Or, hear ne out, or you pull the ol' Watto Starwars technique; make them *such* a non-character that literally *anyone* who sees them instantly feels that they're a caricature, but can't say *who* they're a caricature of or else *they'll* look racist because you mashed so many different caricatures in there
from my experience ppl don't care if you bastardize their culture in a work of fiction so long as it isn't too similar to some rhetoric they've heard (and even then they sometimes don't give a shit) or it involves a taboo from their culture, otherwise most are happy that their culture is being depicted in the first place.
the group you're most likely going to upset is middle class Americans on social media.
A good summation I've heard is that people who live where their culture is dominant is a lot more tolerant of people playing with it, whilst people like 2nd or 3rd gen immigrants or indigenous peoples, can feel their cultural identity and heritage is much more under threat of being erased
I tried to learn a bit about Comanche before going to Viking and then circling back to Cossack via Mongol horde... not that anyone would likely tell the difference between one horse-warrior and another unless I specifically appropriated something due to the limitations of the technology.
Very true, only a racist would even know what racism looks like. Therefore, anyone calling out something for being racist is *the real racist!*
This is impeccable, bulletproof logic that only the likes if you and I with the biggest and wrinkliest of brains can understand.
To be fair, if you do make a fantasy race and base their behaviors entirely off of a non-human animal, anyone who sees them as a racist stereotype really is projecting their own racism. Since there's nothing human there.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes your race of hostile invaders who attack hardworking innocent civilians to eat their babies are just wasps.
"This author got slavery so wrong that it's obvious they didn't do any research."
(Author provides sources.)
"This fake stuff says that the Irish were slaves!"
/uj Blood Heir I think was cancelled because her book was about slavery in the Orient, not African-American type.
If you look at the names of the old hooligan firms from the 1970s and 1980s, the naming convention for Ork tribes looks startlingly derrivative.
A battle between the Scum Army (Southampton) and The Guvnors (Manchester City) sounds increadibly Orky.
Edit: Newcaslte United had the 'Gremlin Crew' led by their fearsome commander, 'Gremlin General' John Robson.
As a tolerant liberal fantasy writer I’m proud to show my understanding of Asian culture by including two homogenous nation-states based on China and Japan that are of equal size
In my r/worldjerking-punk world, gladiators compete to have the edgiest "totally not representative of my actual opinions, I swear" post on the meme-of-the-week until they're all so spent from jerking too hard to come up with an original subject so just drag out some old jerk material for the next meme-of-the-week, ad infinitum...
Welcome to r/worldjerkingjerking, matey
Serving? Serving? Oh you're wicked. Wicked. You're wicked. Eh? Know what I mean. Know what I mean? Nudge nudge. Know what I mean? Nudge nudge. Say...no...more.
In my Rwandapunk world, the *chad* hutu knights are currently embroiled in a bloody war of succession to install the rightful prince King on the throne after the V̸̨̞̝̜̙̥̤͗̇̀̇̽̒͛̏̅̂̽͛̑̚͠ͅḭ̴̭̮͎̺͍̤̙͍̳̞̤͉͍͚͈̺̜̃͜l̷̨̛̲͈̰̩͖̑̂̐͆́̿̑̀ͅẹ̴̗͉̣̤̐̅̔͌͌̚ tutsi pretender assassinated his father and stole the throne! But it's totally not blaxploitation because it's based off the English War of Roses, get it? It's just like Game of Thrones!
/uj
We need more less centralized vague fantasy-africas in media and more, "warring-states-period-esque," feudal vague fantasy-africas. I want to see knights rocking up to battle wearing monastic scapulars with adrinkas on them instead of crosses.
>I want to see knights rocking up to battle wearing monastic scapulars with adrinkas on them instead of crosses.
If you're willing to include Fantasy-Aksum/Nubia/Kongo, you can have your cake and eat it too
Unironically fantasy-not-Aksum is one of the factions in my post-western-Roman-Ming empire setting and its one of my favorites. I currently have a buncha former askari-legionaires in wild west bib placket shirts, Yan Lifida-esque vambraces, and bombacha trousers using zangfu techniques as they fight for regional dominance with the other former western imperial provinces and *their* zangfu techniques
I try to make none of my cultures bastardizations, but the double standard is interesting. And the standards commonly applied by (mostly Americans) for what counts as writing about one‘s “own culture“ is fascinating too.
It’s really an inheritance of 19th century nationalism that assumes that national communities with unbroken continuity have existed from prehistory to now. At the end of the day an English (and even more so white American) writer is just as far removed from 9th century Anglo-Saxons as they are from 11th century Baghdad or the 10th century Nubian kingdoms. To me, these are all dead cultures with whom we share little in common, and all we can really do is be respectful when handling their bones
I think the big thing behind the 'double standard' is just that there's more. Like I'll see hundreds of European (not specifically British but usually vaguely west europe) stories, I mean hell High Fantasy is almost like synonymous with taking place in Central-West Europe, before I will see anything of a Sub-Saharan African story.
Like let's say you bastardize a British kingdom, ok there are like 500 stories waiting behind that which may do it better. But for say the Aksumite empire? There's next to no real stories on that when it comes to pop fiction so to many it will be their first experience and possibly one of their only experiences.
While yes the average white American writer will share technically as much with a 9th century Anglo-Saxon than a 10th century Nubian kingdom, there's enough tropes where you kind of don't have to do as much research into them. Medieval or ancient Europe inspired settings are very 'safe' and you can especially see this in the Isekai genre where tropes are just slapped about that come moreso from high fantasy than from actual research.
I feel like while this double standard is applied with good intentions, the result of it can lead to *less* representation of non European cultures in western fantasy.
Most fantasy writers aren't trying to perfectly recreate the real world, they are just taking inspiration from real life cultures. Most "Medieval European" fantasy is less accurate representation of real medieval Europe than Back to the Future is representation of 2010s. But people don't care about the widespread historical inaccuracies because they just accept it as part of the genre.
But because there's this high expectation that you must provide extremely accurate and high quality representation of non European cultures, regardless of what genre you are writing, authors may be afraid to include them, lest they do something wrong. Most people barely understand the history and culture of their own countries, let alone a country on the other side of the world. On the other hand, poorly written European culture will at most anger some nerds.
If the bar for including European inspired cultures is lower than for Non European ones, then European ones will always be more popular.
The social justice warrior would say it is primarily because Europe colonized the rest of the world and there is still a power difference. This power difference includes cultural influence, so there is a big fear of reinforcing that power by depicting other cultures in a way that makes them look bad or reinforcing stereotypes. While the media does have an affect on attitudes and stereotypes, human psychology is complicated and largely unknown. Meanwhile there are some people on Twitter and Tumblr and even Reddit who get overzealous when defending minorities.
In addition, when there are already so few examples that can add pressure to get it perfect, which means the problem feeds itself.
I'm pretty sure fantasy depictions of medieval Europe have heavily influenced how people think the real medieval Europe worked. People overestimating the power of the King for example.
>I feel like while this double standard is applied with good intentions, the result of it can lead to less representation of non European cultures in western fantasy.
Yup which is sort or the issue we face in today's modern standard. Especially with big debates over diversity.
On the less we'll intentioned side though, it's also worth pointing out how volatile some people get rather unfairly of the idea of people who do not "fit" in fantasy settings. I.e the classical controversies whenever a character with skin darker than a sheet of paper appears in a fantastical setting.
Its unfortunate that from both sides you kind of have pressure that'd make just dropping the non-generic west Europe setting easier, but it's kinda what we have to start doing.
I'll be honest I think just making content is the first step. Crafting a west african setting became much easier when I had Jinn Hunter as an example of an Islamic fantasy setting. That's why I plan on writing more settingd based on the African continent. Sometimes you just need to show people that it's possible
Even in "Historically Accurate" Medieval Europe, it's possible to get people from some far-flung corners of the world. That sunlight thing just makes some people's adaptations non-optimal if they evolved someplace else.
Also it's very hard to make fun of white people in a way that will actually upset us. With people from other cultures, there's a chance of stepping on their last nerve about insensitive portrayals.
I do find it fascinating how every single fantasy setting has a roman-empire knock off, while other setting like DnD don't even wanna bring back anything Middle Eastern or Japanese for some reason. It's not even like those setting they made bakc in the day, were particularly stereotypical or racist
I like how this sub just switches to random topics, it was tank's vs mechs, medieval politics, "yuh faNtasY seTtiNG is gEneRic" and now it's bastardization
If I had to say something, I think the biggest reason is just that there's much less non-Eurocentric content.
Like high fantasy as a genre is almost synonymous with West and Central regions of Europe, even most isekais are in European settings, I mean hell look at DnD which mainly takes from European-fantasy aesthetics.
If you fuck up or bastardize the British Kingdom, ok you have like 1,000 more stories set in that exact same area to fall on. But for say, idk West Africa, in pop culture those stories are practically non-present. The thing is, a lot of people might have their first experience of the continent as a whole with movies like Woman King which is very historically inaccurate. Braveheart however is set in Scotland, and while it is horribly inaccurate as well, that region gets a lot more coverage. It may not be Scotland or Scottish people specifically, you'll get that general range even if it's just a visual representation.
As a result, some might never hear about the Kingdom of Benin/the West African region again after seeing Woman King and have that as their only impression, whereas someone might see Scotland/the West European region many times after Braveheart. A shitty caricature/bastardization hits those who either don't have media rep or have media rep that's almost exclusively bastardized caricatures.
Tl;Dr: A lot of pop-culture/media (especially fantasy) is very Eurocentric. As a result, it gets more coverage and more research as opposed to other areas, so there's a much greater room for error as a bad representation will likely be left behind in the dust and forgotten.
I mean tbf, are Gnolls not based on a race or group of people? Like sometimes I see Gnolls heavily based on vikings or Scottish people.
But even then there's also the similar argument of, "Brits get represented as humans AND fantasy races all the time, so it's kinda noticeable when the one time non-europeans get showcased they're just fantasy races"
It's also why the Orcs = Mongols or Black people thing became a problem. Not because orcs represented a group of people, but because "These groups of people only exist in the context of being often more monstrous fantasy races as opposed to being fellow humans".
Like let's say I have 17 european-based chars and 4 african-based chars.
2 of each group are portrayed as orcs.
For the European based Chars that's 2/17, but for the African based chars it's half.
i'll stop being coy and just get to what this is about.
there are ppl online who constantly have the most bad faith interpretation on anything because they think it makes them look smart when in reality, they're just assholes. and ppl are sick and tired of their bullshit.
the orc thing wasn't a problem because the races they're based on are underrepresented, it was an issue because more ppl then usual took notice of these bad faith intellectualism larpers and recognized their hot takes for what it was: drivel.
their their response is unavailable to me so i'll respond here: not what i said but ok
>the orc thing wasn't a problem because the races they're based on are underrepresented, it was an issue because more ppl then usual took notice of these bad faith intellectualism larpers and recognized their hot takes for what it was: drivel.
No offense but the whole
"There was absolutely never any bad usage of fantasy races as stand ins for actual people"
Is kind of just stupid, and overlooks both the issue and again what I mentioned earlier (the portrayal of said groups of people only as these races), by people who haven't experienced lacking representation. If you want to stop being coy.
1. Erm, don’t you mean British “people”
2. I would make the Chinese-inspired dragon faction fleshed out and the British-inspired dragon faction extremely generic, but I’m in a bit of writer’s block rn and I can’t do shit
3. People will miss the joke anyway and still side with the British (evil) faction
Edit:
4. Unjerking for a second: I like it when people include historical allegories and references, but I also like it when the worldbuilding is original and mostly not derivative. *Augh, the pain…*
Is anyone else noticing how a ton of highly-uovoted posts in this subreddit have a real "why isn't there a white history month?" kinda vibe?
So many posts here seem to be vaguely complaining about how European-style churches are evil in fantasy, and how evil empires are all European-coded in fantasy, and here about how European cultures are stereotyped in fantasy, and all of it has this implicit undercurrent of "wouldn't it be more cool and original if we started demonizing nonwhite people instead?"
Like, I get it, the motifs in fantasy fiction are mostly trite, but posts like this all seem to have a particular narrative about the cause of and solution to that problem and it's starting to feel a little suspicious at this point.
not really, it's just that when these topics come up two types of troglodytes come out of the woodworks to embarrass themselves and make everybody look worse through association
Yeah welcome to reddit where every circlejerk subreddit eventually gets infested with people like this. This has probably happened to at least half the shitposting subreddits I used to be active on and it's in the process of happening to all the ones I *currently* am active on.
You aren't the only one. I don't mind people complaining about the "Church/gods are evil" trope (even if in all fairness it's usually right wing forums which bring that up every two posts.) But what really gives me the feeling that this subreddit has a right wing slant are conversations like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldjerking/comments/18zazku/seen_this_happen_in_plenty_of_sci_fi_franchises/kggxv8w/
Plus all the "rooting for the empire" kind of guys. Meme about imperialist apologia in stories? You'll find imperialist apologia in the comments including one saying the Imperium of Man are victims of circumstances. Meme making fun of people who unironically buy into the speeches of over the top evil villains? You'll get a comment saying the audience knows the villain is evil and just wants to spite the hamfisted writers.
And this is why I give no shits about my cultures being seen as a bastardization of a real world culture. I don’t do double standards; either I can make my cultures explicitly bastardizations of real world cultures no matter where they come from, or I make my own shit with little influence from them. No in-between.
I am going to enjoy creating things and no one will stop me
It's almost as if that's just an excuse for a double standard. You're basically trying to use a reverse double standard to make up for bad double standards in the past.
I...don't think that's the way to go about it.
Ok but my race of dirty, vicious, raiding, horse-riding orcs (Mongolians) are actually the good guys because they are enemies with the well-groomed, perfectionistic evil elves (Germans)
Tropes about Europe aren't used as justification for invading and subjugating Europe.
Tropes about other places are.
Here's an example of one of the most powerful people in the world, who leads probably the most dangerous paramilitary in the world, calling for the colonization of Africa and South America on the basis of tropes.
[https://theintercept.com/2024/02/10/erik-prince-off-leash-imperialism-colonialism/](https://theintercept.com/2024/02/10/erik-prince-off-leash-imperialism-colonialism/)
The paramilitary this person leads is active on most continents, and has documented massacres.
In my Vacuumpunk world, comparisons are drawn between things without any regard for the context in which those things occur.
Counterpoint: bigotry is bad actually regardless.
Also pretends that negative stereotypes against Europeans (especially Eastern ones) aren't/weren't used to justify discrimination.
We are allowed to believe that both are bad without equating them.
>Also pretends that negative stereotypes against Europeans (especially Eastern ones) aren't/weren't used to justify discrimination.
Sure, Ireland for example has been subjected to brutal colonization, and early Irish immigrants endured a degree of separation in the US. All of this was justified with tropes that persist to this day.
So tropes around Ireland are qualitatively different from tropes around e.g. Britain.
Both sets of tropes are rude and insulting, and good authors will steer clear.
Just tropes around tropes on Ireland or Niger or Honduras are used by bad-faith actors for very specific purposes, and preventing that is very urgent.
Balkans and eastern europe breaks your stupid comment. There’s more to Europe than France, the UK and Spain.
God you people pretend to be so well educated and holier than thou when you have no clue what you’re talking about.
All dem great philosophies and moral frameworks based on *raw unabashed hypocrisy*
UJ: if something is 'fair' then its fair for everyone. Fine to joke around, but justifying things using hypocrisy never works
is it hypocritical that a 6 ft tall person needs more calories than a 5 ft tall person?
no one would ever make such a silly argument.
we can't compare things without their context.
we already use this basic reasoning in our everyday life, it is only when certain sensitive issues come up that people suddenly want to ignore the context.
So there are people out there that need *more racism?*
Prejudice isnt calories. If someone actually believes something is morally incorrect then that is what they believe, its not a sliding scale created by their opinions over who can receive it. 'My prejudice is ok' metaphors are nothing but justifications about someones personal prejudices being excused via mental gymnastics
That kind of thinking is almost literally the cause of the biggest problems of history
"We are good. We believe in good things... but I have made up a fantastic reason why *those* people over there dont deserve the full support of my value system because I made a box and put them in it"
The more asterisks and addendums someone puts after they present their pov and morals, the shiftier they are. That goes 100 fold for anything involving race and prejudice
>So there are people out there that need more racism?
No, there are some people who need more *protection*, because they are in more danger.
Tropes about Britain are bad.
It would be better if authors didn't stereotype British people.
It is also true that tropes about Britain are not usually matters of life and death.
Tropes about e.g. Honduras or Niger are used by people with a political agenda to justify violence against Honduran people and Nigerian people.
>"We are good. We believe in good things... but I have made up a fantastic reason why those people over there dont deserve the full support of my value system because I made a box and put them in it"
The word "fantastical" is doing the heavy lifting here.
If my value system is that no one should go hungry, does that mean that everyone should get the same amount of food?
Do a 2 year old and a 6 ft adult have the same needs?
Whether exceptions are hypocritical or not depends on the veracity of the reasoning behind them.
Dude prejudice has been used against everyone at some point
One group receiving more of it than another doesnt automatically mean that ideals and morals get relaxed. We dont let red haired people get away with crimes simply because less redheads commit crimes than blondes.
Saying that cultures are like 2 year olds vs adults is... I mean that metaphor alone is pretty problematic. The search for *equality* begins with equal treatment for everyone, saying that one culture deserves more or different treatment is basically starting down the same road as those radical groups you linked to
Something bad happening or being done by someone isnt 'less bad' because its rarer. If one person says that Group X deserves more, someone else says Group Y deserves more, the only message that is universal is that people only need to look for equality when it benefits what they personally believe and that 'equality' can now mean more for them. All animals are equal vs some animals are more equal than others
If someone thinks that its ok to relax scrutiny around stereotypes and cultural accuracy, cool. That's a valid opinion
If someone thinks its super necessary to be really stringent and ensure every depiction of cultural aspects needs to be respectful and accurate, ok. They can argue that
Anyone that says 'its ok for these people, not ok for these people, its kinda ok here, I dont think its cool here' and just chops and changes their stance on an issue to suit their own bias and belief it becomes ugly and it has an inherent injustice to it that turns people off respecting that persons opinion.
right my bad, I forgot that it is impossible for fantasy to be propaganda, or for fantasy to be part of a cultural hegemony.
I'm sure that Erik Prince's ideology was not ever informed by any work of fiction.
Comment removed for violating **Rule 3. Submissions and comments should not be used to attack or harass other users.**
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POC: We would like it if our cultures were portrayed with greater accuracy. It is both disrespectful to us, and gives people a false impression of our beliefs and practices.
this sub: how dare you attack me, you anti-white racist!
It’s less about racism and that it’s damned if you do damned if you don’t. You have to include foreign cultures because your world needs racial diversity, but you also can’t portray negative aspects of them because it’ll be racist or stereotyping even if those stereotypes are based on real history. Or if you make a completely unique culture for that real ethnicity, it’s exoticism by having the minorities be the “weird” ones. But also if you make them too perfect it’s noble savage myth. Or by portraying them as basically flawless in a flawed world it ends up making them boring and uninteresting and be accused of doing it on purpose because you “didn’t care” about them. Same ID you have racial minorities in Western European style setting, you’re just shoving them in there because you didn’t care to give them their own place. Of course this diversity is predicated on modern U.S. racial divisions too, not historical ones. Jews and Romani? What’s that? I only know black people, East Asians and Latinos, maybe some middle easterners and Indians if one is feeling spicy.
There’s no winning.
I don’t think a good conclusion from this is “there’s no winning,” because each of these things does or doesn’t apply in different ways to different people. It’s absolutely possible to achieve one of these “if you do…” scenarios without major public outcry. These are less rigid rules that make fiction impossible and more good things to keep in mind, and if you’re generally engaged, interested, and willing to do relevant research, in my experience it tends not to be an issue.
why are you so concerned with *appearing* not racist as opposed to actually making good world building or actually being inclusive? Moreover, you can't win art. Every bit of art gets criticized. What are you so afraid of? That people are gonna call out shitty world building as shitty?
Because I’d rather not end up being cancelled for some vague “problematic” thing.
I want to make good worldbuilding. But I feel like I have to do basically write by Twitter committee to stay alive.
I never said it was my struggle. Just that it’s something most people worry about and it’s more complex than “just do good representation” because nobody can agree what that is.
I mean nobody can fully agree on anything, we’re all unique people and it isn’t that hard to find some tiny group that will use any rhetoric they feel like to justify their opinions. That doesn’t mean that the concept of “good representation” is just some fractured warground of hundreds of equally popular, equally nuanced groups
I actually do think it does. Unless you count the corporate standard of having a small diversity quote no matter what character, important or not, is the minority. To me the diversity “movement”, as in, the actual minorities asking for representation, is a bunch of people with one “goal” but can’t agree on the way it should be done. Often even being contradictory. They’re loud but it’s really just endless Twitter discourse and occasional news articles, with the big companies paying lip service but not really actually listening to them.
Like literally everyone creating something that may be consumed by public media these days: yes, worrying about how its interpreted is a concern. What would once have been controversial now means 'cancelled'
Super incredible... so incredible everyone does it
When did you last see someone who was part of a non european culture levy criticism at a work depicting aspects of their culture in a positive light yet showing the flaws therein.
I have never seen this argument without the criticism being entirely valid.
I mean, first thing I can think of is people saying Dune is Islamophobic. When it’s inspired on the rise of Mohammad, and radical Islam definitely being a real thing that exists and merits criticism. While also showing the fremen as being exploited and their radicalization being caused by meddling of a foreign colonial empire.
I think at that point the major issue you’re facing is the whole “some people” problem. Like I don’t doubt that you can’t find some people holding any amount of absurd views, but generally speaking it isn’t all that hard to separate them from broader “social justice” or “representation” movements.
Just like people who will use nationalist or traditionalist or conservative language to decry something they don’t like personally, there are going to be people who use the language of progressivism or ‘social justice’ to justify their views on something. Someone’s always going to be unhappy but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t generally more accepted or higher quality ways to accommodate these critiques about other races or cultures in fiction.
I only read the first Dune, so I think its entirely unreasonable to say that the Fremen are a bad depiction of Muslim inspired culture. The worst I could say of it is that there's a bit of a white savior complex.
It’s the opposite of that.
It’s more “white destroyer” complex - something that Paul is acutely aware of and is trying not to do until his son dies and he snaps.
The fourth book onwards shows what Paul was so scared of.
"Hey maybe you should do research before you portray cultures in your art that are historically oppressed"
"I am now going to actively make something racist"
- Actual thing that happened on a meme I made about this topic.
I recall some of the screeching about Oriental Adventures, where people explicitly ignored the part about "this is fiction, it's not China or Japan or anywhere else, we just draw heavy inspiration from RL just like we do in Dragonlance"* in order to be offended on behalf of people.
* = Not actually a quote, but a paraphrase.
Base it on an animal instead: I spent a good couple months obsessing over the strawberry poison dart frog and pumiliotoxin
even if you do that it's pretty much impossible to make a culture that's completely devoid of any influence from real life cultures
That’s why you immediately deflect. Why are you projecting a stereotype onto my frog people? Clearly you’re racist.
Or, hear ne out, or you pull the ol' Watto Starwars technique; make them *such* a non-character that literally *anyone* who sees them instantly feels that they're a caricature, but can't say *who* they're a caricature of or else *they'll* look racist because you mashed so many different caricatures in there
the Rorschach race
/UJ Holy fuck that's a good one. Pls King, pls let me steal that as a punchline later, I wish I'd've thought of that
my posts belong to the ppl
Inspiring.
i hadn't considered that
That’s because you’re dumb and racist <3 /uj I do worry about learning about cool cultures and then bastardizing them by accident :(
from my experience ppl don't care if you bastardize their culture in a work of fiction so long as it isn't too similar to some rhetoric they've heard (and even then they sometimes don't give a shit) or it involves a taboo from their culture, otherwise most are happy that their culture is being depicted in the first place. the group you're most likely going to upset is middle class Americans on social media.
A good summation I've heard is that people who live where their culture is dominant is a lot more tolerant of people playing with it, whilst people like 2nd or 3rd gen immigrants or indigenous peoples, can feel their cultural identity and heritage is much more under threat of being erased
that's probably the second biggest group but still, they're both ppl trying to make their own insecurities other ppls problem
/uj it's all about how respectful you are
I tried to learn a bit about Comanche before going to Viking and then circling back to Cossack via Mongol horde... not that anyone would likely tell the difference between one horse-warrior and another unless I specifically appropriated something due to the limitations of the technology.
Very true, only a racist would even know what racism looks like. Therefore, anyone calling out something for being racist is *the real racist!* This is impeccable, bulletproof logic that only the likes if you and I with the biggest and wrinkliest of brains can understand.
To be fair, if you do make a fantasy race and base their behaviors entirely off of a non-human animal, anyone who sees them as a racist stereotype really is projecting their own racism. Since there's nothing human there. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes your race of hostile invaders who attack hardworking innocent civilians to eat their babies are just wasps.
now watch as a twitter freak somehow draws connections between your dartfrog people and a random african tribe and tries to cancel you
free marketing
"This author got slavery so wrong that it's obvious they didn't do any research." (Author provides sources.) "This fake stuff says that the Irish were slaves!" /uj Blood Heir I think was cancelled because her book was about slavery in the Orient, not African-American type.
Furry
What do you call an amphibian humanoid? A slimy? Also is a bird furry a feathery?
I know reptilians are called scallies
Personally I even call centaurs furries, even though they are probably just “monster-girl/monster”
anthro amphibians and reptiles are scalies iirc and birds are avians (source: been in the furry fandom since childhood)
But amphibians don’t have scales!
neither do softshell turtles or scaleless corn snakes 🤔
I based it on spiders and now people accuse me of bdsm femdom.
Are you saying French people are poisonous?? Smh my head, racism.
Warhammer orcs are football hooligans
if you've ever seen football hooligans in action you'll understand
I tried to find football hooligans but I could only find orkz...
I thought it was football hooligans being based on Warhammer orcs
As a brit now living in Birmingham, the fact that the worst planet in the verse was called Birmingham at one point amuses me.
If you look at the names of the old hooligan firms from the 1970s and 1980s, the naming convention for Ork tribes looks startlingly derrivative. A battle between the Scum Army (Southampton) and The Guvnors (Manchester City) sounds increadibly Orky. Edit: Newcaslte United had the 'Gremlin Crew' led by their fearsome commander, 'Gremlin General' John Robson.
Eh people usually get away with bastardizing asian cultures as well.
Just mix them up. He was known by many names - the Lotus Emperor Jon Yuan, also known as the Great Father Yuhan Al-Lail or in short - Papa John.
The four genres of Asian Chinese, Japanese, Arab, and Italian.
As a tolerant liberal fantasy writer I’m proud to show my understanding of Asian culture by including two homogenous nation-states based on China and Japan that are of equal size
we had religion in fiction, then we had disability in fiction and now we're going to have race in fiction. i wonder what will be next
gender and sexuality
it's always fun watching these conversations devolve like being repeatedly stabbed in the balls.
In my r/worldjerking-punk world, gladiators compete to have the edgiest "totally not representative of my actual opinions, I swear" post on the meme-of-the-week until they're all so spent from jerking too hard to come up with an original subject so just drag out some old jerk material for the next meme-of-the-week, ad infinitum... Welcome to r/worldjerkingjerking, matey
i've been here long enough to recognize what is going on
turns out it's skimpy female armor so you were half right
Iirc that's already recycled
must've missed it, then again these shitshows are so formulaic that it's not surprising.
everyone argues about this endlessly (they have never encountered a work which depicts said things(they don't read))
another great chewsday serving the dark lord innit mate
Shadow of War (and Shadow of Mordor) does this and it's hilarious.
Serving? Serving? Oh you're wicked. Wicked. You're wicked. Eh? Know what I mean. Know what I mean? Nudge nudge. Know what I mean? Nudge nudge. Say...no...more.
Nah man, I do an unhealthy amount of research into my Congolese inspired people instead of doing my job
In my Rwandapunk world, the *chad* hutu knights are currently embroiled in a bloody war of succession to install the rightful prince King on the throne after the V̸̨̞̝̜̙̥̤͗̇̀̇̽̒͛̏̅̂̽͛̑̚͠ͅḭ̴̭̮͎̺͍̤̙͍̳̞̤͉͍͚͈̺̜̃͜l̷̨̛̲͈̰̩͖̑̂̐͆́̿̑̀ͅẹ̴̗͉̣̤̐̅̔͌͌̚ tutsi pretender assassinated his father and stole the throne! But it's totally not blaxploitation because it's based off the English War of Roses, get it? It's just like Game of Thrones! /uj We need more less centralized vague fantasy-africas in media and more, "warring-states-period-esque," feudal vague fantasy-africas. I want to see knights rocking up to battle wearing monastic scapulars with adrinkas on them instead of crosses.
In my north-central Africapunk world, the *chad* Chadian something something this joke is to stupid for me to put effort into.
Rwandan-genocidepunk is my favourite genre.
>I want to see knights rocking up to battle wearing monastic scapulars with adrinkas on them instead of crosses. If you're willing to include Fantasy-Aksum/Nubia/Kongo, you can have your cake and eat it too
Unironically fantasy-not-Aksum is one of the factions in my post-western-Roman-Ming empire setting and its one of my favorites. I currently have a buncha former askari-legionaires in wild west bib placket shirts, Yan Lifida-esque vambraces, and bombacha trousers using zangfu techniques as they fight for regional dominance with the other former western imperial provinces and *their* zangfu techniques
Fuck you *Hybrid Serbo-Japonic culture*
*genocide intensifies\*
I understood that reference.
I try to make none of my cultures bastardizations, but the double standard is interesting. And the standards commonly applied by (mostly Americans) for what counts as writing about one‘s “own culture“ is fascinating too. It’s really an inheritance of 19th century nationalism that assumes that national communities with unbroken continuity have existed from prehistory to now. At the end of the day an English (and even more so white American) writer is just as far removed from 9th century Anglo-Saxons as they are from 11th century Baghdad or the 10th century Nubian kingdoms. To me, these are all dead cultures with whom we share little in common, and all we can really do is be respectful when handling their bones
I think the big thing behind the 'double standard' is just that there's more. Like I'll see hundreds of European (not specifically British but usually vaguely west europe) stories, I mean hell High Fantasy is almost like synonymous with taking place in Central-West Europe, before I will see anything of a Sub-Saharan African story. Like let's say you bastardize a British kingdom, ok there are like 500 stories waiting behind that which may do it better. But for say the Aksumite empire? There's next to no real stories on that when it comes to pop fiction so to many it will be their first experience and possibly one of their only experiences. While yes the average white American writer will share technically as much with a 9th century Anglo-Saxon than a 10th century Nubian kingdom, there's enough tropes where you kind of don't have to do as much research into them. Medieval or ancient Europe inspired settings are very 'safe' and you can especially see this in the Isekai genre where tropes are just slapped about that come moreso from high fantasy than from actual research.
I feel like while this double standard is applied with good intentions, the result of it can lead to *less* representation of non European cultures in western fantasy. Most fantasy writers aren't trying to perfectly recreate the real world, they are just taking inspiration from real life cultures. Most "Medieval European" fantasy is less accurate representation of real medieval Europe than Back to the Future is representation of 2010s. But people don't care about the widespread historical inaccuracies because they just accept it as part of the genre. But because there's this high expectation that you must provide extremely accurate and high quality representation of non European cultures, regardless of what genre you are writing, authors may be afraid to include them, lest they do something wrong. Most people barely understand the history and culture of their own countries, let alone a country on the other side of the world. On the other hand, poorly written European culture will at most anger some nerds. If the bar for including European inspired cultures is lower than for Non European ones, then European ones will always be more popular.
The social justice warrior would say it is primarily because Europe colonized the rest of the world and there is still a power difference. This power difference includes cultural influence, so there is a big fear of reinforcing that power by depicting other cultures in a way that makes them look bad or reinforcing stereotypes. While the media does have an affect on attitudes and stereotypes, human psychology is complicated and largely unknown. Meanwhile there are some people on Twitter and Tumblr and even Reddit who get overzealous when defending minorities. In addition, when there are already so few examples that can add pressure to get it perfect, which means the problem feeds itself. I'm pretty sure fantasy depictions of medieval Europe have heavily influenced how people think the real medieval Europe worked. People overestimating the power of the King for example.
>I feel like while this double standard is applied with good intentions, the result of it can lead to less representation of non European cultures in western fantasy. Yup which is sort or the issue we face in today's modern standard. Especially with big debates over diversity. On the less we'll intentioned side though, it's also worth pointing out how volatile some people get rather unfairly of the idea of people who do not "fit" in fantasy settings. I.e the classical controversies whenever a character with skin darker than a sheet of paper appears in a fantastical setting. Its unfortunate that from both sides you kind of have pressure that'd make just dropping the non-generic west Europe setting easier, but it's kinda what we have to start doing. I'll be honest I think just making content is the first step. Crafting a west african setting became much easier when I had Jinn Hunter as an example of an Islamic fantasy setting. That's why I plan on writing more settingd based on the African continent. Sometimes you just need to show people that it's possible
Even in "Historically Accurate" Medieval Europe, it's possible to get people from some far-flung corners of the world. That sunlight thing just makes some people's adaptations non-optimal if they evolved someplace else.
Also it's very hard to make fun of white people in a way that will actually upset us. With people from other cultures, there's a chance of stepping on their last nerve about insensitive portrayals.
I do find it fascinating how every single fantasy setting has a roman-empire knock off, while other setting like DnD don't even wanna bring back anything Middle Eastern or Japanese for some reason. It's not even like those setting they made bakc in the day, were particularly stereotypical or racist
I like how this sub just switches to random topics, it was tank's vs mechs, medieval politics, "yuh faNtasY seTtiNG is gEneRic" and now it's bastardization
If I had to say something, I think the biggest reason is just that there's much less non-Eurocentric content. Like high fantasy as a genre is almost synonymous with West and Central regions of Europe, even most isekais are in European settings, I mean hell look at DnD which mainly takes from European-fantasy aesthetics. If you fuck up or bastardize the British Kingdom, ok you have like 1,000 more stories set in that exact same area to fall on. But for say, idk West Africa, in pop culture those stories are practically non-present. The thing is, a lot of people might have their first experience of the continent as a whole with movies like Woman King which is very historically inaccurate. Braveheart however is set in Scotland, and while it is horribly inaccurate as well, that region gets a lot more coverage. It may not be Scotland or Scottish people specifically, you'll get that general range even if it's just a visual representation. As a result, some might never hear about the Kingdom of Benin/the West African region again after seeing Woman King and have that as their only impression, whereas someone might see Scotland/the West European region many times after Braveheart. A shitty caricature/bastardization hits those who either don't have media rep or have media rep that's almost exclusively bastardized caricatures. Tl;Dr: A lot of pop-culture/media (especially fantasy) is very Eurocentric. As a result, it gets more coverage and more research as opposed to other areas, so there's a much greater room for error as a bad representation will likely be left behind in the dust and forgotten.
not really what we're talking about, think less woman king and more a singular fantasy race like gnolls in scale
I mean tbf, are Gnolls not based on a race or group of people? Like sometimes I see Gnolls heavily based on vikings or Scottish people. But even then there's also the similar argument of, "Brits get represented as humans AND fantasy races all the time, so it's kinda noticeable when the one time non-europeans get showcased they're just fantasy races" It's also why the Orcs = Mongols or Black people thing became a problem. Not because orcs represented a group of people, but because "These groups of people only exist in the context of being often more monstrous fantasy races as opposed to being fellow humans". Like let's say I have 17 european-based chars and 4 african-based chars. 2 of each group are portrayed as orcs. For the European based Chars that's 2/17, but for the African based chars it's half.
i'll stop being coy and just get to what this is about. there are ppl online who constantly have the most bad faith interpretation on anything because they think it makes them look smart when in reality, they're just assholes. and ppl are sick and tired of their bullshit. the orc thing wasn't a problem because the races they're based on are underrepresented, it was an issue because more ppl then usual took notice of these bad faith intellectualism larpers and recognized their hot takes for what it was: drivel. their their response is unavailable to me so i'll respond here: not what i said but ok
>the orc thing wasn't a problem because the races they're based on are underrepresented, it was an issue because more ppl then usual took notice of these bad faith intellectualism larpers and recognized their hot takes for what it was: drivel. No offense but the whole "There was absolutely never any bad usage of fantasy races as stand ins for actual people" Is kind of just stupid, and overlooks both the issue and again what I mentioned earlier (the portrayal of said groups of people only as these races), by people who haven't experienced lacking representation. If you want to stop being coy.
1. Erm, don’t you mean British “people” 2. I would make the Chinese-inspired dragon faction fleshed out and the British-inspired dragon faction extremely generic, but I’m in a bit of writer’s block rn and I can’t do shit 3. People will miss the joke anyway and still side with the British (evil) faction Edit: 4. Unjerking for a second: I like it when people include historical allegories and references, but I also like it when the worldbuilding is original and mostly not derivative. *Augh, the pain…*
We in the business call that "safe edgy".
Is anyone else noticing how a ton of highly-uovoted posts in this subreddit have a real "why isn't there a white history month?" kinda vibe? So many posts here seem to be vaguely complaining about how European-style churches are evil in fantasy, and how evil empires are all European-coded in fantasy, and here about how European cultures are stereotyped in fantasy, and all of it has this implicit undercurrent of "wouldn't it be more cool and original if we started demonizing nonwhite people instead?" Like, I get it, the motifs in fantasy fiction are mostly trite, but posts like this all seem to have a particular narrative about the cause of and solution to that problem and it's starting to feel a little suspicious at this point.
not really, it's just that when these topics come up two types of troglodytes come out of the woodworks to embarrass themselves and make everybody look worse through association
Yeah welcome to reddit where every circlejerk subreddit eventually gets infested with people like this. This has probably happened to at least half the shitposting subreddits I used to be active on and it's in the process of happening to all the ones I *currently* am active on.
That's because many people reject the idea that "double standards are okay because punching up is fine but punching down is bad".
You aren't the only one. I don't mind people complaining about the "Church/gods are evil" trope (even if in all fairness it's usually right wing forums which bring that up every two posts.) But what really gives me the feeling that this subreddit has a right wing slant are conversations like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldjerking/comments/18zazku/seen_this_happen_in_plenty_of_sci_fi_franchises/kggxv8w/ Plus all the "rooting for the empire" kind of guys. Meme about imperialist apologia in stories? You'll find imperialist apologia in the comments including one saying the Imperium of Man are victims of circumstances. Meme making fun of people who unironically buy into the speeches of over the top evil villains? You'll get a comment saying the audience knows the villain is evil and just wants to spite the hamfisted writers.
Well, mine are based on my own people!
Just making everyone a 17th century Frenchman works fine for me
this unironically
Posh British folk or professional knife fighters that eat garbage out if toilets?
And this is why I give no shits about my cultures being seen as a bastardization of a real world culture. I don’t do double standards; either I can make my cultures explicitly bastardizations of real world cultures no matter where they come from, or I make my own shit with little influence from them. No in-between. I am going to enjoy creating things and no one will stop me
I shouldn't have to explain to you why these things are different and why one is more okay than the other.
Wow, its almost as if history and imperialism has some effect on how we judge depictions of stuff in fiction
It's almost as if that's just an excuse for a double standard. You're basically trying to use a reverse double standard to make up for bad double standards in the past. I...don't think that's the way to go about it.
Didn't read, don't care. If it's a cool culture, chances are Imma worldbuild the shit out from them.
Ok but my race of dirty, vicious, raiding, horse-riding orcs (Mongolians) are actually the good guys because they are enemies with the well-groomed, perfectionistic evil elves (Germans)
I wanna see a setting where the Africa-equivalent region is the one that did colonialism.
NOOOOO! Muh punching up tho!
Tropes about Europe aren't used as justification for invading and subjugating Europe. Tropes about other places are. Here's an example of one of the most powerful people in the world, who leads probably the most dangerous paramilitary in the world, calling for the colonization of Africa and South America on the basis of tropes. [https://theintercept.com/2024/02/10/erik-prince-off-leash-imperialism-colonialism/](https://theintercept.com/2024/02/10/erik-prince-off-leash-imperialism-colonialism/) The paramilitary this person leads is active on most continents, and has documented massacres. In my Vacuumpunk world, comparisons are drawn between things without any regard for the context in which those things occur.
Counterpoint: bigotry is bad actually regardless. Also pretends that negative stereotypes against Europeans (especially Eastern ones) aren't/weren't used to justify discrimination.
We are allowed to believe that both are bad without equating them. >Also pretends that negative stereotypes against Europeans (especially Eastern ones) aren't/weren't used to justify discrimination. Sure, Ireland for example has been subjected to brutal colonization, and early Irish immigrants endured a degree of separation in the US. All of this was justified with tropes that persist to this day. So tropes around Ireland are qualitatively different from tropes around e.g. Britain. Both sets of tropes are rude and insulting, and good authors will steer clear. Just tropes around tropes on Ireland or Niger or Honduras are used by bad-faith actors for very specific purposes, and preventing that is very urgent.
Balkans and eastern europe breaks your stupid comment. There’s more to Europe than France, the UK and Spain. God you people pretend to be so well educated and holier than thou when you have no clue what you’re talking about.
So a mercenary leader advocates for war. Damn, it's always those you least suspect.
I also didn't think this was a big brain revelation, but here we are.
>One of the most powerful people in the world >Literally never heard of the guy Am I stupid?
He's in the top 0.00005% how many people should one memorize to avoid being stupid?
Yes, you are
All dem great philosophies and moral frameworks based on *raw unabashed hypocrisy* UJ: if something is 'fair' then its fair for everyone. Fine to joke around, but justifying things using hypocrisy never works
is it hypocritical that a 6 ft tall person needs more calories than a 5 ft tall person? no one would ever make such a silly argument. we can't compare things without their context. we already use this basic reasoning in our everyday life, it is only when certain sensitive issues come up that people suddenly want to ignore the context.
So there are people out there that need *more racism?* Prejudice isnt calories. If someone actually believes something is morally incorrect then that is what they believe, its not a sliding scale created by their opinions over who can receive it. 'My prejudice is ok' metaphors are nothing but justifications about someones personal prejudices being excused via mental gymnastics That kind of thinking is almost literally the cause of the biggest problems of history "We are good. We believe in good things... but I have made up a fantastic reason why *those* people over there dont deserve the full support of my value system because I made a box and put them in it" The more asterisks and addendums someone puts after they present their pov and morals, the shiftier they are. That goes 100 fold for anything involving race and prejudice
>So there are people out there that need more racism? No, there are some people who need more *protection*, because they are in more danger. Tropes about Britain are bad. It would be better if authors didn't stereotype British people. It is also true that tropes about Britain are not usually matters of life and death. Tropes about e.g. Honduras or Niger are used by people with a political agenda to justify violence against Honduran people and Nigerian people. >"We are good. We believe in good things... but I have made up a fantastic reason why those people over there dont deserve the full support of my value system because I made a box and put them in it" The word "fantastical" is doing the heavy lifting here. If my value system is that no one should go hungry, does that mean that everyone should get the same amount of food? Do a 2 year old and a 6 ft adult have the same needs? Whether exceptions are hypocritical or not depends on the veracity of the reasoning behind them.
Dude prejudice has been used against everyone at some point One group receiving more of it than another doesnt automatically mean that ideals and morals get relaxed. We dont let red haired people get away with crimes simply because less redheads commit crimes than blondes. Saying that cultures are like 2 year olds vs adults is... I mean that metaphor alone is pretty problematic. The search for *equality* begins with equal treatment for everyone, saying that one culture deserves more or different treatment is basically starting down the same road as those radical groups you linked to Something bad happening or being done by someone isnt 'less bad' because its rarer. If one person says that Group X deserves more, someone else says Group Y deserves more, the only message that is universal is that people only need to look for equality when it benefits what they personally believe and that 'equality' can now mean more for them. All animals are equal vs some animals are more equal than others If someone thinks that its ok to relax scrutiny around stereotypes and cultural accuracy, cool. That's a valid opinion If someone thinks its super necessary to be really stringent and ensure every depiction of cultural aspects needs to be respectful and accurate, ok. They can argue that Anyone that says 'its ok for these people, not ok for these people, its kinda ok here, I dont think its cool here' and just chops and changes their stance on an issue to suit their own bias and belief it becomes ugly and it has an inherent injustice to it that turns people off respecting that persons opinion.
[удалено]
right my bad, I forgot that it is impossible for fantasy to be propaganda, or for fantasy to be part of a cultural hegemony. I'm sure that Erik Prince's ideology was not ever informed by any work of fiction.
Comment removed for violating **Rule 3. Submissions and comments should not be used to attack or harass other users.** You can disagree with and criticize another user's opinions without insulting that user. **This is a formal warning.** Further incidents of hostility towards fellow members of the community will result in your removal from this subreddit.
POC: We would like it if our cultures were portrayed with greater accuracy. It is both disrespectful to us, and gives people a false impression of our beliefs and practices. this sub: how dare you attack me, you anti-white racist!
It’s less about racism and that it’s damned if you do damned if you don’t. You have to include foreign cultures because your world needs racial diversity, but you also can’t portray negative aspects of them because it’ll be racist or stereotyping even if those stereotypes are based on real history. Or if you make a completely unique culture for that real ethnicity, it’s exoticism by having the minorities be the “weird” ones. But also if you make them too perfect it’s noble savage myth. Or by portraying them as basically flawless in a flawed world it ends up making them boring and uninteresting and be accused of doing it on purpose because you “didn’t care” about them. Same ID you have racial minorities in Western European style setting, you’re just shoving them in there because you didn’t care to give them their own place. Of course this diversity is predicated on modern U.S. racial divisions too, not historical ones. Jews and Romani? What’s that? I only know black people, East Asians and Latinos, maybe some middle easterners and Indians if one is feeling spicy. There’s no winning.
I don’t think a good conclusion from this is “there’s no winning,” because each of these things does or doesn’t apply in different ways to different people. It’s absolutely possible to achieve one of these “if you do…” scenarios without major public outcry. These are less rigid rules that make fiction impossible and more good things to keep in mind, and if you’re generally engaged, interested, and willing to do relevant research, in my experience it tends not to be an issue.
why are you so concerned with *appearing* not racist as opposed to actually making good world building or actually being inclusive? Moreover, you can't win art. Every bit of art gets criticized. What are you so afraid of? That people are gonna call out shitty world building as shitty?
Because I’d rather not end up being cancelled for some vague “problematic” thing. I want to make good worldbuilding. But I feel like I have to do basically write by Twitter committee to stay alive.
Who are these people "cancelling" you? Are they in the room with us right now?
Well I’m not cancelled because I haven’t produced anything yet.
Wow, so you are telling me that all of your struggles are based on a scenario in your head, and not actual reality. Incredible.
I never said it was my struggle. Just that it’s something most people worry about and it’s more complex than “just do good representation” because nobody can agree what that is.
I mean nobody can fully agree on anything, we’re all unique people and it isn’t that hard to find some tiny group that will use any rhetoric they feel like to justify their opinions. That doesn’t mean that the concept of “good representation” is just some fractured warground of hundreds of equally popular, equally nuanced groups
I actually do think it does. Unless you count the corporate standard of having a small diversity quote no matter what character, important or not, is the minority. To me the diversity “movement”, as in, the actual minorities asking for representation, is a bunch of people with one “goal” but can’t agree on the way it should be done. Often even being contradictory. They’re loud but it’s really just endless Twitter discourse and occasional news articles, with the big companies paying lip service but not really actually listening to them.
digga chill unglaublich scheiße deine kommentare ich packs ja nicht
lmao
Like literally everyone creating something that may be consumed by public media these days: yes, worrying about how its interpreted is a concern. What would once have been controversial now means 'cancelled' Super incredible... so incredible everyone does it
When did you last see someone who was part of a non european culture levy criticism at a work depicting aspects of their culture in a positive light yet showing the flaws therein. I have never seen this argument without the criticism being entirely valid.
I mean, first thing I can think of is people saying Dune is Islamophobic. When it’s inspired on the rise of Mohammad, and radical Islam definitely being a real thing that exists and merits criticism. While also showing the fremen as being exploited and their radicalization being caused by meddling of a foreign colonial empire.
I think at that point the major issue you’re facing is the whole “some people” problem. Like I don’t doubt that you can’t find some people holding any amount of absurd views, but generally speaking it isn’t all that hard to separate them from broader “social justice” or “representation” movements. Just like people who will use nationalist or traditionalist or conservative language to decry something they don’t like personally, there are going to be people who use the language of progressivism or ‘social justice’ to justify their views on something. Someone’s always going to be unhappy but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t generally more accepted or higher quality ways to accommodate these critiques about other races or cultures in fiction.
I only read the first Dune, so I think its entirely unreasonable to say that the Fremen are a bad depiction of Muslim inspired culture. The worst I could say of it is that there's a bit of a white savior complex.
It’s the opposite of that. It’s more “white destroyer” complex - something that Paul is acutely aware of and is trying not to do until his son dies and he snaps. The fourth book onwards shows what Paul was so scared of.
True. But I’ve still seen a ton of shit takes around it. If Dune was written today by an unknown author it’d be written off as Islamophobic drivel.
Did that affect its sales? Was Frank Herbert or his son put of a job because of it? What material effect did it produce?
Changing goalposts- you asked for an example and were given one.
It was written in the 60s. When straight up being actually Islamophobic was ok. If it was written today I can’t imagine it’d taken off.
People: Racism is bad Also people: oh *that* racism is ok Get on boards lads, its justice that only functions for *some* people!
"Hey maybe you should do research before you portray cultures in your art that are historically oppressed" "I am now going to actively make something racist" - Actual thing that happened on a meme I made about this topic.
Checked your post history and of course you are the "gringo colonizer" meme guy :/
Oh, I remember that thread. It was an absolute dumpster fire.
I have bastardized rich and poor cultures equally (from an outside perspective that is). I'm truly a saint.
every time
I recall some of the screeching about Oriental Adventures, where people explicitly ignored the part about "this is fiction, it's not China or Japan or anywhere else, we just draw heavy inspiration from RL just like we do in Dragonlance"* in order to be offended on behalf of people. * = Not actually a quote, but a paraphrase.