By that logic, the NY Times should be banned as a source. They’re opinion section is chocked full of basically the pro US point of view and defending Israel (including a memo advocating genocide denial). One-sided coverage, poorly sourced, nakedly biased, it all applies to them, too.

Allowing sources from all points of view, as long as the facts are true, seems better than picking and choosing due to bias. Even these “centrist” institutions have their own biases.

That’s true lol

History is exactly why I’m skeptical.

The USA is the world’s sole superpower and this is in their area of influence. It’s always about them when they get involved (as they have in 2002, 2013, 2017, and 2019, etc.).

It’s not really democracies vs dictators, it’s countries in the US’s sphere vs countries not in the US’s sphere. It becomes more obvious and easy to see then. The OAS has been a puppet of US interests since the beginning (there’s a reason they didn’t let Cuba in). It literally started by a pledge to fight communism in the western hemisphere. Basically, it’s the US empire and it’s puppets and allies vs a rising new order of old colonized and sanctioned countries, which admittedly looks scary, but hopefully will one day lead to a multipolar world where people can deal with their own local issues without worry of western interference (which has almost always been net bad for the people of those countries in the global south Asia, Africa, and South America).

Plenty of Democratic administrations have done coups and wars all over the world. It’s just a US empire policy, no matter who is President, mostly because of capitalism. Sure, conservatives are usually worse about it, but Democrats do it, too. Biden is supporting a genocide in Israel. McKinley fought the Philippines, Teddy Roosevelt in the Spanish American, JFK invaded Cuba and tried to coup it, Truman led the war in Korea and established a US puppet dictatorship in n the south for, JFK and LBJ were also involved in Vietnam, etc.

Not in the same period of time for the same level of development. And when it did, they accomplished it mostly through colonies and 1800’s imperialism.

I know someone in the US who is adamant Biden cheated, too. That’s not really evidence.

I mean, they seem to be for open markets and pro-Zionist, also more for Christians than indigenous, and against Chavez, who helped a lot of the poor in Venezuela. So far, she’s looking pretty conservative but I’m learning as I go along.

Isn’t the opposition conservative? If so, doubt it will be good for the people. I don’t know too much about the politics of Venezuela specifically, but I’ve never seen a conservative government benefit anyone but the rich long term.

And even if you’re don’t get banned, just like Reddit, you may get down voted a lot if you go against the discourse of the current thread. But not sure if that’s fixable anywhere with big groups of people.

I figured it meant drama happening from players going out and then breaking up or something like that. Seen that before, but I could totally believe your theory, too lol.

He cites the issue in the blog post, but it will probably be a hard one to find on the internet. Someone else in this thread tried, but wonder if it’s the kind you have to go to a library and look at that microfiche or microfilm to find. That would be cool if someone finds a link.

Some of those quotes blew my mind. It sounded exactly like FATAL. I couldn’t believe it lol.

Good point, and I think that was main thesis of the article. There were sexist parts of the game, but nothing easily fixable. Gygax and Arneson created something greater than themselves, that could live beyond any flaws they had (well, Gygax, so far nothing on Arneson luckily).

I agree. It doesn’t mean we ignore all the good they did, but it does give us a more well-rounded view of our heroes, which I think is useful to humanize them. We can take the good and evolve from the bad. This blog post isn’t asking anyone to quit D&D, it’s asking people to recognize the flaws of our forefathers of the hobby, recognize that the hobby has changed from that time, and to look forward to further change, growth, and inclusion for all of us. They created a game that will live beyond them, which is kind of awesome. At least that’s how I read it.

Hell maybe one day I’ll have kids and grandkids and they’ll think I’m backwards in some way, and I’ll be worried or skeptical because I think they’re too radical or weird in some way. But in the end, I’ll hope they’re right despite my misgivings, because the world is better that way - if the world’s next generation is able to carry things on and improve the state of affairs at the same time. We should want that and cheer it on. And looking back at things like this, including acknowledging the flaws of our progenitors and ourselves in addition to their great works, it let’s us see all that and celebrate it, the path we’ve taken from there to here.

I’d agree with that, and I think that’s what makes it acceptable to play the game nowadays and not be ashamed. If we didn’t move past that as a hobby, it would be bad and we should boycott it. But because we have, it means we can instead acknowledge the past and learn from it. So there’s no need to ignore it or hide from it.

Thanks!

Arrest you for protesting a genocide or trying to get an abortion? No, sorry, that’s something people in the US have to worry about when their government has their data, not China.

Considering our data is being bought and sold by US companies to whoever I don’t think this is going to help with that. Tbh, I’m more scared of the US having our data than China. The US can use it to find people seeking abortions, or to track protestors trying to get human rights, or things like that. Not China. I’d rather they make a general law to preserve privacy, but this half-assed measure to preserve US monopolies.