I see what you mean, maybe just leaving the minis unpainted is a viable option. But i mean, if you don’t paint the face MIDNIGHT BLACK and the lips RUBY RED you’re probably doing ok for the most part.
Edit/Addition: you’d probably run the risk more if it was a life size bust of Harrison Ford - minis are, well, mini, and you’re not likely to make it look like you’ve done a racist Han Solo monstrosity .
(I don’t think anyone is saying that racism doesn’t exist. @whswhs never said that racism doesn’t exist - he has said he specifically opposed it, along with all other forms of collectivism. He just has a different interpretation of what the solution is - i.e. libertarianism.)
This reminds me of a conversation I had with someone at a UKGE and the subject came up of recent Star Wars films. They tried to say how funny it was, and forced, that consecutive shots had humans of different nationalities*. I was a bit stumped what to do at the time. That feeling of awkwardness was enough to compel me to point out that them thinking that was in some way radical was in itself a shocking indictment of how skewed our world’s media is in representing people. For me this was when the penny fully dropped about representation.
As a result I certainly like your sentiment and I think the efforts of the new Star Wars films to open their universe more is worth building on. While I understand the feeling of it seeming a bit jarring for a recognisable named character to be painted in a different skin tone my guess is that maybe not really enough of a problem to make up for the benefits of implying that you don’t have to be white to be important/a protagonist.
Thank you. Yes. It’s one thing to say, “Here is problem X; I favor solution A.” It’s another thing, when someone says, “I don’t favor solution A,” to go back to, “Well, then, you must not want to solve problem X; you must be in favor of having problem X,” or to, “Well, then, you must not believe that X is a problem.” Maybe their position is “Here is problem X; I favor solution B” and/or “Here is problem X; I think proposed solution A makes problem X worse.”
If we are talking, not about racism in general, but about bengeile’s concerns, I have in fact proposed some ideas for how they might be addressed. It even seemed as if bengeile thought some of them might be helpful.
Star Wars should be the most diverse group of humans imaginable, considering how they must have a much much greater population than us and live in places beyond our imagination (new adaptations to new environments, new cultures as they mix with alien cultures, etc.). I also like to believe that the humans in Star Wars are not racist, sexist, etc. because they are speciest against aliens instead, lol.
haha, you would think right?
The same is true of the idea that sexism doesn’t exist, and of the idea that anthropogenic climate change is a hoax, and of the idea that Jews are in a nefarious conspiracy, and of the idea that the Earth is flat, and of the idea that covid-19 is just a little flu that will disappear like a miracle in the warmer weather. Some of those ideas are not just incorrect, but also the cause of great harm.
But I cannot bear to live in the house of war all the time.
I agree with the first part - the second part isn’t really up to us - and if it is, it’s only up to us because of forms of privilege.
My mental illness is not a privilege.
Sure, that’s what I said.
I appreciate all of the perspectives on this. One of the reasons I wanted to bring this issue into this forum is that the diversity of thought I get here will more closely model what I’ll see in my classroom.
Thank you for keeping the conversation civil.
@Agemegos, I think I understand your point about not living in a house of war: Needing to take a moment of retreat to find peace in the midst of turmoil, while still maintaining your stance. If I’ve misunderstood it, can you clarify?
Personally, this hobby is something that I use to both create safe spaces for conversation and growth for my students on tough subject matter, and respite for myself when I play at home.
These conversations are, and should be, challenging. But they don’t need to be relentlessly fraught.
Yes, but you must bear in mind that if it’s an obligation to oppose things that are wrong, then it’s also an obligation for me to oppose things that are wrong, likely including some things that you believe (because I think we probably disagree on some questions of what’s right and what’s wrong). And I’m not sure that debating those things would help bengeile address his concerns, or make this discussion more rewarding for anyone.
I want to add that my basic philosophy for things like this is not “If you gotta message, call Western Union” (I can read fiction that has a message)—but it is the Renaissance saying of “Instruct by pleasing.” Your first job is to have the audience involved in what you’re presenting them; if that happens, you can hope that the underlying assumptions may make an impression on them.
Nationalities is the wrong word I used in my last post. I’m not sure with using races due to reading some things suggesting it doesn’t apply to humans biologically and is an old word of nasty origin that lends it self to older views that builds to discrimination. Skin tones maybe? Is ethnicities any better? Maybe races would be sufficient?
I don’t think I have really anything to say to contribute to the conversation, but I wanted to quickly chime in to say I’m very impressed by @bengeile. What you are doing for your student is amazing, and they are lucky to have a teacher like you. And the fact that there is a pedagogic line-through for the student between the art class and yours, whoaw! That’s really cool!
Back in 1994 I ran an investigative horror game for strangers at a con, and made one player so very uncomfortable that she had to be given adrenalin and an antihistamine to restore her to consciousness. I don’t do that any more.
Why doesn’t that entail that you also can’t argue that a plastic toy version of Han Solo having pinkish skin is not in any way the same as the character being white? If it’s just a toy, it’s just a toy, right?
That’s a thing I worry about. So far I’ve managed to read the room and not hit anyone’s particular vulnerabilities. But I think I will do the X-card thing if/when I start running games with strangers again.
(Hmm, is there an X-card equivalent for online play? The point of the thing, as I see it, being that you don’t have to interrupt whoever it is who’s making you uncomfortable, you just have to pick up the card.)
I think establishing things that shouldn’t be part of your narrative can be easier online with PMs and edit tools.
In my mothership RPG there was a possibility that an NPC might do something I thought might be an issue, so I asked all players privately. No one objected, but I didn’t use it anyway. The conversation helped me realise it wasn’t important to the narrative and could be altered.
I remember playing Call of Cthulu ages ago (those pink days in Uni) and our GM had a key word in case somebody needed a break from all the running away from monsters/getting freaked out by them… We never needed it, but I can see how it can be useful.
Also, congratulations @bengeile for your initiative. As my 50 cents, a Han Solo character of any other colour of skin, or even alien species would be fine by me. Dark skin with gills under the jaw line and silver blue hair would be my suggestion. In the end, not all vested gunners have to even be called Han Solo.
We had an attempt at painting our figures of Hero Quest when we were teenagers, and my elf was a dark elf like Drizzt, only that rather than black skin it was closer to brown. That long mane he styled called for an odd-ball colour, and marble white with some silver and blue strands it went. It was nowhere near as cool as other figures my friend’s elder brother had painted, but I still think my colour choices were better 
On the other hand, my barbarian ended up like a Conan wannabe with a cheap bronze-hilted sword (I love bronze colour) so I must admit my original ideas ended showing on the elf only…
Me too. I’d like to go to those lessons.