Too often in the SF that I have read (perhaps a couple hundred of books over the years, so it is very possible that I might not have read the right sorts of SF), way too often are the issues surrounding diversity/Otherness presented from the dominant culture’s point of view. While many SF authors over the years have taken great pains to avoid the “White Man’s Burden” point of view dominating their stories of First Contact, all too often the notion of “discovery” that creeps into these tales is that these Others (perhaps analogues for Africans, Asians, Latinos, Native Americans, Pacific Islanders, etc. in US society today?) is that these “discovered” peoples (aliens) are ciphers, are often dangerous or at least potentially threatening, and that too often there isn’t a concerted effort even to “understand” these alien groups.

I remember reading A Wizard of Earthsea several times before it really clicked with me that Sparrowhawk and his people were non-white (specifically ‘red-brown‘ according to Ursula LeGuin) and the Kargish people who are the enemy of Sparrowhawk in the second book int he series, are white. As LeGuin puts it

My color scheme was conscious and deliberate from the start. I didn’t see why everybody in science fiction had to be a honky named Bob or Joe or Bill. I didn’t see why everybody in heroic fantasy had to be white (and why all the leading women had “violet eyes”). It didn’t even make sense. Whites are a minority on Earth now—why wouldn’t they still be either a minority, or just swallowed up in the larger colored gene pool, in the future.

In my experience, RPGs fall into the same trap. Most fantasy worlds feature primarily white people, usually surrounded by white demihumans, in a world with vague similarities to medieval Europe. In these worlds, the other is usually humanoid monsters, some with odd aesthetic similarities to real human cultures (I remember wither WFRP or D&D having hobgoblins who look like Mongols, but I can’t find the picture right now to prove it). Even worse is the oft-mentioned fact that, with a few exceptions, the ‘evil’ version of a normal RPG race is invariably black skinned.

I’ve tried to consider this in my own games. My last D&D campaign involved a group called the Dareco who were dark-skinned humans who worshipped dragons and were ostracised for it. But it never really gelled in the campaign except for an occasional backdrop. But I’ve played more female characters than non-white ones in my time.

Ultimately, people do play RPGs (in general) for escapism and its fair enought to not want to engage too heavily in the problems of the world while doing so. And, further to that, the tendency of sci-fi and fantasy to take real-world genuine issues and make pat plot hooks out of them is hardly something we want to encourage. But it would be nice if we tried to be more inclusive – it woudn’t make it any less fun.

KapCon is New Zealand’s biggest RPG convention and happens here in Wellington every January. It is two packed days of games and if you’re in the area, and interested it is well worth coming to. However there seems to be a bit of reluctance for people to GM games. So I’m going to do my bit to help pimp the idea.

I’m running three games. Derby of the Damned, Project Breather and A.C.O.R.N.. All of these are written up over at the site. Also to get more back ground nip over the The NZRag boards.