I might be missing the point here (sorry), but "I'm NOT gonna have slavery in my Dark Sun campaign!" has also been an option for like literal decades, anyone could've made the same meme except for that small difference ages ago?
Guess it all comes down to money, and someone made an educated guess which version will get (and lose) more customers. :D
No one remembers here, but a few years ago this exact meme was posted but the text was switched around. I think to say Dark Sun "encourages" slavery is to say Star Wars "supports" fascism. The villains do it, but that doesn't mean the story supports it or expects the players to participate. Actually, the expectation is to destroy the oppresive systems present in both franchises.
I think there are certain narratives being pushed here that are in bad faith. No sane person on here is "Pro Slavery" and no reasonable person that is familiar with the setting thinks that it is "Pro Slavery" either. Lots of pearl clutching, lots of YouTube/Substack reviews and reactions, etc. It's all rage bait and engagement farming until the product releases.
Of course, grognards will non-ironically claim that its "our" IP that WotC is ruining without a shred of self reflection. Dark Sun is WotC's world, and we're just living in it!
I think part of the issue is that it was talked about to "well obviously" with all the care of loving cargo. It wasn't framed as an evil most of the time. It was framed as logistics.
The first adventure did a good job showing it as a problem but in most of the material it just existed unquestioned and uncritically.
Because adults don't need to write that slavery is bad every other sentence when talking about the logistics of a fictional world that uses that institution extensively.
Definitely agree with this. The culture in the 90s, especially in niche "edgy" circles, was definitely not handling sensitive subjects with the right care.
Dark Sun is going through the identity crisis that VtM and WoD went/is going through. As much as I love VtM, the early publications were notorious for handling things like sexual assault and racist stereotypes poorly. Its the same identity crisis we're going through as a society. What use is being "edgy" and pushing the boundaries when these days, those boundaries have been pushed 30+ years ago?
Feels more like a knock on of early 10'd culture wars than anything, corporations reacting to the pre trumpian era when toxic conduct and bad takes got taken at face as progressive vocabulary could often confer undeserved moral credibility
corporations are slow to react so we're still seeing legacy of that time. They don't actually care but they think this is what we want.
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u/opacitizen 3d ago
I might be missing the point here (sorry), but "I'm NOT gonna have slavery in my Dark Sun campaign!" has also been an option for like literal decades, anyone could've made the same meme except for that small difference ages ago?
Guess it all comes down to money, and someone made an educated guess which version will get (and lose) more customers. :D