The Dweller in the Forbidden City blog posted about a Twitter poll they did on the question of colonialism in D&D. Here is a snip.
The author seems to be surprised by the amount of vitriol they received as a result of this poll question. I don’t find it surprising.
The way this poll was worded was only going piss some people off. It was seen by many as picking a fight on a platform where word battles are the point of the platform. Not surprisingly, a fight ensued.
The way I read this poll question and a lot of other people read this question is as follows:
Colonialism and racism are omnipresent themes in D&D. Do you think that D&D can be played without colonialism and racism?
Some critics claim that D&D is a colonialist and racist game.
This implies that anyone who enjoys D&D is a colonialist and racist.
It’s not hard to see how a lot of people would feel insulted after reading that poll question without the qualifier of “if you believe the underlying premise to be true.”
Here is a quote from the blog post about the poll.
“I wasn’t interested in whether or not people believed that those themes were actually there, I was curious to know, *for those who feel that they are there*, could they be separated or not?”
Assuming that the intent of the author was to find out the thinking “*for those who feel they are there*” it was a badly worded poll. That phrase is crucial to the context.
Without that qualifier; The question sounds like, “Is D&D a game for racists and colonialists?”
I’ll accept the explanation that the author overlooked including that qualifying phrase and would, in the future, be more careful in the wording of their polls.
The author goes on to insult the intelligence and reading comprehension of those of us who do not find colonialism in Dungeons & Dragons and then uses several logical fallacies in his commentary.
The first fallacy being an appeal to authority.
Colonialism doesn’t mean what you want it to mean, it means what the community of scholars who use the term say it means. Or at least that’s a great starting point if you want to have a conversation that can draw on the evidence and scholarly research built on the established, agreed upon definitions.
And if you read that scholarship, and I have read much, “killing people and taking their stuff” is a core part of colonialism
I have no doubt that “killing people and taking their stuff” is the core property of colonialism, AND it is also a the core of other human activities, myths, and folklore that have nothing to do with colonialism.
1
“Killing people and taking their stuff”, has been a core part of warfare since the invention of organized violence. The practice of killing a foe and taking his stuff is what warriors have done in every culture I’ve ever read about. There may be some culture where taking the enemy’s stuff is taboo but I’m not aware of it. Violence between humans has mostly been about resources throughout our existence.
The practice of killing an opponent and looting their body is found in the oldest literature of western civilization. Here is Hector giving the Trojans a pep talk as he dons the armor of Achilles he looted from the slain Patroclus.
So saying, he shouted aloud, and called to the Trojans: “Ye Trojans, and Lycians, and Dardanians that fight in close combat, [185] be men, my friends, and bethink you of furious valour, until I put upon me the armour of peerless Achilles, the goodly armour that I stripped from the mighty Patroclus, when I slew him.”
The Iliad Book 17: Translation by Samuel Butler
There are multiple examples throughout The Iliad of warriors killing and looting each other. In this particular case <spoiler> it goes badly for Hector and Achilles shows up to get his armor back.
In my experience most D&D characters don’t build a colonies in the dungeon. They kill the monsters, carry their loot back to civilization, and spend it. They are not leading a wagon train of settlers into a wild land, and exterminating it’s current occupants for the benefit of the new arrivals. If that was the core activity of adventurers in Dungeons & Dragons, then one might have an argument.
Characters kill and often profit by it.
That doesn’t make it colonialism.
2
Let’s return back to this quote:
And if you read that scholarship, and I have read much, “killing people and taking their stuff” is a core part of colonialism.
Note the word people. This is not what player characters do most of the time in D&D.
One of the pillars of play in Dungeons & Dragons is killing monsters and villains who threaten society.
Monsters are abominations. The Latin root of “monster” means warning or bad portent.
In the Christian tradition, monsters are the children of Satan or Cain.
In the Norse tradition, monsters are the enemies of the gods seeking to bring about the Ragnarok.
In Middle Earth, monsters are the twisted mockeries of life made by the dark lord Melkor.
In folklore, monsters are, at best, spirits of faery to be appeased lest they get up to mischief.
In myth and legend, monsters are physical manifestations of spiritual or moral corruption.
Monsters are not “people.” They are supernatural beings. Monsters are a threat to the people in the story, or a metaphor used by the storyteller as a way to present the anti-theme of the story.
D&D was ultimately inspired the legends and myths of the medieval and ancient world. Fantasy fiction also has it’s roots in myth and legend. Those ancient stories feature monster slaying heroes.
Dungeons & Dragons is part of the ancient story traditions of heroes slaying monsters for the good of society.
Dragons burn villages, kill people, and eat people. Dragons steal gold and hoard it in their lair. Adventurers go to the dragon’s lair, in the dungeon, kill the dragon, and take back the stolen loot.
The core activity characters in Dungeons & Dragons is adventurers exploring the underworld, killing monsters, and returning the treasures stolen by monsters from people.
It says that right on the tin: Dungeons & Dragons.
Mythic stories of the ancient world were not merely escapist entertainment.
The stories instructed the listener about correct behavior and heroic ideals. The old stories are warnings to the foolish and aspirations for the young.
Stories are one way a community teach its values. It is instruction in story form.
The monsters of myth were more than just entertaining foes for the hero to do battle with. Monsters were the contrast to the hero, a negative example of unacceptable behavior in society.
We do NOT behave like this. This is monstrous. This is what monsters do. We are not monsters. This behavior leads to problems in the community and we will do anything, including kill, to discourage that kind of behavior. The monsters have stolen our stuff, we must kill the monsters and get our stuff back in order to preserve our community.
There is a significant literature in medieval studies about monsters and why they appear in these stories. JRR Tolkien’s most important academic work was on this very subject. His lecture, Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics was a seminal work that completely changed the way that monsters were viewed in the study of medieval literature. After Tolkien pointed it out, medievalists realized the monsters represented the kinds of behavior that communities did not want.
Monstrosity was a tool of colonial narratives.
It must be acknowledged that claiming that “the other” is “a monster” or “monstrous” is the most common way violence is justified by those looking for a pretext.
The primary motivation of colonial invaders throughout history has been financial. The land being colonized had a resource of value that the colonists wanted.
A claimed monstrosity of “the other” was one of many rationalizations used by colonial powers to justify their avarice. If you view the people you are stealing from as monsters then you have a ready made justification for your pillaging, enslavement or genocide. If the people you are stealing from are “brutal savages” or “beasts” then one can sleep well knowing they’ve ridded the world of evil while making a tidy profit.
Colonial powers were themselves the monsters. They used violence to oppress, enslave, and displace native people wherever they had superior capacity for organized violence.
Colonization has nothing to do with the core themes of Dungeons & Dragons. The critics of D&D making the claim that colonialism and racism are the core theme of the game couldn’t be more wrong.
They believe the killing of monsters in a game and the recovery of treasure is a metaphor for colonialism.
In fact, it’s precisely the opposite. In the Slavelords modules, the slavers are the bad guys. Orcs, drow, mindflayers, and other monstrous humanoids in the original game are all noted for their enslavement and murder of anyone they can subjugate. In the Dark Sun module Freedom, the liberation of slaves in the city of Tyr is the background of events.
The claim that the core theme of D&D is pro-colonialism and pro-racism is self evident balderdash.
It is nonsense that any serious minded person should dismiss without further comment.
Conclusion
The game as it was originally conceived, allows for a wide variety of expression and thematic content.
If you want to play colonialist invaders in your game, you can. That’s not what it was built for and was not the fundamental assumption of it’s designers. This is obvious to any reasonable, thinking person.
The people who claim the game is racist and colonialist are ignorant of real world history, the history of D&D, and cynically seek social status in their sub-culture of Critical Theory extremism.
The central theme of Dungeons and Dragons is about heroes who protect civilization from monsters and villains.
Heroes enter the underworld, kill monsters and return stolen treasure back to civilization.
That is the core theme of Dungeons & Dragons.
Grumpy Wizard 
I think you may be jumping in too soon, here. Just a quick glance at the article on the Dweller of the Forbidden City blog shows that their post is part 1 of 2. Many of the claims you are discussing seem more likely to come up in part 2. Remember that early on in the article they said
“almost half, so nearly 900 responses, voted that these themes cannot be separated from the game. I find this shocking”
That seems to imply that they will end up agreeing with many of the points you make here (though likely not all).
I find this shocking.
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I do like the insight re monstrous beings and their role in culture, and that Travis here has made the distinction between “kill monsters and take their things” with “kill people and take their things”.
I see Ian has his part 2 up. Worth the read.
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Except “Monsters” in D&D are people, even if fictional ones. They have cultures, they have brains, they have sentience, they have language, they are even playable for player characters in some editions. In your perspective, then, aliens in Star Wars should not be considered people, like the Yuuzhan Vong, just because they are antagonists in the Expanded Universal Mythos. Or, gosh, even the Sith.
But I can see where you want to go: the world is full with stories of monsters, so monster’s depiction shouldn’t be considered by any form of criticism. To you, they are just are mindless toys to play nice tabletop stories. I can understand that.
No one is saying D&D is KKK conspiracy to turn people into racists. And no one is saying the way you have been playing D&D makes you a bad person or a racist.
However, both art and entertainment, as any subject matter in the world, should be passed by analysis and then, being under criticism. As a brazilian, I always found the whole idea of adventurers and explorer too near from the idea of “bandeirantes”. “Bandeirantes” were, roughly, Portuguese adventurers in Brazilian soil. They were sent to explore uncharted territory, they killed natives or captured them to send to slavery. They also received gold for that. In Brazil, we even have an adventure (for GURPS) to simulate their “bandeiras” (their “adventures”).
Also, when people tries to play an Orc, a Half-Orc or a Drow, it is common they suffer from prejudice (in character, mostly, but really meany groups can be nasty at those choices). See how the line between a Player Character and a Monster becomes too thin. Yes, it may be realistic to portray a heroic Orc or Drow to suffer ostracism (and maybe the Player wanted to roleplay that), depending on Campaign Setting. Yet we would have trouble to different to draw the line between Monster and Hero.
If actions and deeds are what differ between Monster and Hero, we can’t tell if all Orcs are monsters… or heroes. Maybe being a Monster is not so far from being a Villain. And to have a villain in your game is much more interesting, compelling and even in pair with all stuffs of legend than “he is an orc, so he is evil, we can slay him without thinking too much”.
The idea of trying to make a sentient being, with culture, language, society… to pass a monster is exactly what colonies had suffer under Colonialism. They become dehumanized by invaders and settlers — at first, because the Catholic Church was against any violence to non-Christians in other lands. Except, of course, if they violated the “Natural Law”, postulated by Thomas of Aquines, and it was stuffed with European values. After the Enlightment, God was kicked out in name of the Reason; the Reason became the poor excuse to dehumanized people under Colonialism. The colonized was portraited as irrational, exotic, impulsive… like, you know, an Orc. or a Drow. Like a monster. In some colonies, natives were slaughtered; in other, enslaved.
Yeah, in D&D… they don’t enslave goblins and don’t try to teach kobold the Common language, so it’s not colonialist? Are not enough for adventurers to being murder hobos inside dungeons? And to have all campaign settings portraing the massacres was justified, since the victim were actually “monsters”?
D&D will not lose the essence if we just make a few tweaks. We don’t need to portrait adventurers as slayers of goblins and killers of giants. We need to portrait D&D adventurers as heroes who fight villains — it changes little to nothing of our beloved game.
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Hi Nesicha. I hope you are well and weathering the strange and challenging times we find ourselves in. Thank you for taking the time to respond to my post. I appreciate your feedback. I do have some differences of opinion though.
In general, I think that what you are trying to say is that there are some elements of the game, as it currently exists in 5E which could, at very least, be interpreted as racist or colonialist in nature and with a few minor adjustments the There may be some merit to that. I don’t play 5E. I own the core books and one of the adventures. I’ve read through the material and do not find it to be to my taste. As I am not an expert on the content of the game, in its current edition, I have no opinion as to whether it is racist/colonialist or not.
I do NOT believe that colonialism is the core activity of the game. I’m not a mind reader nor do I have any sort textual documentation on the subject but I feel quite confident that colonialism was not intended to be the core activity of the game by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson nor do I think it was even a thought in their minds when they made the game.
I have quoted your statements and responded to each one in turn.
“Except “Monsters” in D&D are people, even if fictional ones. They have cultures, they have brains, they have sentience, they have language, they are even playable for player characters in some editions.”
That was an error on the part of the designers and publishers of the game. Monsters are not people in the mythic traditions of nearly all human societies who have monsters as part of their mythic stories. Though it is possible that some culture somewhere doesn’t have a monster or monstrous entity as part of their myth and legend, I am completely unaware of it.
Monsters are beings which disrupt or destroy organized society. They are metaphors for undesirable behavior. The somewhat recent trend in film,fiction and games of giving monsters some rationalization for their monstrous behavior upends that tradition. That designers of D&D decided to give monsters the characteristics of people doesn’t negate the original purpose of monsters in myth. I linked to several of my other essays about monsters and their function in myth and culture. You may have missed those.
“In your perspective, then, aliens in Star Wars should not be considered people…”
The various species in Star Wars are people. This is a strawman argument.
“However, both art and entertainment, as any subject matter in the world, should be passed by analysis and then, being under criticism.”
I never said or implied that monster stories shouldn’t be analysed or criticised. In fact, I linked to an entire book of essays analysing and critiquing monsters.
“No one is saying D&D is KKK conspiracy to turn people into racists.”
Another strawman.
“And no one is saying the way you have been playing D&D makes you a bad person or a racist.”
Here we get to the purpose of my essay.
Yes there are people saying this precise thing.There was a month long Twitter fight about orcs, stating exactly that. You may choose to ignore such statements but there are indeed people saying, unequivocally, that D&D is racist.
I’ll not give the individuals claiming D&D is racist any more bandwidth than they already get by linking to their posts, tweets and essays. They are out there if you want to look for them yourself. A search on any social media platform or search engine of your choice will turn up plenty of examples.
“The idea of trying to make a sentient being, with culture, language, society… to pass a monster is exactly what colonies had suffer under Colonialism. “
I acknowledged this in my post.
If we follow the logic of your argument to its conclusion, where we arrive at is an absurd destination. Any idea used by human beings to rationalize violence and oppression for their own gain can never be used again by anyone for any reason, no matter how justified the argument is. That seems like a terrible logical bind to put oneself into.
If you feel that adventurers entering previously civilized places like ruined cities, or the underworld lairs; clearing out the monsters and recovering the treasures that ancient cultures created is too close to conquistadors murdering and enslaving indigenous people for their own gain and glory; I’m not going to tell you how you should feel about it. Those are your feelings and that you have them is not something I’m going to contradict.
I don’t think colonization and heroes recovering treasure and knowledge are the same thing.
“Also, when people tries to play an Orc, a Half-Orc or a Drow”
I don’t run games for people who want to play monsters. I don’t run 5E, but if I did, tiefling and dragonborn would also not be available. If they want to play humans who do monstrous things, that is different. That is actually interesting to me.
I don’t use the majority of humanoid monsters in my games at all. Mainly because I consider them to be boring and one dimensional. It is precisely because they are simple monsters that I don’t use them.
“D&D will not lose the essence if we just make a few tweaks. We don’t need to portrait adventurers as slayers of goblins and killers of giants. We need to portrait D&D adventurers as heroes who fight villains — it changes little to nothing of our beloved game.”
“We” who? Wizards of the Coast owns the brand and they can do whatever they want with it. I make my own material, borrow (steal) from other hobbyists and buy independent products that have the sort of aesthetic appeal that I enjoy.
Quite right, “we” don’t need to portray adventurers in any particular way at all. I think game masters and players can make those decisions for themselves, independent of what anyone else thinks, including and especially me.
There are some very vocal people, getting a lot of attention, claiming that the game is, at its core, a racist game and the people who play it are racists. I think we both agree that this is not true. I stand and say that is false and will continue to do so.
Thank you for sharing your perspective. I appreciate your time and effort
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