The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread
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@Caryatid said in The Savage Skies:
@marsmrsmars My guess is staff hadn't seen or realized that song was linked because holy shit.
@bear_necessities said in The Savage Skies:
@marsmrsmars said in The Savage Skies:
Shooting fascists and bombing nazis sounds pretty cool, but this MUSH has a weird issue with racism against asian people.
I wish people would give MUSH administrators the benefit of the doubt before declaring the GAME ITSELF to have "issues with racism" against a certain class of people.
This is a game that spent a CONSIDERABLE AMOUNT OF EFFORT re-designing history to scrub out all instances of sexism and racism and classism and almost all -isms from that point in history. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that they didn't do ALL OF THAT only to keep the Asian racism in.
Please please please give people some credit and point stuff out without casting judgment. As a game admin (for a separate game), the idea that I have to go through EVERYBODY'S wiki page on a daily basis and click all their links and make sure they aren't being stupid/racist/whatever is EXHAUSTING.
Oh, no, no blame on the administrators, since these are players doing these things. But they did have to vet and accept the second one. There is no report function, so.
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@bear_necessities said in The Savage Skies:
the idea that I have to go through EVERYBODY'S wiki page on a daily basis and click all their links and make sure they aren't being stupid/racist/whatever is EXHAUSTING.
Seriously. If something is offensive, report it.
Forgive me if I'm missing something, but I don't get how an ex-navy pilot with a specific RP hook of being benevolent toward non-Japanese people is racist? Should the game ban all Japanese characters?
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@marsmrsmars +request about it on game.
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@faraday said in The Savage Skies:
@bear_necessities said in The Savage Skies:
the idea that I have to go through EVERYBODY'S wiki page on a daily basis and click all their links and make sure they aren't being stupid/racist/whatever is EXHAUSTING.
Seriously. If something is offensive, report it.
Forgive me if I'm missing something, but I don't get how an ex-navy pilot with a specific RP hook of being benevolent toward non-Japanese people is racist? Should the game ban all Japanese characters?
Japanese characters who were part of their mass-murdering military, praising their murderous Emperor, arguing against democracy in favor for that Emperor? Yes. Again, there's an obvious restriction against ex-nazi characters in the character generation section. Imperial Japan was nearly synonymous with Nazi Germany.
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@Arkandel @Ganymede @The other admin whose name I always forget (sorry) - Could someone maybe lock this ad thread and push the discussion over to the discussion parts of the forum?
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@marsmrsmars said in The Savage Skies:
Japanese characters who were part of their mass-murdering military, praising their murderous Emperor, arguing against democracy in favor for that Emperor? Yes. Again, there's an obvious restriction against ex-nazi characters in the character generation section. Imperial Japan was nearly synonymous with Nazi Germany.
I don't think that it is accurate. Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan might both have committed horrible acts as expansionist empires, but they were entirely separate entities, with entirely separate forms of government, ideologies, goals, etc.
Furthermore, clearly while the character worships the Emperor, she blames the higher ups in the military for the actions of Imperial Japan at present. We can argue how much blame Hirohito deserves (seems a decent amount), but that's really besides the point. From the character's perspective the Emperor can do no wrong, while its the outsized influence of the military in running Imperial Japan that's the problem. (Or perhaps just exactly which military personnel). That's a significant nuance that you're ignoring.
Personally, I find nuances like that, and the shades of grey in the world to be where you get some of the more interesting clashes in roleplay.
Also, the rule is not against establishment Germans in general, its specifically nazi members.
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@krmbm said in The Savage Skies:
@Arkandel @Ganymede @The other admin whose name I always forget (sorry) - Could someone maybe lock this ad thread and push the discussion over to the discussion parts of the forum?
Yeah, for real, like I think it's a legit discussion but THERE CAN BE OTHER THREADS.
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@faraday said in The Savage Skies:
Forgive me if I'm missing something, but I don't get how an ex-navy pilot with a specific RP hook of being benevolent toward non-Japanese people is racist? Should the game ban all Japanese characters?
I think the argument to be made there is that Imperial Japan is every bit as offensive to Asian people as Nazi Germany is to westerners, and that therefore permitting one but not the other indicates a cultural bias. To be clear, I'm not making this argument, but that's how I read the objection.
I'm less clear on the objection to monarchist characters; the game's background is explicit that populations are divided between communists, democrats, monarchists, and fascists, and none are specifically called out as forbidden (even fascists, although that might be a tough pitch in a game that's explicitly about punching fascists). Perhaps it's more about a character who supports this specific monarch, and an openly pro-Communist character who supports Stalin would garner a similar response?
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I wouldn't be playing this game if I didn't have complete and absolute confidence in the staff's genuine interest in creating an inclusive game environment where minority players don't need to deal with or be exposed to the kind of stigma they either live with day-to-day or have a personal family history of tied to the era.
I did go check that song link and agree that it's pretty yikes. But I will second giving staff the benefit of the doubt.
For what my opinion counts on this topic, I'm vouching for them and the game in general. It's a nice place. People are very welcoming and I'm enjoying myself. The one time something even close to annoying me on a channel (specifically to do with reasons one might be wary to play a game set in this era), staff shut it down and handled it admirably.
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@Autumn said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
I think the argument to be made there is that Imperial Japan is every bit as offensive to Asian people as Nazi Germany is to westerners, and that therefore permitting one but not the other indicates a cultural bias.
That's a fair point, but as someone else pointed out - the game (appears to) allow you to play Germans, just not Nazis specifically. It's unclear to me from the policy file whether that would cover a Luftwaffe pilot who was not a member/supporter of the Nazi party. That's something that could certainly be clarified.
But if a non-Nazi-supporting Luftwaffe pilot could be allowed then that would seem on the surface to be on par with the Japanese Navy pilot who was likely insulated from most of the war crime type stuff by nature of their military role. If the Luftwaffe pilot is off limits just for being on the wrong side of the war, then I agree it seems oddly inconsistent to allow the Japanese one.
Either way, though, it's a far leap from "oddly inconsistent" to "racist".
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So, do we all agree that @GirlCalledBlu and @Seraphim73 probably aren't racists just 'cause their pretendy funtime world that they made doesn't address all the things ever?
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@krmbm said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
So, do we all agree that @GirlCalledBlu and @Seraphim73 probably aren't racists just 'cause their pretendy funtime world that they made doesn't address all the things ever?
No one ever said they were.
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@marsmrsmars said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
No one ever said they were.
Not directly, no, but there was a statement that the game had an "issue with racism against Asian people." That's a pretty strong statement.
I think @Autumn raises a valid point about cultural bias/perspective/whatever, because on reflection, in America we (generally as a society) really don't equate the Imperial Japanese as being "just as bad" as the Nazis. There were war crimes, sure, but I don't think we generally view them as being in the same league. In fact, I'd say that equivalency would be frowned upon here as calling back to the anti-Japanese sentiment that led to Manzanar and other badness.
The fact that Asians may have a different perspective does raise valid questions about what concepts should be allowed, if the goal is to be as inclusive as possible. But realistically, I think a historical game is never going to be completely inoffensive. Heck, we can't even manage that on modern-setting games. It's actually quite impressive that Savage Skies has come up with an alt-history that is as inclusive as it is.
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@Autumn said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
@faraday said in The Savage Skies:
Forgive me if I'm missing something, but I don't get how an ex-navy pilot with a specific RP hook of being benevolent toward non-Japanese people is racist? Should the game ban all Japanese characters?
I think the argument to be made there is that Imperial Japan is every bit as offensive to Asian people as Nazi Germany is to westerners, and that therefore permitting one but not the other indicates a cultural bias. To be clear, I'm not making this argument, but that's how I read the objection.
I'm less clear on the objection to monarchist characters; the game's background is explicit that populations are divided between communists, democrats, monarchists, and fascists, and none are specifically called out as forbidden (even fascists, although that might be a tough pitch in a game that's explicitly about punching fascists). Perhaps it's more about a character who supports this specific monarch, and an openly pro-Communist character who supports Stalin would garner a similar response?
Ex-Nazis are explicitly disallowed in character generation which I assume extends to fascism, which Nazi Germany is the poster boys for. I'd not care about someone who was a monarchist for, say, the UK, but the Japanese monarch of this time period consistently adopted fascist ideals and worked alongside Nazi Germany. The Emperor of Japan was the monarch that stood for mass rape, mass murder, ethnic cleansing, and the glorification of all of the above.
It's not the fact that they are simply a monarchist, but are supporting specifically that emperor. They even have "tenno-heika banzai" or "Long live His Majesty the Emperor" which was the common military hurrah of the ground forces that would commit these acts.
So yes, your first point is correct, Imperial Japan is to Asian history as Nazi Germany is to European history.
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@faraday To judge that it was "just as bad" or not is in bad faith. You would not be saying these things if you researched what the Rape of Nanking was. Even the Nazis took issue with it.
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@marsmrsmars said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
To judge that it was "just as bad" or not is in bad faith. You would not be saying these things if you researched what the Rape of Nanking was. Even the Nazis took issue with it
To be clear, I am not making a personal value judgement here. I am familiar with Nanking and a number of other things that happened in the Pacific theater.
I am merely stating what I believe to be the pervasive American cultural viewpoint, based on what our public education covers, what our popular media covers, etc.
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@marsmrsmars said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
Ex-Nazis are explicitly disallowed in character generation which I assume extends to fascism, which Nazi Germany is the poster boys for.
That's an interesting question. I wonder whether, say, an Italian army veteran who fought in the Ethiopian campaign would be permitted. I would guess it would depend more on the details of the character concept than the bare facts per se (e.g., a character disgusted by what their country did and determined to stop the spread of fascism would get a very different response from an enthusiastic Mussolini-ite) -- but that's just a guess on my part, since I have no more insight on staff's decisionmaking than anyone else.
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It's super extreme under any circumstances to suggest that administrators are racist, or that the game has "wrong racial feels" or whatever just because they don't outright ban or alt-history every single bad thing that anyone ever did in that time period. Like, I wouldn't go around thinking @Seraphim73 or @GirlCalledBlu were racist even if they DID allow Nazis, or racism, or sexism, because omg you can explore these themes on a game without being racist, sexist, and/or a Nazi yourself.
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I see that the main theme here is simply mischaracterization of issues put forth, rather than honest engagement with those issues. I didn't ask for them to alt-history every bad thing that anyone ever did @bear_necessities , in fact I think doing so lessens the impact of 'fighting fascism' as the game advertised. However, when a game bans ex-Nazi characters, I assume that applies to all grotesque and outright evil regimes of the time period, who were also in alliance with said Nazis.
I think you're projecting your own issues with banning these things onto this thread, since the administrators have multiple rules in place against all the things that you seem to take an issue with banning.
Pointing out issues with a game regarding racism does not mean someone is accusing the game administration team.
Wrong racial feels? Where'd you get that? Or did you just make that up to accentuate the absurdity of your feigned outrage?
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@bear_necessities said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:
It's super extreme under any circumstances to suggest that administrators are racist, or that the game has "wrong racial feels" or whatever just because they don't outright ban or alt-history every single bad thing that anyone ever did in that time period. Like, I wouldn't go around thinking @Seraphim73 or @GirlCalledBlu were racist even if they DID allow Nazis, or racism, or sexism, because omg you can explore these themes on a game without being racist, sexist, and/or a Nazi yourself.
Can, but ... based on experience, usually don't.
There's honestly way too much Nazi sympathy out there in the world these days and I'm glad @Seraphim73 & @GirlCalledBlu chose to simplify things with some hard lines in the sand.
I don't think playing a fascist makes you a fascist but I think a game with fascism as a theme where you can play a fascist will almost definitely attract some people who are here to live out their fascist dreams.
Also to be really fair to @marsmrsmars, that's not what they said.
I don't want to go into details but since already one person on this game managed to annoy me with something that felt uncomfortably close to Holocaust denial, though it's entirely possible I misread, misinterpreted, or am naturally inclined to overreact and be on extra high alert because it's an emotive topic — I'm just really glad this person wasn't actually playing a Nazi, and is unable to, or I might not have reacted as calmly and as I did. But like I said, staff handled it well.
I'm keen to defend this game too but also, can we please not dogpile @marsmrsmars who's raising concerns. A kneejerk reaction to allegations of racism, even if you don't agree with those allegations, is never a good look.
