Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.

[Kanye Qwest]

@surreality said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

<raises a hand> I am a little testy because painkillers and, well, pain. Just want to note this because I may be coming off snarlier than I intend, since it's kinda hard to see straight at the moment and I'm keeping things a bit short (for me anyway).

Yeah, a little snarly for a thread you opened up for discussion. Hope you feel better!

@GangOfDolls - Aha. That does make more sense, as one scenario was at least a series of scenes/events.

[surreality]

@Kanye-Qwest I didn't exactly plan to break a rib and tear several muscles between then and now from violent projectile vomiting. Not exactly something one pencils into their schedule.

[Seraphim73]

@Auspice said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

Give people the opportunity, but make sure they understand that they may face IC backlash for it. I've done that on games and had an -awesome- time of it.

I generally agree with you, but this can be a problem, because so few players actually provide that IC backlash. It's almost always left up to NPCs, usually run by the players taking the opportunity themselves (and often not played very harshly, very few people really like to torment their characters--yes, I know that some do, and yes, it's fun to do so). I really wish that more people would help with that sort of IC repercussions.

@faraday said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

Saying that the PCs are the exception to the rule only goes so far. Unless you've got people really exercising the "mainstream" NPC viewpoint, the exception becomes all you see and therefore becomes people's mental rule no matter what you say. So you get this weirdly-jarring discontinuity when the person claiming to be oppressed by totally valid IC prejudices ends up looking like a looney since it never happens on-camera. (or if it does, the poor NPC is quickly smacked down by all the modern-sensibility PCs.)

This is another one of those issues where you really need players willing to play the "average" -- characters who represent the general NPC viewpoint. I've actually had great success playing these characters because people really want to get themselves grounded in the universe by interacting with characters who actually represent the universe, rather than the outliers.

[Gilette]

@Seraphim73

People generally don't want to provide that IC backlash because there are a lot of players who respond to any level of IC backlash with something like 'what the fuck? why do you hate me? this is a bullshit grudge and i'm going to staff about it - wait, no, i'm just going to say you're a toxic player to everyone i meet!'

[Derp]

@surreality

I think I see where you're going with this, but... I'm not so sure this fix is going to work the way you think it will.

This seems like an easy way for players to game the system, to me. If they can just include a NOPE pref for everything they just don't find fluffy, then you're going to run into some issues.

For instance, what if, say, your PC is playing the town sheriff, but has NOPE listed for, I don't know, violence? (Probably not going to be as dramatic as that, but it's just an example). How do those stories move forward? Do you create an NPC? What happens to the person who trusted that this sheriff would handle it? What happens to the multitude of NPC's who elected them to do the same? If you tell the player they're not a good fit for the position, aren't you in fact violating their prefs and such as well?

I see more harm than good coming out of this system, in the long run. But I do agree with one thing: we're all adults. People should be able to handle this kind of thing, because that is part of adulting, and I don't think that a 'get out of things free' card is really going to help you more than it hurts you.

[Seraphim73]

@Gilette
Yup, exactly that. But without an IC backlash to breaking themely norms, you create new norms, which are usually the opposite of what you intended.

[surreality]

@Derp said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

@surreality
For instance, what if, say, your PC is playing the town sheriff, but has NOPE listed for, I don't know, violence? (Probably not going to be as dramatic as that, but it's just an example). How do those stories move forward? Do you create an NPC? What happens to the person who trusted that this sheriff would handle it? What happens to the multitude of NPC's who elected them to do the same? If you tell the player they're not a good fit for the position, aren't you in fact violating their prefs and such as well?

I regard this in the same way I regard pharmacists who refuse to distribute birth control or similar products 'because it goes against their beliefs': they shouldn't have that fucking job. You don't get to fuck others over or disregard an aspect of play critical to the position you want to take on to the detriment of a large segment of the playerbase. Similarly, you couldn't sign on to play a madam and refuse to have anything to do with prostitution ever.

I don't think that a 'get out of things free' card is really going to help you more than it hurts you.

I've stated repeatedly: that is not remotely how it works. For consent-required subjects, yes; not for preferences. There are 6 consent-required subjects that have nothing whatsoever to do with this topic (and only came up because someone wanted to equate it to rape, which is handled differently, as stated before) and about 30 or so various preferences people can set. The consent-required ones are repeated in the prefs simply because it's a convenient place to get that information out there in advance to make people aware, but consent is not required for every possible preference.

[Derp]

@surreality said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

There are 6 consent-required subjects that have nothing whatsoever to do with this topic (and only came up because someone wanted to equate it to rape, which is handled differently, as stated before) and about 30 or so various preferences people can set.

But I think that's where the disconnect is coming from. 'Consent required' usually is reserved for 'sensitive materials', which is (as the name suggests) exactly the point of this topic. And if the policy is 'consent required', then ... why are we talking about how to handle them at all?

And while there have been good points on both sides of this so far, I think that one thing that's come up repeatedly, and one that strongly resonates with me so far, is ' if consent for a thing is required, you are inevitably going to run into a story derailment, because nothing on a MU exists in a total vacuum'.

That's really my concern here. But, apparently I misunderstood what the point of the topic was, if you've already worked out how you're going to handle the sensitive subjects.

[ThugHeaven]

I tend to shy away from "Historical" mu*s for a couple reasons. I'd approach my decision to play there on the same criteria I would in making certain character rulings if I were a staffer.

1. Which version of history are we talking about? I hate to be that person....but. Even in history you have people that broke norms. If the concept is interesting, it should be allowed. Just about any time period you can think of there was someone that was abnormal in the societal sense. Medieval? There were examples of women fighting and leading armies. Berlin 1943? There were certainly Germans that didn't agree with nazis. I could go on and on with this.

I'm not even the type of person to say, "this setting? Imma break it with this concept." I just think historical settings are sanitized and attempted to be portrayed in black and white, when even a little research proves otherwise. So, I'm all for if you have a historical basis for the character concept, it's allowed. Most Mu*s with historical themes don't do this, so I don't play them. This leads me to #2.

2. History and accuracy aren't always interesting in terms of storytelling. Ever watch Vikings? Love it! Guess who my favorite character is? Yeah, you guessed it....Lagertha.

Now Vikings is a great show. It's not the most historically accurate show. I'm pretty sure women didn't really go on raids and Lagertha probably didn't exist....neither did Ragnar most likely. But I enjoy watching the show and if it were historically accurate. I doubt it would've lasted a season. I know I wouldn't watch it.

The same applies to an mu*, if I log on to a Viking game and I'm looking through the help files and I see something like "we are a historically accurate game, that means no Lagertha, you can play a shield maiden but..." I'm typing quit...not even going to finish reading.

So the point I'm making is, history is great. It just doesn't always tell a fun or interesting story. Sometimes it's a confining box that's not even all that accurate either. There is a point where realism becomes unfun. If it is one of those sticking points, at least try to be flexible with it.

[surreality]

Specifically, it's sensitive cultural/political/religious concerns. As related to fantasy worlds and historical games that may, or may not, include these themes as part of the setting. Not just 'anything someone might possibly be sensitive about', which is literally anything.

I will be clear here, and possibly more than a little blunt: if someone things they can force a sexual preference change, romantic relationship, sexual assault, pregnancy, a forced template (in this case type) change that may require them to freeze that alt or another, completely rewrite another player character's personality into something they have no interest in playing, or force the player into taboo sex (bestiality, incest, snuffsex, etc.) just because they want to, with zero fucks given for the experience of the other player whose fun is as important as theirs is? They have no place on any game I put together. ^ Those are the consent subjects.

You're still conflating 'consent subjects' and 'preferences', after I was pretty clear that, no, they are not the same thing. The only reason they came up is because @Ominous decided that 'rape' was the same thing. Maybe to them, it is, no skin off my nose either way. In the context of what I am doing, it is functionally not the same thing.

[Kestrel]

@surreality said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

Insisting that someone's RP must focus exclusively on their cultural disadvantages in any given time or place is, you're essentially saying: "If you want to play a woman, a person of color, someone gay, you accept that the only RP you're going to do involves those subjects being front and center at all times, and those are the only character choices that will or can matter."

No one's actually saying that, though — especially not the part you've emphasised in italics. To insist that characters or a setting be grounded in the cultural sensitivities of the time does nothing to limit the minutiae that real people experience regardless of where, when and how they were born. If someone's created a character so two-dimensional that they can't, say, experience the awkward butterflies of a first romantic kiss outside of the context of their circumstances, that's on them, not the realism of a setting.

Ultimately, I agree with @Thenomain. Create the game you want, that you like, that you would play, and expect people who share your ideals to play it. Trying to strike a multitude of compromises is, as @Kanye-Qwest said, the worst of both worlds.

[WTFE]

@Kestrel You know, it is actually possible that "create the game that you want" is precisely what @surreality is doing…

What I'm seeing is a lot of people bitching that it's not the game they want.

[Ganymede]

@WTFE said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

You know, it is actually possible that "create the game that you want" is precisely what @surreality is doing…

What I'm seeing is a lot of people bitching that it's not the game they want.

I was never a big fan of echo chambers, but I also voted for Bernie Sanders, so --

[Derp]

@WTFE said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

You know, it is actually possible that "create the game that you want" is precisely what @surreality is doing…

All I was saying is that it seemed like a question was being asked, and then when people gave some responses, it came off like "I already have my answer for sensitive subjects".

Of course they can create the game they want. I was simply confused on why ask an opinion if you already know what you're going to do.

Personally, I think that the things listed as 'what I'm actually wanting answers for' are... honestly, minutiae. There's no one good way to handle it. Someone's feathers are always going to get ruffled on those. And it sounds like you'd prefer to just use a prefs system to handle them anyway, so...

I guess you've got what you need here?

[Ominous]

@WTFE said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

@Kestrel You know, it is actually possible that "create the game that you want" is precisely what @surreality is doing…

What I'm seeing is a lot of people bitching that it's not the game they want.

I am in the same boat as others, and think surreality should make whatever game they want. However, surreality did start this thread asking for input, so we're giving. We didn't start this thread saying "OMG, look at what surreality thinks and here is our thoughts on that."

I am alright playing on a game with rape, racism, etc. I'm not going to engage in such RP myseld, but if it's happening around me, whatever. But surreality is the one that asked, and we are only responding with our thoughts.

[surreality]

@Derp said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

All I was saying is that it seemed like a question was being asked, and then when people gave some responses, it came off like "I already have my answer for sensitive subjects".

I get this, but I wasn't asking 'just for me'; the time I've done that was to put the basics of a former site in progress to ask for input. This was spawned by the reactions to some of the setting elements in the ShadowhuntersMUSH thread, specifically. That larger conversation would be kinda crappy for everyone to have (re: 'how have other games handled similiar issues like this one?') in somebody's ad thread and it was veering that way fast.

Of course they can create the game they want. I was simply confused on why ask an opinion if you already know what you're going to do.

I don't do design by committee when the committee is a free-for-all. That way lies madness. Never have and never will. That doesn't mean that engaging in conversation about how other games have handled this (we've had historical games, how have they tackled it?/why do people feel the way they do about the Shadowhunters setting?/Do people typically want games to be sanitized for modern sensibilities?/etc.) isn't illuminating.

I also feel it would be a bit shit-heel-ish if I didn't mention what I intend to do, but only in the context of as one of many, because I'm not of a mind to ask people to share information I'm not willing to share myself.

Personally, I think that the things listed as 'what I'm actually wanting answers for' are... honestly, minutiae. There's no one good way to handle it. Someone's feathers are always going to get ruffled on those. And it sounds like you'd prefer to just use a prefs system to handle them anyway, so...

Personally?

The most useful post here for me in this context was from @GangOfDolls, describing the experience of her friend who was setting a game during a time and in a place in which slavery was part of that society, and the options and considerations they had to contend with in doing so. So far as I can tell, no one much responded to that, but that is an entirely different sort of decision-making process than just policy-making around an issue, it's a setting design consideration.

The other was @faraday's post about 'if it existed, it will be allowed', and that typical skewing the PC pool toward exceptions, its impact on the game, and the discussion that followed. I find it a little weird that people take such issue with this, since almost every game suffers from this issue; TR and FC hole-in-the-wall parts of the northeast are not, generally, overflowing with celebrities and endless billionaires and typically higher-than-book-average percentages of supernaturals for the size of the population, but I don't see folks generally insisting they not be allowed to make those characters because the representations of the mundane human population is not proportionally accurate.

[Kanye Qwest]

Look, I have made lots of noise about how silly it is to have "small towns" in Maine be filled to bursting with a thousand strip clubs, vampire hangouts, opera houses and private airports and such - not to even touch the 90% vampire/werewolf population. It's not that no one thinks that stuff is silly, it's just that I'm going to say so here instead of logging on the game and shouting it at the people who are having fun despite (or because of!) it.

[surreality]

@Kanye-Qwest That's 'bitching about it being silly'. Hell, I do that, too.

That's different from saying 'they shouldn't allow that to happen because it corrupts the purity of the setting by skewing it too far into unrealistic territory', however.

[Arkandel]

@surreality said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:

Of course they can create the game they want. I was simply confused on why ask an opinion if you already know what you're going to do.

I don't do design by committee when the committee is a free-for-all. That way lies madness. Never have and never will. That doesn't mean that engaging in conversation about how other games have handled this (we've had historical games, how have they tackled it?/why do people feel the way they do about the Shadowhunters setting?/Do people typically want games to be sanitized for modern sensibilities?/etc.) isn't illuminating.

That's a common misconception, yes. It's one thing to ask for input and pool cool ideas together, which especially for a place like MSB (or even a smaller collective of friends over Skype or whatnot) can be great to bounce ideas off of, and another completely to actually try and design anything in that way.

In fact if you want extra madness try running a MUSH by committee, then you'll know true misery! We tried that back in the late nineties and, being fools new at this MU* thing, we figured democratizing staff processes was the way to go. The stalemates we had! The staff politics alone were enough to make me cringe even now since votes were taken during meetings where everyone who wanted a say had one, leading to some of those things lasting for easily five hours. We even had votes after which, people quickly realized, would go their way easier if meetings were scheduled in the first place during times or days the opposition wouldn't be able to make. So much fun.

Anyway. Yeah, asking for opinions is great but the buck must stop with one person or at least a small well-knit group of them. Anything else is insane, not because folks aren't well meaning but because, if nothing else, it adds a terrible amount of overhead and makes everything go slower.

[Lithium]

Theme is theme.

If you don't like the theme, don't play on a game.

I've played some games that had theme that were /wildly/ different from the norm. Back in the day when MU's were plentiful there was a lot of really great games that had some very non PC themes, the RP was awesome, people just dove in and RP'd and it was great.

I still feel that playing a character that breaks theme is a cardinal sin, theme should be enforced, it's part of why I as a whole dislike open chargen unless the theme can absorb all sorts of ideas.

It's also why I dislike small town games, they can be really restrictive, potentially to restrictive.

I never understood why there was 50 odd vampires in a town of 10,000 for example.

As a staffer I am pretty big on enforcing theme because theme makes up the core of the game setting imho, more than system used or anything else. If theme isn't enforced, it might as well be a talker, with or without rules.