$\"A$ <\/a>
Photo via Flickr user Megan Knight (http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/meganknight\/5497474167\/)<\/p><\/div>\n
That\u2019s a pretty provocative statement, right there. But I\u2019m confident in making it, because the evidence is there for anyone who wants to see it. You could start by flipping open a copy of pretty much any D&D book and looking through the artwork. See how many women and people of colour you can find \u2013 and then see how many of them are half-dressed or made to look weak or submissive.<\/p>\n

Actually, you don\u2019t need to, because someone already did it for you. Anna Kreider reviewed the artwork in the D&D 4th edition<\/a> books (specifically the Dungeon Master\u2019s Guide<\/strong>, Players Handbook<\/strong>, Players Handbook 2<\/strong> and the Adventurer\u2019s Vault<\/strong>) and rated the images therein.<\/p>\n
Kreider\u2019s findings were striking \u2013 of the 40% or so of humans (and demi-humans) that were depicted as female, well over a third hit each of the measures she chose (being half-dressed or posed in a sexually suggestive way, for instance). Needless to say, the remaining 60% of images, the ones which were of men, tended to be wearing more clothes, in more active, non-sexual poses.<\/p>\n
It gets better, because Chris Van Dyke had a look at D&D from the perspective of race<\/a>. He was able to find only two examples of a non-white character in the core books of all four numbered editions of D&D. That means non-white folks are practically invisible in D&D.<\/p>\n

Now, these findings are based on subjective judgements. That\u2019s unavoidable, because things like \u201csexually suggestive\u201d and \u201cwhite\u201d can often only be judged subjectively in artwork. You can go and judge for yourself if you doubt their conclusions. But I think if we\u2019re honest, these results only confirm what most of us already knew from experience.<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t the end of the world. I\u2019ve enjoyed lots of pop culture replete with sexism. And after all, it\u2019s only a fantasy! But then again, shouldn\u2019t our fantasy worlds contain a richer variety of creatures than real life? And what does it say to potential new gamers if they can\u2019t find a picture of someone like them anywhere in these books? Is D&D really just a game about white dudes slugging it out in a dungeon somewhere? I don\u2019t think so.<\/p>\n

OK, so what to do about it? I love roleplaying, and despite years of moaning about the mechanics, I still love D&D. The fact that it\u2019s not exactly a beacon of gender and racial equality is, for me, an obstacle to be overcome rather than a sign I should give up on the game altogether.<\/p>\n

It so happens that Wizards of the Coast<\/a> are writing a new edition of D&D right now. That\u2019s why I put together a petition calling on them to do better<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve read this far, maybe you agree with me \u2013 and if so, it would be great if you went and signed it<\/a>, and better yet share it with your friends and encourage them to sign too.<\/p>\n

The petition won\u2019t change anything in itself. Wizards of the Coast could ignore it, and maybe they will. But if they can see that there are hundreds of gamers out there who want more than whitewash and chainmail bikinis, maybe they\u2019ll respond. We owe it to the hobby to give them a clear message.<\/p>\n

\n
Rabalias<\/strong> is a leftie, feminist Londoner and veteran roleplayer. He plays and GMs more than any normal person and less than he’d like to. He designs games in the time he has left over from playing them, and blogs about roleplaying at Black Armada<\/strong><\/a>. Rabalias has two cats and a lady companion who also roleplays, which is pretty sweet. <\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li>
More<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul>

LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Email<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li>
Print<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Who else is into tabletop roleplaying and sick of all the whitewashing and chainmail bikinis?<\/p>\n

Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li>
More<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul>

LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li>
Email<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li>
Print<\/span><\/a><\/li>
<\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[8,13],"tags":[4040,4044,4047,4038,855,1257,1259,4039,4045,2368,2470,2492,2593,4043,2766,4046,4041,4042,4037],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2xLWb-3nx","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12991"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12991\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}