The bigger issues that Spelljammer Hadozee thing underscored
So Wizards of the Coast has been busy lately. Lots of releases. There was the phenomenal Journeys through the Radiant Citadel, the confusing One D&D and the disappointing Spelljammer.
I’m not going to talk about the mechanics of any of them - there’s loads of other videos out there that’ll do a better job than me, but I do want to talk about the business and impact of Spelljammer specifically. What gives me the knowledge to talk about the business of it? I get paid a lot of money in real life to develop business strategies and I’m good at what I do. I’m well versed in that space. I’m not trying to brag or say I know Wizards’ inner workings or anything - I’m just making the point that I have the experience and knowledge to be able to make some educated guesses because of what I do for a living.
For folks who don’t know, Spelljammer was a highly anticipated re-release of an older setting. There are underlying issues of people being generally disappointed with the mechanical quality of the book. Things like - disappointing mechanics for ship battles even though you’re essentially playing space pirates. Basic shit like that. Not like finicky specifics but big overarching problems. Within this, there has been further concern around one of the playable races, the Hadozee. The Hadozee are monkey people who are slaves to the elves and just so thrilled about being able to serve. And the art for them distinctly mirrors art that has historically been used to caricature black people. See ‘minstrel show’.
So, I’m not going to go into why that’s an issue. It is. It objectively is. And if you want to understand more, you should seek out black voices on the subject. One that I very specifically recommend, not just for discussion on this topic and the cultural impact and meaning of this, but about race and equity in tabletops in general is : TheUmbralKnight-@Umbral_KnightX
So - WotC released a racist-depicted playable race. Pretty much immediately, everyone responded with ‘uh this is crap and you’re stupid for thinking it’s not crap’. Two or three days into this reaction, they issued a pretty milquetoast statement apologizing and publishing an errata modifying what was considered the problematic elements of the Hadozee. This has prompted a couple of things. The first is that people are asking - a, if you realize now that it is a problem, why didn’t you realize before? It was just as racist two weeks before launch as it is two days after. Let’s put a pin in this because it’s what I want to come back to desperately. B - what’s being done to prevent this in the future? Wotc hasn’t said anything.
It has also prompted the awakening of basically all the slavery and white supremacist apologists to complain that this is just one more example of Wotc giving in to the woke mob. So there’s just this general anger about Spelljammer right now, and if you’re a cynic, Wotc did this on purpose because outrage marketing is a very effective tool to reach people you may not have reached otherwise. I wasn’t planning on buying Spelljammer, I’m still not - but here I am, making a video about it.
Anyway, going back to that earlier point: if Wizards’ realizes now that it is a problem, why didn’t they realize before? So to this point - basically one of two things has happened.
The issues around the Hadozee were identified and brought up to leadership of the project - who then ignored it. This may have happened. But for a company as big as Wizards with a parent company like Hasbro, it seems weird that feedback that would fundamentally change a playable race in your highly anticipated release would be ignored. So - maybe this happened because who really knows about how the project team was managed but I personally don’t super think this is likely.
They didn’t catch this before because no feedback was given because it was not something people working on this registered. At this point, I want to say that - realistically - if Wizards had anyone around the table with ancestral history of colonialism or slavery - basically anyone black or brown - they probably would’ve caught it. So the easiest answer, if we are going by the KISS principle, is that the Spelljammer team had limited or no black or brown people on it - certainly not in any decision-making capacities.
But let’s play devil’s advocate for a second, even though I really hate doing that - Let’s give Wizards the benefit of the doubt and assume they had at least 1 or 2 people of colour on the team. Here’s the thing with that - not every black and brown person might be looking with this lense or see an issue with this stuff. And that is totally normal, honestly. Unless the team leader has specifically asked black and brown employees to put on cultural sensitivity glasses when reviewing something, it is not appropriate to assume they will be responsible for making sure the company isn’t making cultural missteps. It is inappropriate to ask them to put in the emotional labour that you won’t expect from your white employees. Like if they asked everyone to have a cultural sensitivity lens upon review then maybe the black and brown team members on the Wizards’ Spelljammer team may be the first people to notice anything because we’re closest to it - but certainly it should not be only their job to call it out or fix it. Everyone should be watching for this kind of shit. And on top of this, maybe hire a sensitivity reader because as I said, the cultural sensitivity review is extra emotional labour, for all employees.
So what is my central point?
What: Diverse thinking at all levels is needed. There needs to be diverse representation with space for different perspectives to expand and exist in all project areas - in the ideation, in the writing process, art direction, project management, editing, and most importantly, decision making.
How: Hire and promote black and brown people and use sensitivity readers.
Why: From a cold, capitalist perspective - To avoid massive cultural missteps that’ll hurt your brand and bottom line. Also, potential revenue growth and a bigger pool of potential team members. And this isn’t just some nebulous insight - I’ll link a McKinsey & Co. set of studies for folks to check out if you want on how diversity and inclusion in the workplace is what companies should be pursuing for long-term, sustainable growth. (https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/diversity-and-inclusion. From a more human perspective - to mitigate harm to vulnerable folks, increase visibility and representation which has been sorely lacking, and break down institutional barriers.
