (all of a "race" is the same) can reinforce stereotypes, however unwittingly. I can understand a desire to move away from that term and game usage, and changing it to species is certainly something that shouldn't be controversial.
(I would add that while I am using 'race' as a proxy, this applies to all the conversations about the desirability of certain aspects of D&D, like alignment, or killing humanoids, that have a history with the game but are increasingly viewed unfavorably.)
As a general rule, it is my opinion that the game can, and should, evolve when it comes to the rules of the game. People can do whatever they want to in their own games, of course, and always play past editions if that's what they really want ... but the idea that "we've always done this, so we must always do this," usually is a poor argument, and would mean that we would still be playing with cheesecake art and gendered ability maximums. Change is a part of life, and I think that everyone wants D&D to live.
2. On the other hand, I would disagree with those who would argue for removing any possible reference to the Cthulhu mythos, root and branch, from D&D as I have seen argued before. Not only because it would cause interminable squabbles as to what it is (what aberrations and other aspects of cosmic horror are we to remove?), but also because there are times when you can remove the creation from the creator; are we to edit the movie Apocalypse Now because it contains a snippet of Die Walkure and Wagner could be a nasty piece of work?
As a general rule, it is my opinion that if the problem is because there has been some incorporation at some point, and the original creator is 'problematic,' but the actual material within the game is fine, I wouldn't worry about it. Everyone has a different tolerance for things, and I cannot speak for everyone, but I prefer to focus on the actual material used in play and ensuring that it is of the highest quality.
3. Then there are the recurrent conversations about the legacy material in D&D. We've seen this with, inter alia, Oriental Adventures, GAZ10, and many other older works. This renewed emphasis comes primarily because these works are now available; as hard as it might be for some people to believe, for long periods of time (both pre-internet, and before WOTC agreed to allow their catalog to be available) you simply couldn't just get a digital copy of these works.
As a general rule, it is my opinion that for legacy products you provide an appropriate disclaimer, and otherwise let it be. Products are, for better and for worse, a product of their time. If a product is to be re-released (to 5e, for example), then it should be updated. But otherwise, people should see the original just like it was, and marvel at it in much the same way that people might be perusing youtube and stumble on Into the Night by Benny Mardones and say to themselves, "What ... the ... actual .... H... E.... DOUBLE HOCKEY STICKS?????"
4. Finally, there is the "Gygax" debate. What do you do when something you love (OD&D, AD&D, Greyhawk) were created by someone that had attitudes that were, at best, of his time? Well, I can't speak for everyone. For me, I think the only proper thing to do is to acknowledge it. Yes, Gygax had views that were misogynistic, and he continued to state those views into the 2000s. There is also evidence in the material- from the harlots table, to the Good Wife, to the gendered ability caps... it's there. This is a matter of historical fact, and sunlight is the best disinfectant. We can, and should, acknowledge these things. Importantly, by acknowledging these things, and being aware of them, you can then approach the material with better judgment. I still run AD&D on occasion, but when I do I make sure not to incorporate some of the elements that I believe shouldn't be in there- like the gendered ability caps, or the harlot table. And while I love my old books, I also know that the cheesecake art isn't welcoming to female gamers and I make sure to use a neutral rules system for the table for reference that doesn't include that. Most importantly, I try to make sure that I can separate my love of the work with the historically accurate criticism of the person; when people say that Gygax had some sexist attitudes, I recognize that this is a statement that isn't about me, and doesn't attack me as a person. I can still appreciate the things that I loved about those early D&D books while still understanding that they had issues. In short, it's a problematic fave. But I certainly won't defend sexist tropes just because I happen to like the 1e illusionist and arcane rules debates.
In short, I think that these conversations are hard, but necessary, and there isn't a categorical imperative on most of these issues. We should be striving to be better, but cognizant of the complexity of these issues. But hey, maybe I'm wrong.
This is where I'm throwing it out for discussion. Please keep the discussion focused on D&D.
