The crux of it is this: systemic problems require systemic solutions. If you don't recognize that a problem is systemic in nature, your treatment will be overly superficial (e.g., "I'm not prejudiced because I have black friends, therefore all racism in society is solved. Done!"). Prejudice is an aspect of racism, but it has to be understood in terms of the broader societal context. Note that the context is a constant regardless of the scale, an understanding which is missing from your analysis.
Let me preface this by saying that I don't actually disagree with you here; the structural/systemic elements of racism have adressed poorly so far and are definitely the ones that need the most attention right now. In my original post I mentioned the problem of placing "medium-sized" actors - organizations like the KKK, other supremacist groups, racist or at least strongly prejudiced communities - but of course these can only "be a thing" because they're imbedded in systems that somehow allow them to exist. But in the end, racism is both a bottom-up and top-down issue, that's why I think it's not helpful to completely cut one half of it out of the definition.
I'm trying to think of an analogy here. Let's say Johnny's mom tells Johnny he needs to wash his hair. Johnny knows washing his hair involves using shampoo, which is a liquid. He sees a bucket of mercury, which is a liquid. Ah! Shampoo! He dumps it on his head. No Johnny, mom says, that's not shampoo. But it's a liquid! You can't redefine shampoo to not be a liquid! Maybe the mercury is getting to him.
You're right, it's a top-down and bottom-up issue, and both need to be integrated together into the whole for our understanding.
On the smaller, more personal level, comments like "that's racist (of you)" are most commonly understood to refer to "small r racism", similar to "that's homophobic." It would be good if people didn't always take it as a personal attack and instead saw it as an opportunity to reflect on their own biases and the context of their daily lives, but frankly I don't think it's possible with such a loaded term. Maybe I'm too pessimistic, I don't know.
Note that I'm here making a good faith effort to explain everything, far from the attitude that "it's not my job to educate you." And I don't think that the left really has a choice in its strategy of using language correctly. So while I understand where you're coming from I think you should consider more why the left's ideology has the features it does.
Oh, the bit about the "it's not my job to educate you" was in reference to the Twitter threads and the general debate on this topic. I appreciate that you're taking your time with this, although I think we're pretty much on the same page. A lot of online/media debate is focused on "winning" an argument, "destroying" / "canceling" someone, "exposing" them for what they really are, etc. While there definitely are many people that you simply can't get through to, I do think that those judgments are often made too quickly. Of course Twitter with its low character limit encourages this from all participants in any given conversation.
Accusing someone of being racist is a surefire way to get their back up and force them into becoming defensive. That particular individual can in the long term respond in two ways: double down on the racism to get back at people who bruised their ego (the narcissistic rage route), or reflect on what they said and adjust their language in the future (the developing social skills route). Especially over the internet, we often don't know how an individual will handle criticism. But unless it's a conversation in a PM, other people will be influenced seeing these discussions and may be helped by seeing racism identified through the example of the criticized individual. Still, the effectiveness of the rhetoric can be a mixed bag, since culturally right-wing people have solidarity with one another in the effort to resist the "libs." No outside voice will penetrate into that community. They take it as a principle to never compromise, value faith over reason, etc. They've all collectively decided to double down, the way the situation is unfolding makes it unlikely for peaceful resolution to be possible.
I agree that cancel culture is toxic. But I think it derives more so from immaturity than ideology.
The reason I keep asking if you understood the context of my post is because I’m alluding to Breonna Taylor, a young black woman who was gunned down in her own home by plainclothes officers executing a no-knock warrant. Breonna Taylor didn’t get the benefit of a safe space where she could just stop being black long enough for a night’s sleep, let alone talk about fantasy card games. I get that this thread and this conversation is an obstacle to your escape from reality - whatever that might be - but it’s still absolutely critical that we have it, even here, on a random Magic forum.
Which is sad, tragic, and unfortunate event to that person.
As for the ‘tags,’ I obviously can’t speak for you, but: it’s simply no longer acceptable on our part to say “I don’t see color,” because that implies that the social and economic barriers people face on a daily basis don’t fundamentally shape their lives.
Wrong. The hurdles in your life may shape you, but that does not ultimately define you.
He didn't say a person was defined by them. He was talking about how their life experience was defined.
No one is saying you can't be a mystical existentialist if that's what you really want. In fact, probably the stupidest and most irrational thing about racism is the idea that skin color has any casual relationship to moral character. Yet that doesn't mean we should ignore the fact that real people do believe such things and act accordingly. The reality of our society is that people of color are treated differently because of their socially designated race. Are you really seeing a person's "inner light" if you refuse to acknowledge that they also have those experiences?
Being blind to color is being blind to the injustices perpetuated because of it. It's not deep; it's not even shallow.
Being blind to color is being blind to the injustices perpetuated because of it. It's not deep; it's not even shallow.
No.
Being blind to color would mean you threat everyone as a person, and individual.
If someone is discriminated, its a individual, and you solve the issues.
If a person gets hurt, in todays age, a entire mob jumps on the issue and proclaims its a racist crime, while its nothing remotely like that, its just a crime, no racism at all.
So a lot of issues get inflated and overblown into a topic of racism thats simply not real and it is pushing the entire argument in a direction that is not grounded in reality.
And if baseless or speculative claims are made that something is supposedly racist, while its not, then there is nothing to fight against, but the mob is still attacking anybody based on that claims ; and thats a fight that cannot end, as there are no winners and everyone loses, it ends in pure destruction, anarchy, blood and death ; it completely derails anything into utter chaos, thats 100% not helpful to anybody.
Being blind to color is being blind to the injustices perpetuated because of it. It's not deep; it's not even shallow.
No.
Being blind to color would mean you threat everyone as a person, and individual.
If someone is discriminated, its a individual, and you solve the issues.
And here we have the ontological individualist.
There's a thing that exists: black people as a group. Groups exist. The existence of groups does not diminish the individuals that comprise them, but makes them be the individuals that they are in their full, concrete existence. You can't solve everything just by treating the individual situation; you must treat the causes, not the symptoms.
If a person gets hurt, in todays age, a entire mob jumps on the issue and proclaims its a racist crime, while its nothing remotely like that, its just a crime, no racism at all.
That's a funny thing to think, given the statistics of those crimes.
So a lot of issues get inflated and overblown into a topic of racism thats simply not real and it is pushing the entire argument in a direction that is not grounded in reality.
And if baseless or speculative claims are made that something is supposedly racist, while its not, then there is nothing to fight against, but the mob is still attacking anybody based on that claims ; and thats a fight that cannot end, as there are no winners and everyone loses, it ends in pure destruction, anarchy, blood and death ; it completely derails anything into utter chaos, thats 100% not helpful to anybody.
So you think the banned cards aren't actually racist. Alright, I have a challenge for you. Define for me something that would actually be racist.
If you see art like Invoke prejudice, it is displayed as a vision / dream of smoke.
Its a vision of exactly what the name implies.
But why ban that art ?
It displays something everyone will recognize as bad, when you learn about its meaning, and its just as bad as we all agree Murder is bad.
But just because art displays something we all agree on is evil, doesnt justify to ban the art.
As i explained in detail in my above comment already, you have to accept art for what it is, a depiction of fantasy.
Countless people look at Invoke prejudice and do not know about the historic detail, they dont see any problem with it.
And if you happen to see it (which is already incredible unlikely as the card is so old, expensive and all that) , what is your response ?
Is someone freaking out in panic looking at that art ?
Really ? Absolute not.
So why ban that card, when so many other stuff displays disturbing art and thats a non-issue.
----
The artist made the art not with the intention to hate on the historic events, but knew about it and made the art as it very well expresses the name Invoke prejudice, you could even say its a perfect depiction of any form of prejudice.
The art itself is not racist, it displays a historic event (in a cloudy smoke style) that is absolutely racist by nature, but that doesnt make the art racist itself and it doesnt glorify what happens, and it doesnt make it look acceptable or anything.
I have seen the card get played a lot of times, and what it usually does the first time someone sees it and recognizes the Clans-Men , is "Wow, damn" ; and thats about it, you accept the art for what it is, and thats about it.
Banning the card doesnt do anything good, its pointless pandering and a show.
----
You dont start by banning everything and then pick what you deem ok, someone has to make that picking and some authority will have to judge what is ok and what is not.
I dont like anybody to be that authority, art should always be allowed to express and display what the artist wants to show ; and the viewer of the art will then interpret the art with their own feelings and memories.
Its the beauty of art to allow that.
Before art is commissioned and released of course you can decide what art you want to have on a card.
This does obviously not mean that anything should be put on a card, but the art was approved, accepted and got released, it was around for 25+ years, and then suddenly by events in the real world, decide to retroactive go ahead and ban the art, the card and make a giant fuss about it, doesnt do any good at all, so there is no point in doing that, only pandering to a mob that is asking for book burning and destruction of history.
Its much more valuable to keep a card like Invoke prejudice around, as the card is part of magics history and the act of erasing it entirely is just the surrender to your own incapability to deal with the cards meaning and history.
Artist Harold McNeill's entire art style in Magic is depicted as lotsofcloudsandsmoke. When he was asked about Invoke Prejudice, he mentioned his vision was the Spanish Inquisition. Thing is, his actual white supremacist beliefs (seriously, look him up if you haven't) have been reflected on the card art, whether he meant them too or not. That's a very close to the discussion example of why context is everything. Sure, in an ideal world the art is cringeworthy at worst, but there are people who are affected by it nonetheless. The intent may make it damning, but the effect is there whether you like it or not. There's a reason accidental theft, arson, and murder are still crimes: because the effect is there.
Context is everything, as much as you wish for it not to be so. We're fine with whatever Captive Audience is implying, because we know there's not way that will actually happen in public. Murder the card is fine, despite depicting something that actually happens, because we have the context of a card game with combat and creatures that supersedes the very illegal real-life action it's depicting, plus murder in general (ignoring more nuanced statistics) is an everyone thing. Invoke Prejudice and cards like Stone-Throwing Devils do happen in the context of a card, but also carry a very heavy negative real-life cultural reaction. Murder can happen to anyone. Whatever Invoke Prejudice is depicting only happens/ed to a very specific group of people.
The authority you're looking for that dictates these things is the court of public opinion. Majority opinion controls social and moral norms.
Finally, you seem to have this recurring point that people need to stop thinking of groups and focus solely on the individual. The problems lies in that we don't really do that. We didn't reach the top of the global food chain alone. Humans very much prefer being in groups, and it still reflects to this day.
There's a thing that exists: black people as a group. Groups exist.
So a gang member of the Bloods or Crips is just part of the "black group" ?
They have very different issues, and its always the individual that is about to fix their own misery in life.
Get away from gangs, get away from violence, get away from drugs.
Get a job and make a lawful living, helps a lot.
Non of these issues have anything to do with the "black group" , they are individual issues and everyone has to fix them on their own personal level.
The group think is a petty excuse to not fix anything and just blame everything on being oppressed as a group, which is silly by nature, as the supposed group is not a group at all, as each of them is an individual with its own background, its own history and capabilities.
The existence of groups does not diminish the individuals that comprise them, but makes them be the individuals that they are in their full, concrete existence. You can't solve everything just by treating the individual situation; you must treat the causes, not the symptoms.
You cannot fix anything by group think, as some people in that group will have the problems you try to fix and others do not, but you give all of the people the same treatment, which is unfair by nature, as it does not take the individual into account.
Any law and action that is only looking at a group and not the individual is DOOMED to be unjust and unfair.
That's a funny thing to think, given the statistics of those crimes.
There is nothing funny about it. And its sick to think these issues are funny in any way.
You either have proper justice, or you have mob rule that will jump and attack everyone before any justice is spoken at all.
Mob rule is the worst kind of proclaimed justice you can ever have.
You would expect people learned from history that this only produces more hate, aggression and utter chaos.
So you think the banned cards aren't actually racist. Alright, I have a challenge for you. Define for me something that would actually be racist.
There is not a single magic card that is explicitly racist.
For art that is explicitly racist, just google for these images you will find them aplenty.
If art displays a historic event accurately even if it shows racism, the art itself is not racist.
----
A similar issue arouse with Terese Nielsen , supposed twitter comments, and suddenly people destroy her cards publicly and go on a "book burning" rampage against the artist.
Then the artist itself is attacked, shunt and damaged in their job and the mob descents to tear her apart.
Such hate is disgusting, its not solving any supposed problems, but attacking what a group proclaims to be problematic and then they just leash out for it.
As adults you would expect people to be able to solve their issues peacefully, in dialog and find solutions everyone can agree on.
Instead we get mob rule, someone claims victim status and uses that as a weapon to ban and remove an artist, label them racist, bigot or what not, and nobody that is the target of such a mob is able to defend themselves, as the defense itself is labeled an act of guilt and justifies hitting more and harder on the victim.
This kind of violence is disgusting, pathetic and the essence of evil.
The supposed victims just become perpetrator themselves, and in the mob, they stop thinking, they stop judging the individual, they dont see the damage they cause and in the end, an entire city is burning and nobody wants to remember who is responsible anymore, as nobody thinks as an individual, but surrenders in group think, that fuels the angry mob that only seeks destruction.
There's a thing that exists: black people as a group. Groups exist.
So a gang member of the Bloods or Crips is just part of the "black group" ?
They have very different issues, and its always the individual that is about to fix their own misery in life.
Get away from gangs, get away from violence, get away from drugs.
Get a job and make a lawful living, helps a lot.
Non of these issues have anything to do with the "black group" , they are individual issues and everyone has to fix them on their own personal level.
The group think is a petty excuse to not fix anything and just blame everything on being oppressed as a group, which is silly by nature, as the supposed group is not a group at all, as each of them is an individual with its own background, its own history and capabilities.
The existence of groups does not diminish the individuals that comprise them, but makes them be the individuals that they are in their full, concrete existence. You can't solve everything just by treating the individual situation; you must treat the causes, not the symptoms.
You cannot fix anything by group think, as some people in that group will have the problems you try to fix and others do not, but you give all of the people the same treatment, which is unfair by nature, as it does not take the individual into account.
Any law and action that is only looking at a group and not the individual is DOOMED to be unjust and unfair.
That's a funny thing to think, given the statistics of those crimes.
There is nothing funny about it. And its sick to think these issues are funny in any way.
You either have proper justice, or you have mob rule that will jump and attack everyone before any justice is spoken at all.
Mob rule is the worst kind of proclaimed justice you can ever have.
You would expect people learned from history that this only produces more hate, aggression and utter chaos.
So you think the banned cards aren't actually racist. Alright, I have a challenge for you. Define for me something that would actually be racist.
There is not a single magic card that is explicitly racist.
For art that is explicitly racist, just google for these images you will find them aplenty.
If art displays a historic event accurately even if it shows racism, the art itself is not racist.
----
A similar issue arouse with Terese Nielsen , supposed twitter comments, and suddenly people destroy her cards publicly and go on a "book burning" rampage against the artist.
Then the artist itself is attacked, shunt and damaged in their job and the mob descents to tear her apart.
Such hate is disgusting, its not solving any supposed problems, but attacking what a group proclaims to be problematic and then they just leash out for it.
As adults you would expect people to be able to solve their issues peacefully, in dialog and find solutions everyone can agree on.
Instead we get mob rule, someone claims victim status and uses that as a weapon to ban and remove an artist, label them racist, bigot or what not, and nobody that is the target of such a mob is able to defend themselves, as the defense itself is labeled an act of guilt and justifies hitting more and harder on the victim.
This kind of violence is disgusting, pathetic and the essence of evil.
The supposed victims just become perpetrator themselves, and in the mob, they stop thinking, they stop judging the individual, they dont see the damage they cause and in the end, an entire city is burning and nobody wants to remember who is responsible anymore, as nobody thinks as an individual, but surrenders in group think, that fuels the angry mob that only seeks destruction.
----
i feel like you're focusing entirely too much on just the art. its about the entire card. you have to take all of it into consideration. stone throwing devils for instance. the art is just some devils throwing rocks. that's fine, nothing so bad about that. when you tack on the name, which is a racial slur, the art becomes irrelevant there. invoke is a perfect storm of name, art, mechanic, and artists views. crusade, jihad, imprison, cleanse also have to incorporate the art with the name, and the mechanics. we can't pick and choose the aspects of a card that we don't find racist and say the entire thing is or isn't. if those elements all come together it can and does change how its perceived by others. it can be about the whole as much as it can be about just one aspect.
regardless, i would ask; why are you comfortable with these cards being a part of the game if someone can walk up to a table and interpret them as racist at all? why do you want to be associated with that? if more than a few people feel that way about them (and a large number of players do as these have existed for years, and has been discussed for years) why are you comfortable with them being offended at all?
pressure doesn't just come from without either. wotc is a company run by people. their feelings and views will be reflected in the end product. its not just about public pressure, there was surely a lot of internal pressure as well. shouldn't it be okay to act on something deemed racist if the public is for acting, and the internal team members are too? isn't it better to make the game more approachable, to expand the audience, rather than let it shrink?
There's a thing that exists: black people as a group. Groups exist.
So a gang member of the Bloods or Crips is just part of the "black group" ?
Interesting that I posited the existence of black people as a group and your first reply is to mention gangs.
They have very different issues, and its always the individual that is about to fix their own misery in life.
Get away from gangs, get away from violence, get away from drugs.
Get a job and make a lawful living, helps a lot.
Thanks, elementary school DARE speaker. That was illuminating.
Non of these issues have anything to do with the "black group" , they are individual issues and everyone has to fix them on their own personal level.
Except for all of the issues that do have to do with the black group and are impossible to solve at a personal level. Like how white supremacists have infiltrated police forces around the country in order to institutionally target black people for incarceration, violence, and even murder.
The group think is a petty excuse to not fix anything and just blame everything on being oppressed as a group, which is silly by nature, as the supposed group is not a group at all, as each of them is an individual with its own background, its own history and capabilities.
You're creating a false dilemma between "group think" and acknowledging the individual. You can actually do both.
You cannot fix anything by group think, as some people in that group will have the problems you try to fix and others do not, but you give all of the people the same treatment, which is unfair by nature, as it does not take the individual into account.
Yes, this is actually right. You do have to take the individual into account because treating them all the same is unfair. That's exactly my premise. The only difference is the "group think" we're engaging with. You're grouping all people under the category "individual," a universal which is stripped of all the particular content actual individuals have.
It would be a mistake on the other hand to essentialize individuals according to the groups of which they are a part. It would be a mistake to generalize every member of the group being identical. But I'm not proposing either.
Any law and action that is only looking at a group and not the individual is DOOMED to be unjust and unfair.
True. But as the laws and actions in question aren't "only" looking at a group and do also look at individuals, this is a nonissue.
There is nothing funny about it. And its sick to think these issues are funny in any way.
You either have proper justice, or you have mob rule that will jump and attack everyone before any justice is spoken at all.
It's not "haha funny." It's "peculiar funny," as in, it's very odd that you don't think those crimes are racist. Almost as though some bizarre race-based cognitive error is preventing you from seeing the racist nature of the crime...
Mob rule is the worst kind of proclaimed justice you can ever have.
You would expect people learned from history that this only produces more hate, aggression and utter chaos.
And yet, no one has suggested "mob rule."
There is not a single magic card that is explicitly racist.
That's a pretty ridiculous position, considering Invoke Prejudice. It's also irrelevant; what about implicit racism?
For art that is explicitly racist, just google for these images you will find them aplenty.
If art displays a historic event accurately even if it shows racism, the art itself is not racist.
I asked you to provide an example of something that is racist. You keep on telling me things that aren't racist. Please answer the question.
This kind of violence is disgusting, pathetic and the essence of evil.
Oh, but there is no such thing as "that kind of violence." It's only stuff that happens to an individual committed by an individual, right?
i feel like you're focusing entirely too much on just the art. its about the entire card. you have to take all of it into consideration. stone throwing devils for instance. the art is just some devils throwing rocks. that's fine, nothing so bad about that. when you tack on the name, which is a racial slur, the art becomes irrelevant there. invoke is a perfect storm of name, art, mechanic, and artists views. crusade, jihad, imprison, cleanse also have to incorporate the art with the name, and the mechanics. we can't pick and choose the aspects of a card that we don't find racist and say the entire thing is or isn't. if those elements all come together it can and does change how its perceived by others. it can be about the whole as much as it can be about just one aspect.
And no matter the reason i would not ban the image.
Its more valuable to have it around and have that dialog, than banning the image and claiming it never existed.
Erasing history is on its own destructive, as once banned, removing the ban is much more of a burden if social norms keep changing all the time.
Lots of art is controversial, but you dont ban the art because of it.
You will have people that like the art, and they are by proxy labeled racists and people that want to collect these cards for whatever reason are too.
This does not result in anything positive.
regardless, i would ask; why are you comfortable with these cards being a part of the game if someone can walk up to a table and interpret them as racist at all?
There are countless people that use alternate art on their cards, some very sexual art too. In lots of cases thats not a problem at all, i dont have any issue even with pornographic art that someone put on their favorite Commander card.
If someone does, yea, you can take it away, you deal with the INDIVIDUAL of a person, but i do not ban these cards and restrict the freedom of expression of these people that want the art to exist.
If you know children will be around, you will not use these cards, we can all assume some level of understanding of decency.
And i can absolutely see people to claim that a person that feels so deeply offended by a supposed racist card image that they would proclaim the same act of decency, but i also assume that people and especially adults are capable to separate between the real world and a fantasy game.
Some people just assume the worst first and act as if a person wants to personally harm or insult them. Thats hardly if ever the case (and if it is, you have a very individual case between you and that person and you should be able as adults to figure out a peaceful way without attacking anybody).
why do you want to be associated with that?
Nobody wants to associate with anything.
And thats the entire point.
Even if a card depicts something that somebody claims to be racist, they do not have to personally take that as an insult, nor should they.
They can say that they are offended by that particular art, and people will then work it out, but nobody is forced by any authority to agree to that claims.
The issue here is, these cards are by an authority banned from play, the art is removed from databases, and nobody can sell them without being labeled a racist, and nobody can reasonable buy them without being thrown in a group that labels that person a racist.
Thats for more of an issue than what the card potentially could do to some hypothetical person that sees it played on a table, as that is already so far fetched and requires that the person has a strong believe of racism against them (and that mindset is unhealthy to begin with, to believe that people just outright hate you on racist grounds, better not assume the worst first).
In my mind, the entire racist connotation is much more damaging, as anybody can at any moment make such a claim against almost anything, and they should not be pandered to, as it just makes matters worse.
if more than a few people feel that way about them (and a large number of players do as these have existed for years, and has been discussed for years) why are you comfortable with them being offended at all?
The supposed "large number of players" doesnt exist.
How many play these cards at all ?
They exist in some peoples collections and insult absolutely nobody.
The cards where printed in a time in which the issue was not remotely as prevalent as right now.
And banning these cards is absolutely 100% only based on current world situations, and such actionism is bad, as its irrational.
pressure doesn't just come from without either.
I also advocate to never give in to that kind of pressure.
If a mob demands immediate actions, that mob is unjust and nobody should give in to that.
If anybody gives in to pressure from a mob, it validates the violence and the acts of aggression.
And such violence and aggression should under no circumstances ever get what they demand, as it only fuels the next hate mob that makes demands, and then the next and it never ends.
Its the same logic to never negotiate with terrorists.
If you ever give them what they want, they will continue to pressure and get more and more, it doesnt end.
You stop right at the start, and never give in, thats the only way to stop it.
wotc is a company run by people. their feelings and views will be reflected in the end product. its not just about public pressure, there was surely a lot of internal pressure as well. shouldn't it be okay to act on something deemed racist if the public is for acting, and the internal team members are too?
The people have their own ideology and agenda.
Yes, WotC agenda is questionable in its own right.
I dont agree with lots of them, but i dont go ahead and demand them banning anything, i am even grateful to get as many viewpoints and opinions as humanly possible, as it enriches our minds.
isn't it better to make the game more approachable, to expand the audience, rather than let it shrink?
Instead of expanding its more shifting the audience.
The game grows no matter what, as people of all kinds of opinions play the game and they form groups.
Some groups just cant smell each other, they wont play together, thats ok too, you will never get two extremes together, so why force it.
The company in itself is always pandering to someone, they try to attract "everyone", but some actions always go in contrast to another, you can never be equally fair to everyone, its just not going to work, so its a ever balancing process if you try to.
And i am absolutely in favor of exploring more fantasy, why not, it enriches everything to do so, even the darker fantasy, which does include slavery, demons and devils, violence, just as more passion in love and compassion ; a fantasy world allows all of that, and neither should be banned.
A problematic claim is "the public" , like its a single minded person that all thinks the same.
Thats absolutely not the case.
"The public" demands is pandering to the loudest mob of people, which can be an absolute minority, they just screech the loudest and feel offended by everything, to justify spreading their hate and aggression.
I am opposed to banning anything if its not absolutely necessary.
Listening to the loudest people doesnt mean you hear all the voices, it just means you take a very stupid shortcut to silence the loudest mob, while ignoring anybody else.
Again, these cards are not being removed from the game. They're being removed from official events sanctioned by the company itself. As this company wishes to be more inclusive, they chose to ban playing those cards ONLY in events THEY, THE COMPANY, OFFICIALLY SANCTION. That's it. Your cards are not going to be removed from the game's history, taken from you then burned. You can still play with these cards at home, just not at any officially-sanctioned events. That's it.
Rather like removing cards such as Chaos Orb removed a physical element to the game they didn't want in official play didn't magically prevent people from playing those cards at home, but did remove a potential physical barrier from people from official events in a game that otherwise does not require explicitly physical skills to play. You can still play with those types of cards at home, just not at any officially-sanctioned events. And the history of those cards being in the game remains intact.
Rather like removing ante cards doesn't in any way prevent people at home from playing for ante or with those cards, but does prevent you from having cards permanently taken from you in official events without your consent, as well as removing an explicit gambling element from the game. You can still play with those cards and for ante, just not at any officially-sanctioned events. And the history of those cards and the ante mechanic being in the game remains intact.
In the same way that removing a statue isn't erasing history, it's just removing a memorial to someone from public spaces. Somehow, magically, we can look at post-WWII Germany, not see anymore publicly displayed fascist statues or imagery, yet have deep, complex, nuanced, and THOROUGH histories of that time intact, without a single need to maintain officially-sanctioned public imagery commemorating the acts or the people involved.
This is nothing more than taking some problematic combinations of imagery, words, and effects that have a profoundly negative context to those historically or currently harmed by the aforementioned (and no, no one else gets to tell the marginalized they are not being harmed, and that somehow intent or the lack thereof negates that harm), and removing them from officially-sanctioned public events. The end.
When WotC decides they can take your cards away from you and destroy them, or otherwise utterly erase their existence from the game as a whole instead of merely at official events, then there might be a leg to stand on in terms of accusing them of trying to actually erase history.
Artist Harold McNeill's entire art style in Magic is depicted as lotsofcloudsandsmoke. When he was asked about Invoke Prejudice, he mentioned his vision was the Spanish Inquisition. Thing is, his actual white supremacist beliefs (seriously, look him up if you haven't) have been reflected on the card art, whether he meant them too or not.
This actually brings me to a point which may not yet have been mentioned. I do sincerely hope that the cards you linked above (I'll say Darkness and Enduring Renewal are among my favorite Magic artworks!) will now not get banned just because their art was drawn by a known white supremacist. That, I feel, would be a step too far.
Artist Harold McNeill's entire art style in Magic is depicted as lotsofcloudsandsmoke. When he was asked about Invoke Prejudice, he mentioned his vision was the Spanish Inquisition. Thing is, his actual white supremacist beliefs (seriously, look him up if you haven't) have been reflected on the card art, whether he meant them too or not.
This actually brings me to a point which may not yet have been mentioned. I do sincerely hope that the cards you linked above (I'll say Darkness and Enduring Renewal are among my favorite Magic artworks!) will now not get banned just because their art was drawn by a known white supremacist. That, I feel, would be a step too far.
A lot of people fear that, but that would be a step too far. Just because a racist creates something doesnt make it inherently racist. Again, we have to look at the whole, not just who made it
Hey mods, would you care to move this thread to Talk & Entertainment? Clearly this has little bearing on MTG as a whole and more just as a way for people to in general talk about off topic things.
Can we keep it here, in a forum that doesn’t get a third as much (or less) foot traffic? The card bannings themselves are a paltry event in the grand scheme of things; having a critical conversation where it’ll get the most visibility is actually the best thing that can come of WotC’s recent actions. I’m confident you can ignore just this one little thread, if it really bothers you that much.
Artist Harold McNeill's entire art style in Magic is depicted as lotsofcloudsandsmoke. When he was asked about Invoke Prejudice, he mentioned his vision was the Spanish Inquisition. Thing is, his actual white supremacist beliefs (seriously, look him up if you haven't) have been reflected on the card art, whether he meant them too or not.
This actually brings me to a point which may not yet have been mentioned. I do sincerely hope that the cards you linked above (I'll say Darkness and Enduring Renewal are among my favorite Magic artworks!) will now not get banned just because their art was drawn by a known white supremacist. That, I feel, would be a step too far.
A lot of people fear that, but that would be a step too far. Just because a racist creates something doesnt make it inherently racist. Again, we have to look at the whole, not just who made it
Separating the art from the artist is part of a much larger philosophical conversation, one that still requires context and doesn’t always have easy answers.
This thread has, once again, gone completely off course. This is a gaming forum. While this decision by Wizards has political ramifications, the conversation should remain tied to what this decision means in terms of the game.
This is NOT the place to hold your political rally.
I'm trying to think of an analogy here. Let's say Johnny's mom tells Johnny he needs to wash his hair. Johnny knows washing his hair involves using shampoo, which is a liquid. He sees a bucket of mercury, which is a liquid. Ah! Shampoo! He dumps it on his head. No Johnny, mom says, that's not shampoo. But it's a liquid! You can't redefine shampoo to not be a liquid! Maybe the mercury is getting to him.
You're right, it's a top-down and bottom-up issue, and both need to be integrated together into the whole for our understanding.
Accusing someone of being racist is a surefire way to get their back up and force them into becoming defensive. That particular individual can in the long term respond in two ways: double down on the racism to get back at people who bruised their ego (the narcissistic rage route), or reflect on what they said and adjust their language in the future (the developing social skills route). Especially over the internet, we often don't know how an individual will handle criticism. But unless it's a conversation in a PM, other people will be influenced seeing these discussions and may be helped by seeing racism identified through the example of the criticized individual. Still, the effectiveness of the rhetoric can be a mixed bag, since culturally right-wing people have solidarity with one another in the effort to resist the "libs." No outside voice will penetrate into that community. They take it as a principle to never compromise, value faith over reason, etc. They've all collectively decided to double down, the way the situation is unfolding makes it unlikely for peaceful resolution to be possible.
I agree that cancel culture is toxic. But I think it derives more so from immaturity than ideology.
He didn't say a person was defined by them. He was talking about how their life experience was defined.
No one is saying you can't be a mystical existentialist if that's what you really want. In fact, probably the stupidest and most irrational thing about racism is the idea that skin color has any casual relationship to moral character. Yet that doesn't mean we should ignore the fact that real people do believe such things and act accordingly. The reality of our society is that people of color are treated differently because of their socially designated race. Are you really seeing a person's "inner light" if you refuse to acknowledge that they also have those experiences?
Being blind to color is being blind to the injustices perpetuated because of it. It's not deep; it's not even shallow.
No.
Being blind to color would mean you threat everyone as a person, and individual.
If someone is discriminated, its a individual, and you solve the issues.
If a person gets hurt, in todays age, a entire mob jumps on the issue and proclaims its a racist crime, while its nothing remotely like that, its just a crime, no racism at all.
So a lot of issues get inflated and overblown into a topic of racism thats simply not real and it is pushing the entire argument in a direction that is not grounded in reality.
And if baseless or speculative claims are made that something is supposedly racist, while its not, then there is nothing to fight against, but the mob is still attacking anybody based on that claims ; and thats a fight that cannot end, as there are no winners and everyone loses, it ends in pure destruction, anarchy, blood and death ; it completely derails anything into utter chaos, thats 100% not helpful to anybody.
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And here we have the ontological individualist.
There's a thing that exists: black people as a group. Groups exist. The existence of groups does not diminish the individuals that comprise them, but makes them be the individuals that they are in their full, concrete existence. You can't solve everything just by treating the individual situation; you must treat the causes, not the symptoms.
That's a funny thing to think, given the statistics of those crimes.
So you think the banned cards aren't actually racist. Alright, I have a challenge for you. Define for me something that would actually be racist.
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Spoiler EditorArtist Harold McNeill's entire art style in Magic is depicted as lots of clouds and smoke. When he was asked about Invoke Prejudice, he mentioned his vision was the Spanish Inquisition. Thing is, his actual white supremacist beliefs (seriously, look him up if you haven't) have been reflected on the card art, whether he meant them too or not. That's a very close to the discussion example of why context is everything. Sure, in an ideal world the art is cringeworthy at worst, but there are people who are affected by it nonetheless. The intent may make it damning, but the effect is there whether you like it or not. There's a reason accidental theft, arson, and murder are still crimes: because the effect is there.
Context is everything, as much as you wish for it not to be so. We're fine with whatever Captive Audience is implying, because we know there's not way that will actually happen in public. Murder the card is fine, despite depicting something that actually happens, because we have the context of a card game with combat and creatures that supersedes the very illegal real-life action it's depicting, plus murder in general (ignoring more nuanced statistics) is an everyone thing. Invoke Prejudice and cards like Stone-Throwing Devils do happen in the context of a card, but also carry a very heavy negative real-life cultural reaction. Murder can happen to anyone. Whatever Invoke Prejudice is depicting only happens/ed to a very specific group of people.
The authority you're looking for that dictates these things is the court of public opinion. Majority opinion controls social and moral norms.
Finally, you seem to have this recurring point that people need to stop thinking of groups and focus solely on the individual. The problems lies in that we don't really do that. We didn't reach the top of the global food chain alone. Humans very much prefer being in groups, and it still reflects to this day.
So a gang member of the Bloods or Crips is just part of the "black group" ?
They have very different issues, and its always the individual that is about to fix their own misery in life.
Get away from gangs, get away from violence, get away from drugs.
Get a job and make a lawful living, helps a lot.
Non of these issues have anything to do with the "black group" , they are individual issues and everyone has to fix them on their own personal level.
The group think is a petty excuse to not fix anything and just blame everything on being oppressed as a group, which is silly by nature, as the supposed group is not a group at all, as each of them is an individual with its own background, its own history and capabilities.
You cannot fix anything by group think, as some people in that group will have the problems you try to fix and others do not, but you give all of the people the same treatment, which is unfair by nature, as it does not take the individual into account.
Any law and action that is only looking at a group and not the individual is DOOMED to be unjust and unfair.
There is nothing funny about it. And its sick to think these issues are funny in any way.
You either have proper justice, or you have mob rule that will jump and attack everyone before any justice is spoken at all.
Mob rule is the worst kind of proclaimed justice you can ever have.
You would expect people learned from history that this only produces more hate, aggression and utter chaos.
There is not a single magic card that is explicitly racist.
For art that is explicitly racist, just google for these images you will find them aplenty.
If art displays a historic event accurately even if it shows racism, the art itself is not racist.
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A similar issue arouse with Terese Nielsen , supposed twitter comments, and suddenly people destroy her cards publicly and go on a "book burning" rampage against the artist.
Then the artist itself is attacked, shunt and damaged in their job and the mob descents to tear her apart.
Such hate is disgusting, its not solving any supposed problems, but attacking what a group proclaims to be problematic and then they just leash out for it.
As adults you would expect people to be able to solve their issues peacefully, in dialog and find solutions everyone can agree on.
Instead we get mob rule, someone claims victim status and uses that as a weapon to ban and remove an artist, label them racist, bigot or what not, and nobody that is the target of such a mob is able to defend themselves, as the defense itself is labeled an act of guilt and justifies hitting more and harder on the victim.
This kind of violence is disgusting, pathetic and the essence of evil.
The supposed victims just become perpetrator themselves, and in the mob, they stop thinking, they stop judging the individual, they dont see the damage they cause and in the end, an entire city is burning and nobody wants to remember who is responsible anymore, as nobody thinks as an individual, but surrenders in group think, that fuels the angry mob that only seeks destruction.
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i feel like you're focusing entirely too much on just the art. its about the entire card. you have to take all of it into consideration. stone throwing devils for instance. the art is just some devils throwing rocks. that's fine, nothing so bad about that. when you tack on the name, which is a racial slur, the art becomes irrelevant there. invoke is a perfect storm of name, art, mechanic, and artists views. crusade, jihad, imprison, cleanse also have to incorporate the art with the name, and the mechanics. we can't pick and choose the aspects of a card that we don't find racist and say the entire thing is or isn't. if those elements all come together it can and does change how its perceived by others. it can be about the whole as much as it can be about just one aspect.
regardless, i would ask; why are you comfortable with these cards being a part of the game if someone can walk up to a table and interpret them as racist at all? why do you want to be associated with that? if more than a few people feel that way about them (and a large number of players do as these have existed for years, and has been discussed for years) why are you comfortable with them being offended at all?
pressure doesn't just come from without either. wotc is a company run by people. their feelings and views will be reflected in the end product. its not just about public pressure, there was surely a lot of internal pressure as well. shouldn't it be okay to act on something deemed racist if the public is for acting, and the internal team members are too? isn't it better to make the game more approachable, to expand the audience, rather than let it shrink?
Interesting that I posited the existence of black people as a group and your first reply is to mention gangs.
Thanks, elementary school DARE speaker. That was illuminating.
Except for all of the issues that do have to do with the black group and are impossible to solve at a personal level. Like how white supremacists have infiltrated police forces around the country in order to institutionally target black people for incarceration, violence, and even murder.
You're creating a false dilemma between "group think" and acknowledging the individual. You can actually do both.
Yes, this is actually right. You do have to take the individual into account because treating them all the same is unfair. That's exactly my premise. The only difference is the "group think" we're engaging with. You're grouping all people under the category "individual," a universal which is stripped of all the particular content actual individuals have.
It would be a mistake on the other hand to essentialize individuals according to the groups of which they are a part. It would be a mistake to generalize every member of the group being identical. But I'm not proposing either.
True. But as the laws and actions in question aren't "only" looking at a group and do also look at individuals, this is a nonissue.
It's not "haha funny." It's "peculiar funny," as in, it's very odd that you don't think those crimes are racist. Almost as though some bizarre race-based cognitive error is preventing you from seeing the racist nature of the crime...
And yet, no one has suggested "mob rule."
That's a pretty ridiculous position, considering Invoke Prejudice. It's also irrelevant; what about implicit racism?
I asked you to provide an example of something that is racist. You keep on telling me things that aren't racist. Please answer the question.
Oh, but there is no such thing as "that kind of violence." It's only stuff that happens to an individual committed by an individual, right?
And no matter the reason i would not ban the image.
Its more valuable to have it around and have that dialog, than banning the image and claiming it never existed.
Erasing history is on its own destructive, as once banned, removing the ban is much more of a burden if social norms keep changing all the time.
Lots of art is controversial, but you dont ban the art because of it.
You will have people that like the art, and they are by proxy labeled racists and people that want to collect these cards for whatever reason are too.
This does not result in anything positive.
There are countless people that use alternate art on their cards, some very sexual art too. In lots of cases thats not a problem at all, i dont have any issue even with pornographic art that someone put on their favorite Commander card.
If someone does, yea, you can take it away, you deal with the INDIVIDUAL of a person, but i do not ban these cards and restrict the freedom of expression of these people that want the art to exist.
If you know children will be around, you will not use these cards, we can all assume some level of understanding of decency.
And i can absolutely see people to claim that a person that feels so deeply offended by a supposed racist card image that they would proclaim the same act of decency, but i also assume that people and especially adults are capable to separate between the real world and a fantasy game.
Some people just assume the worst first and act as if a person wants to personally harm or insult them. Thats hardly if ever the case (and if it is, you have a very individual case between you and that person and you should be able as adults to figure out a peaceful way without attacking anybody).
Nobody wants to associate with anything.
And thats the entire point.
Even if a card depicts something that somebody claims to be racist, they do not have to personally take that as an insult, nor should they.
They can say that they are offended by that particular art, and people will then work it out, but nobody is forced by any authority to agree to that claims.
The issue here is, these cards are by an authority banned from play, the art is removed from databases, and nobody can sell them without being labeled a racist, and nobody can reasonable buy them without being thrown in a group that labels that person a racist.
Thats for more of an issue than what the card potentially could do to some hypothetical person that sees it played on a table, as that is already so far fetched and requires that the person has a strong believe of racism against them (and that mindset is unhealthy to begin with, to believe that people just outright hate you on racist grounds, better not assume the worst first).
In my mind, the entire racist connotation is much more damaging, as anybody can at any moment make such a claim against almost anything, and they should not be pandered to, as it just makes matters worse.
The supposed "large number of players" doesnt exist.
How many play these cards at all ?
They exist in some peoples collections and insult absolutely nobody.
The cards where printed in a time in which the issue was not remotely as prevalent as right now.
And banning these cards is absolutely 100% only based on current world situations, and such actionism is bad, as its irrational.
I also advocate to never give in to that kind of pressure.
If a mob demands immediate actions, that mob is unjust and nobody should give in to that.
If anybody gives in to pressure from a mob, it validates the violence and the acts of aggression.
And such violence and aggression should under no circumstances ever get what they demand, as it only fuels the next hate mob that makes demands, and then the next and it never ends.
Its the same logic to never negotiate with terrorists.
If you ever give them what they want, they will continue to pressure and get more and more, it doesnt end.
You stop right at the start, and never give in, thats the only way to stop it.
The people have their own ideology and agenda.
Yes, WotC agenda is questionable in its own right.
I dont agree with lots of them, but i dont go ahead and demand them banning anything, i am even grateful to get as many viewpoints and opinions as humanly possible, as it enriches our minds.
Instead of expanding its more shifting the audience.
The game grows no matter what, as people of all kinds of opinions play the game and they form groups.
Some groups just cant smell each other, they wont play together, thats ok too, you will never get two extremes together, so why force it.
The company in itself is always pandering to someone, they try to attract "everyone", but some actions always go in contrast to another, you can never be equally fair to everyone, its just not going to work, so its a ever balancing process if you try to.
And i am absolutely in favor of exploring more fantasy, why not, it enriches everything to do so, even the darker fantasy, which does include slavery, demons and devils, violence, just as more passion in love and compassion ; a fantasy world allows all of that, and neither should be banned.
A problematic claim is "the public" , like its a single minded person that all thinks the same.
Thats absolutely not the case.
"The public" demands is pandering to the loudest mob of people, which can be an absolute minority, they just screech the loudest and feel offended by everything, to justify spreading their hate and aggression.
I am opposed to banning anything if its not absolutely necessary.
Listening to the loudest people doesnt mean you hear all the voices, it just means you take a very stupid shortcut to silence the loudest mob, while ignoring anybody else.
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Rather like removing cards such as Chaos Orb removed a physical element to the game they didn't want in official play didn't magically prevent people from playing those cards at home, but did remove a potential physical barrier from people from official events in a game that otherwise does not require explicitly physical skills to play. You can still play with those types of cards at home, just not at any officially-sanctioned events. And the history of those cards being in the game remains intact.
Rather like removing ante cards doesn't in any way prevent people at home from playing for ante or with those cards, but does prevent you from having cards permanently taken from you in official events without your consent, as well as removing an explicit gambling element from the game. You can still play with those cards and for ante, just not at any officially-sanctioned events. And the history of those cards and the ante mechanic being in the game remains intact.
In the same way that removing a statue isn't erasing history, it's just removing a memorial to someone from public spaces. Somehow, magically, we can look at post-WWII Germany, not see anymore publicly displayed fascist statues or imagery, yet have deep, complex, nuanced, and THOROUGH histories of that time intact, without a single need to maintain officially-sanctioned public imagery commemorating the acts or the people involved.
This is nothing more than taking some problematic combinations of imagery, words, and effects that have a profoundly negative context to those historically or currently harmed by the aforementioned (and no, no one else gets to tell the marginalized they are not being harmed, and that somehow intent or the lack thereof negates that harm), and removing them from officially-sanctioned public events. The end.
When WotC decides they can take your cards away from you and destroy them, or otherwise utterly erase their existence from the game as a whole instead of merely at official events, then there might be a leg to stand on in terms of accusing them of trying to actually erase history.
A lot of people fear that, but that would be a step too far. Just because a racist creates something doesnt make it inherently racist. Again, we have to look at the whole, not just who made it
Can we keep it here, in a forum that doesn’t get a third as much (or less) foot traffic? The card bannings themselves are a paltry event in the grand scheme of things; having a critical conversation where it’ll get the most visibility is actually the best thing that can come of WotC’s recent actions. I’m confident you can ignore just this one little thread, if it really bothers you that much.
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Separating the art from the artist is part of a much larger philosophical conversation, one that still requires context and doesn’t always have easy answers.
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