I think this is something to keep in mind when formulating ur campaigns. The raciality of d&d and indeed “races” in real life are based on white supremacy. If you don’t outright get rid of “races,” you should be treating them the same as if they were all just different kinds of humans, instead of playing into the fantasy where the hero is made to look “white” in comparison to say, a goblin. The goblin exists in its form to supplement the “white” hero.
More and more, especially with Barker, another prominent trailblazing ttrpg scholar and writer being outed as a neo nazi, it is hard to separate the origin of amerikkkan ttrpg from reactionary, white supremacist, chuddy facistery.
However, d&d is very much a thing that can be reclaimed. Being a nerd isn’t just for mayos!! There are plenty of IBPOC in the nerd traditions. As well as, marginalized mayos and others like myself.
I always broke the rules and treated the “evil races” like ppl. One time I did a random d&d game with a professor guy who turned out to be a leftist. He was shocked by my actions, and some other dude left the table lol. Me n the prof are still friends :p
In games where I have "non-humans" of any type, I go in the complete opposite direction and focus on making them actual species in their own right, instead of just humans with cosmetic alterations and ethical essentialisms. They're harder to play or depict, in some ways, but building a species from its evolutionary or magical origins through to how its social and political-economic structures develop and how its biology (or conceptual or arcane makeup) and environment shape its interactions with the material world tends to prevent the kind of crass racism that underpins most ttrpg 'races'. These are actual, alien species, not just "humans, but small, green, and stupid". Who needs goblins when you have amphibious cephalopods that historically were forced to remain in tidal zones for most of their lives prior to their development of arcanotechnology capable of maintaining their homeostasis and allowing them to travel effectively on land (and who are horrified by the "antisocial" behavior of humans because of the ways in which their societies developed due to the small amount of space in which they could live)?
I think this is something to keep in mind when formulating ur campaigns. The raciality of d&d and indeed “races” in real life are based on white supremacy. If you don’t outright get rid of “races,” you should be treating them the same as if they were all just different kinds of humans, instead of playing into the fantasy where the hero is made to look “white” in comparison to say, a goblin. The goblin exists in its form to supplement the “white” hero.
More and more, especially with Barker, another prominent trailblazing ttrpg scholar and writer being outed as a neo nazi, it is hard to separate the origin of amerikkkan ttrpg from reactionary, white supremacist, chuddy facistery.
However, d&d is very much a thing that can be reclaimed. Being a nerd isn’t just for mayos!! There are plenty of IBPOC in the nerd traditions. As well as, marginalized mayos and others like myself.
I always broke the rules and treated the “evil races” like ppl. One time I did a random d&d game with a professor guy who turned out to be a leftist. He was shocked by my actions, and some other dude left the table lol. Me n the prof are still friends :p
In games where I have "non-humans" of any type, I go in the complete opposite direction and focus on making them actual species in their own right, instead of just humans with cosmetic alterations and ethical essentialisms. They're harder to play or depict, in some ways, but building a species from its evolutionary or magical origins through to how its social and political-economic structures develop and how its biology (or conceptual or arcane makeup) and environment shape its interactions with the material world tends to prevent the kind of crass racism that underpins most ttrpg 'races'. These are actual, alien species, not just "humans, but small, green, and stupid". Who needs goblins when you have amphibious cephalopods that historically were forced to remain in tidal zones for most of their lives prior to their development of arcanotechnology capable of maintaining their homeostasis and allowing them to travel effectively on land (and who are horrified by the "antisocial" behavior of humans because of the ways in which their societies developed due to the small amount of space in which they could live)?