So I have been a Table Top Gamer since it first came out.
I am linking the Brietbart article which I really didn’t want to do.
I saw many youtube channels talk about it
Garcia argues that Dungeons and Dragons encourages a distrust of the “other.” It’s a weird focus for a Stanford scholar, especially since Garcia concedes that race in Dungeons & Dragons is not much like race in the real world. In the game, the characters are divided by their species. Some characters are elves, some are dwarves, and some are halfings, according to Garcia.
According to the article, Garcia’s ultimate wish is to see Dungeons & Dragons move beyond its problematic past into a more diverse and inclusive future.
He obviously doesn’t seem to have played in groups are even watch youtube groups or gone to gaming conventions. Yes Men of all Races Play D&D but their are women as well. All the groups I have played in have had women in it.
As for his concept of Distrust hell that came more for me in CyberPunk than D&D. All of our characters would be wanting to sit in the best spot to get the complete view of the place. I do that when I go out to eat any time.
Like to keep an eye on everything. ~Paranoia
Just don’t get how he came up with his conclusion. Been trying to see if I can find his report.
Dungeons and Dragons can be whatever the Dungeon Master and their players wish it to be. While I don’t personally play, I do follow an online show with a group that gets together once a week. The world they have crafted is very inclusive, featuring characters of various races, genders, sexualities, and more.
I do think it is fair to say that the game’s popularity had tended to trend towards white guys over the years and that there has been some intransigence among some in that group when it comes to opening up the game to others. There are definitely some horror stories out there.
Thank god no African Americans were cast as elves in the Lord of the Rings movies. I can’t imagine the outrage it would have caused online. We were really spared one there.
The group of folks i played DND with, for years, were men and women, and we were of all races, skin colors, you name it.
This notion that DND is a white man’s game is silly. Playing an orc or half-dark elf character, is somehow perpetuating racism in the real world - it’s just ignorant.
I really wish you didn’t have to jump through hoops to read the entirety of Garcia’s paper - all I could get access to was the abstract, and of course the Breitbart writer’s opinion of it.
I played D&D as a kid back in the 1980’s, and yes the group I played it with was exclusively male and almost all white (my best friend and our Dungeon Master was Japanese). Within the game itself it was assumed female characters were about, but they were usually in the background unless they were deities or dungeon bosses (that female spider-demon queen comes immediately to mind). Fast forward a few decades, and my wife and daughter found a group they played with for a year or so that was much more diverse in both race and gender than I was familiar with (I didn’t join them because they were playing a newer edition of the game that didn’t interest me). At no point did they express concerns that the game was upholding white privilege, racism, the patriarchy, etc. It leads me to naturally ask - does the game promote a certain power structure or privilege, or does it merely reflect the standards of the players?
Long winded I know but I will always have fond memories of the game - it was a entertaining means of killing a few hours, and it taught problem solving, critical thinking, and how to work within a group. Or maybe that’s just me justifying my 14 year-old self’s existence back when girls wouldn’t give me the time of day.
