SE Racism?Follow

I saw what you said Alethea and you are right. Female circumsition is not that common and in countries where it does occur even many people in that country are opposed to it. When something amounts to nothing but mutilation nothing wrong with applying our own standards. You think we should associate ourselves with a culture that practices human sacrifices and write it off as nothing but societal differences?

And if you want to flame me for subject matter or helping to change the subject of thread Ill give you something better to flame me on: If everyone in the world would just act like Americans it would all be good.

Wow, how did we get on the topic of FGM? =0

I don't think anyone on here will disagree that it's wrong. ;)

The whole idea can be debated for hours. I'm sorry I used that as an example. I was kind of short on ideas. I was going to just keep it at ritual tattooing and piercing. My apologies.

So, besides female circumcision (where yes, you are correct, there are many who are opposed to it in the local group), when another country or group has rituals or things like that, you really can't try to bind them to your societal standards.

I'm not really trying to flame either, I was just trying to solidify on Lefein's post. We're playing in Vanadiel, and not Earth. So, don't expect to see Terran races when you're not on earth.

For nicities though I'll edit the above post. Don't wanna make anyone else upset :(

Thank you and I appreciate your example as well as the humor you used. No offense taken at all from your previous posts.

Even though we are playing on Vanadiel vs. Earth, they nonetheless included blond haired, caucasian and asian looking people. People on Earth buy the game. These consumers are from all races and it would not have hurt Vanadiel at all if there where a little more variety in the hume, elvaan and taru races.

I know plenty of people that will be turned off when they see that this game only has only caucasian and japanese people. It won't bother me much but some others new to video games or fantasy will be.

I see Terran races with blond, red and brunette hair that look like various people I know. I don't know if you are aware these are Terran features. The Taru look sort of like the children of white and japanese races. Vanadiel has southern continents and warm places just like Earth. Why do most fantasies only include white or asian looking people? Yes, they are fantasies but the people that created them decided to include a couple Terran races.

Yes it is a fantasy world and it is not earth, but they chose to only have white and asian looking people.

Edited, Thu Jan 8 17:52:20 2004 by windhursto

Edited, Thu Jan 8 17:53:37 2004 by windhursto

Edited, Thu Jan 8 17:58:37 2004 by windhursto

Edited, Thu Jan 8 17:59:06 2004 by windhursto

Okay so to expand on your question then. In movies why do the aliens almost always have an identifiable head, eyes, claws?

Everything we make for the fantasy realm is a conglomeration (big word that basically means 'cluster of stuff') of everything that we have seen or know of. Take anything at all and you can pull out pieces of what it resembles. Nothing is truly 'unique' but simple morphed from its current version into somethin different.

Example - Dragons, Mainly a lizard with bat-like wings and teeth of an crocodile.

Point proven?

Absolutely noone disputed the important points you brought up at all and I definately take advantage of the present situaion as much as I can. I agree with all of your points. I am loved by many people in the game and race doesn't matter in that respect.

But what we discussing, and the reason this thread exists is because someone asked the question 'where are the black looking people?' They chose only caucasin and asian looking people for the hume taru and Elvaan races somewhat. Why is that? Is it right? Does it have to be this way in most fantasy oriented things? Will it affect consumers of this game who want someone that looks like the Elvaan featured at the top of this page and only have don't have that choice.

Are you talking about Japan or America? :p

Honestly, something that I've noticed about all RPGs starting with D&D:

The primary settings for these games are based around Medival Europe or a fantasy equivilant. That and the fact that most players of RPGs are white (or asian for videogames) combine to make it obvious why most characters/art work feature white people: very little of the target audience will complain, so why put the extra work in to make a game diverse. When games actually DO make an effort to include additional human cultures and races, they are usually little more than a footnote with nothing but cosmetic changes.

Here is an interesting point though:

Note that the term for different creatures is always "race". How can black, white, and galkan all be a different race? What about dwarves and elves? Those are different races too, but races of what?

Here's what I think: Roleplayers want to experience life outside themselves, but because our actual culture is too messed up with racism and predjudice (not always extreem or violent, but there none the less), it is easier to play a hobbit than a mexican or an elf instead of a black man.

These "races" just represent different aspects of humanity, culturally and physically. Elves represent beauty and aloofness, dwarves represent industry and toughness, Tarutaru represent magic and innocence, and so on and so on depending on the game. Notice in most games, the human "race" is the generic one from which all other races are just modified? This is because the fantasy rpg human is just the generic player "playing himself".

So why can't the black rpger "play himself"? 'Cause alot of game designers make the humans as generic as possible to avoid problems and instead focus on the demi-humans instead. Unfortunately, white is generic because most rpgers are white... it's the only sport we have left :p (ok - bad joke).

I've seen a few games that allow players to make varied skin-tones for their characters, but to be honest, this usually leads to sterotypical jokes and bad roleplaying. Again, this is why people prefere to venture in trans-racial characters by chosing a safe demi-human like a hobbit.

RPers love to discover different cultures, that's what keeps the fantasy genre going, however, to point back to the opening line of this post - Japan/America is not as progressive and THIS is why you don't see many black skin tones in video-game rpgs.

I have run into a few racists in my adventures in FFXI, and by having "race" colors could cause more problems.

By having no real race to identify the users (I'm sure black people would be more likely to use black characters and whites with whites, ect...) people are more free to leave behind a lot of the prejudices that is in the real world making the game more enjoyable.

I personally dont care what color a person is, as long as they are nice they are good in my book, but sadly not all people are like this.

Also like what was said, this is not earth, the races have their own skin colors. Galka are grey. I dont know very many grey people =P
Also, if you notice a lot of the Humes look like what would be "White People". Considering this came out in Japan 1st, if they were really trying to consintrate on race, I would think the majority of characters would look like Asians =)

........hehe...haa....hahaha.......HAHAHAAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHH!

If everyone in the game were black I'd open a KFC in the middle of Bastok! j/k.... seriously

edited: I'd start a Cadillobo dealership instead...

Edited, Thu Jan 8 20:22:16 2004 by Lefein

And before anyone gets mad at my little racist jokes on my previous posts I just want you to know that I'm not racist. Really nothing else I can say... I just joke around. I'm not a racist I'm just an insensitive jerk... Okay, carry on!

More generically speaking I have to agree about the skintones idea. It does make a lot of sense, and I can even remember after installing, the first thing that came to mind during character creation was that it was really limited. I mean, I came from planetside, which I thought was bad (like 50+ faces for female models, like 50+ faces for male models, and then different hair choices and voice choices). Then again, i was kind of dissapointed with most of them after seeing a character being made in SW:G. I know it would take some code, but I'd appreciate the little bit of added diversity. Especially when they do clearly show at a couple points darker skin toned versions of the races of the game. Unless of course they include something in the story about it, but that would be treading very dangerous ground.

As for in game racism, you better believe it exists. There's an incredibly large number of racist gamers out there (unfortunately they can use computers too). There appearantly was enough of it to warrant a game called Ethnic Cleansing a few years back (google for it if you want to know more, its sickening). So, I don't see why there wouldn't be a racist presence here.

And on a side note, when I change my Mithra's hair, why is it the fur of her whole body doesn't change color? Where are the Calico Mithras, the long haired Persian Mithras, and the Tabby Mithras?

After reading all of these posts. Some of you understand the valid concerns and some of you although don't seem to understand at all. A person of a dark skin tone such as myself experiences this sort of thing all of the time. There is nowhere you can go to hide the color of your skin or the different way people treat you in all levels of this society. This small game is but a tiny piece of this very large ubiquity of existence for us. It is NOT the entirety of the phenomenon. I am NOT saying there are advantages to being who I am. There are very big advantages.

Here is a train of logic that might help those of you that don't understand and are making excuses.

1.We are NOT saying that it is a big deal when we are playing. Things like voting, workplace discrimination or politics are a much bigger deal.

2. We are NOT calling anyone a racist, although I do see some people making excuses. I forgive them since I love them.

3. We ARE saying that 95% of ALL fantasy oriented things depict white people as the main characters. Yes this is only a game and is NOT a huge piece of the puzzle but when you start to think of things on a larger scale then you might understand why we are saying number 4 below...

4. What we ARE Saying is it would not have killed them to make a more inclusive character design screen.

You either

A. Think it is a valid concern.

or

B. Think it is silly or unfounded or any number of things and make excuses about why fantasy oriented things should only for the most part include white people.


Also lets be clear. The race selection screen for Humes and Elvaan. are NOT neutral. They are CLEARLY white or "japanese." If you doubt this scan up to the top of the page and look at the beautiful lady to the right. She is clearly WHITE. look at handsome guy to the person to the left. Do we have a choice of selecting someone like him? NO

Now you may understand what this discussion is actually about.

If you are one of the people that are NOT making excuses I personally send you thanks from the heart and a horde of digital hugs. It is nice knowing there are some people out there like YOU that actually do care and don't make excuses. We need more people like you in our wonderful world.