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Roula Khalaf, editor of the FT, picks her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Although he claims his mission is to colonize Mars, I sometimes wonder if Elon Musk’s real purpose is to improve my productivity. His changes to X’s algorithm meant that I discovered far fewer pieces to read on social media platforms, reducing the amount of time I spent sitting at my desk browsing through interesting and cryptic articles that I would never have discovered without him. And now he’s increasingly critical of another way I waste time, the tabletop game Dungeons & Dragons, as he belatedly notes last year’s major overhaul of the rulebook in the name of diversity and inclusion.
One consequence of Kasturi’s influence, especially on the political right, has been the spectacle of people who apparently don’t know the difference between their Asimor and their Aracokra how boring it all is, probably like many of their readers. Eyes sparkle. But this seemingly silly row about a game is actually a useful case study in how to tackle issues of diversity, ethnicity and inclusion – both good and bad.
Changes to D&D’s 2024 rulebook take two forms. First are some overtly political changes in character creation. Gone are player “races” — instead orcs, elves, humans, and more are described using the term “species.” And for the most part, your character’s traits – how intelligent they are and so on – are driven by the choices you make about their backgrounds and the lives they’ve led, rather than their species.
Any number of unorthodox ideas about racial diversity—from the various crackpot theories of countless bigots to the more fanciful notions of some diversity trainers—share, in my opinion, the same core: a belief that there is a real thing “race,” when in fact labels such as “black” And “white” is more or less meaningless. As Christopher Hitchens once wrote, we should remember that racial divisions “can be man-made and man-made”. But the difference between playing as an orc or an elf makes sense, or should be felt. Using the word “species” is a good way to ensure that “race” is real without talking about it. It’s a small but worthwhile change.
Or, at least, it would be if the new Player’s Handbook actually made this argument clear. Since it isn’t, the change seems pointless. Further adding to player frustration, the differences between the different species of D&D have been reduced. Describing orcs and gnomes as belonging to different “races” is a reasonable way to highlight that their vast differences are not the same as races invented by humans. But reducing them to the point where they are barely wider than the distance between “black” and “white” undermines the whole effort.
The second step in game change involves the introduction of detailed recommendations on how to run your campaign, including the stipulation that you discuss everyone’s expectations, feelings, and any dislikes before you start playing. This is always useful advice, because in the world of D&D you can tell anything from a comic, light-hearted adventure to a gruesome tale of murder and misery. As a result, I always start the campaign by asking other players to sense what kind of adventure they want and (after a disastrous incident with a spider) to let me know if they have any phobias or issues. don’t face
But again, the problem here is that while the new handbook has a lot of refined language about comfort and accessibility, nothing in it explicitly walks players through these real issues. It’s all too common for advice on how to improve a workplace, a voluntary organization, or a country for that matter — many organizations can’t explain why they’re doing something or why it’s valuable in simple and accessible language.
This has proven counterproductive in two ways. First because the result can seem like change for change’s sake, which almost always annoys people. The second reason is that it’s a good way to say something in layman’s terms where people actually disagree. Explaining that we are using the word “race” because we do not believe that race is real would be an argument that people could understand. Have a meeting at the beginning to work out “your expectations and any unexpected” rather than more abstract language about “inclusion.”
Getting an organization’s leaders to speak clearly is a good way to test whether they really understand what they’re doing or whether they’re merely picking up the latest fad or trend. This is true whether you’re changing the rule book of a board game or the inner workings of a company.
