Mausklickmoerder wrote:

Laliloluhla wrote:

I'm personally offended that the representation of my Polish Culture is so underpowered haha.

I'm sorry you only got a Fortress EQ.

Not even a fortress. It doesn't have any extra fortification value like garrisons, it can't be built freely like garrisons and has to be attached to a district. It doesn't benefit from garrison upgrades like extra stability or view range. To top it all off it doesn't even benefit from the Polish Legacy trait, which applies 20 extra fortification to garrisons only, and not even the Emblematic Quarter. Oh yeah the Legacy trait doesn't even apply to cities themselves, only garrisons, if it did apply to cities that'd make it marginally useful but nah. Barbicans aren't even particularly Polish, they were a very common defensive arrangement across all of europe, it's like if a star fort was an EQ (Makes me feel bad for the English getting a generic "Stronghold" too) and I suggested replacing it with a Farm fortress known as a Folwark, which could even keep the anti raid ability of the existing EQ.

So now we need to submit our passport or other form of ID to prove our ethnicity, may a DNA profile or family tree, and based on that, we will be allow to choose the garments our avatar is wearing, because clearly if you don't have X ancestry, you can't wear X clothing even in an avatar because that's somehow morally wrong or offensive?

If I like a certain culture, why can't I just display that in my avatar? 

If I think a certain style looks nice, why can't I wear it?

It's not like the avatars are mocking anyone, it's not like by selecting an avatar you're stealing something from someone and pretending you invented it or something.

What's the harm?

zimmah wrote:

So now we need to submit our passport or other form of ID to prove our ethnicity, may a DNA profile or family tree, and based on that, we will be allow to choose the garments our avatar is wearing, because clearly if you don't have X ancestry, you can't wear X clothing even in an avatar because that's somehow morally wrong or offensive?

If I like a certain culture, why can't I just display that in my avatar? 

If I think a certain style looks nice, why can't I wear it?

It's not like the avatars are mocking anyone, it's not like by selecting an avatar you're stealing something from someone and pretending you invented it or something.

What's the harm?

Your first claim uses a slippery-slope fallacy. Neither @dordier or I have stated that this issue would need to be resolved by the submission of ethnic identity. The concern is that in allowing for custom avatars, the game allows for a person to be culturally appropriative by creating an avatar of themselves and using the clothing of a culture for their own pleasure without paying respects to the origin culture. That is, a person shouldn't dress in Native American ceremonial clothing, while at the same time mock them for being "barbaric", and so it may be an issue in the game allowing for the same thing.

To answer your more general point, "What's the harm?", the harm exists in how people playing the game in multiplayer (or watching through streaming) may be offended by seeing someone who wears a hakama wear it simply "because it makes them look cool" where the hakama is recognized as religious clothing in Eastern cultures and ought to be respected as such.

AdeimantusCaird wrote:

To answer your more general point, "What's the harm?", the harm exists in how people playing the game in multiplayer (or watching through streaming) may be offended by seeing someone who wears a hakama wear it simply "because it makes them look cool" where the hakama is recognized as religious clothing in Eastern cultures and ought to be respected as such.

Very well stated, thank you.

AdeimantusCaird wrote:

Your first claim uses a slippery-slope fallacy. Neither @dordier or I have stated that this issue would need to be resolved by the submission of ethnic identity. The concern is that in allowing for custom avatars, the game allows for a person to be culturally appropriative by creating an avatar of themselves and using the clothing of a culture for their own pleasure without paying respects to the origin culture. That is, a person shouldn't dress in Native American ceremonial clothing, while at the same time mock them for being "barbaric", and so it may be an issue in the game allowing for the same thing.

To answer your more general point, "What's the harm?", the harm exists in how people playing the game in multiplayer (or watching through streaming) may be offended by seeing someone who wears a hakama wear it simply "because it makes them look cool" where the hakama is recognized as religious clothing in Eastern cultures and ought to be respected as such.

I get this right, but what's the alternative? Lets have all the avatars be naked as to not appropriate culture. Let's also remove all buildings and cultural city elements cuz otherwise someone might build the pyramids just because they look cool. fuck it, lets just remove all the cultures because some American knowitall white boy will be offended. Like come on, you can see how this argument has no ground for videogames. Between having a better game and not offending people accidently I'll have the better game. It's amazing how much effort the devs have put in to make everything as diverse and inclusive as possible for major civilizations across every era, and still someone is offended enough to complain about it.

Also, who tf chooses a civ for their clothes?? even then, surely the right of choosing what clothes to put on (even in videogames) comes above the privilege not to be offended (even in videogames).

Ps. I know this is technically slippery slope fallacy , maybe even ad hominem. That being said, grow some balls and stop being offended by everything. 

dordier wrote:

First, I am loving the Victor playtest thus far. That being said, I noticed an issue that should be raised.  

 

It's an issue made more obvious by the design of the victor avatar.

In many parts of the world cultural appropriation can a real and damaging issue for many people and having an avatar, especially one of an old white man, dressed in traditional clothing of various cultures could be seen as problematic.

 

As a white man from America, it's often hard to notice things like this myself.  I appreciate the sense of equality this can bring, but that view of equality can often be one-sided.

 

For a very long time, a Eurocentric view of the world has viewed equality as allowing the rest of the world be more like Europe(and America).  That anyone who doesn’t conform to our ideals is “less than”, while at the same time making it “fun” to partake in the activities and dress of those same “less than” cultures.  I’ve best heard this mindset described in the line “make the world England”.  

 

This makes us blind to the fact that other cultures are perfectly equal already, they are just different.  And those people can often be offended by our dual nature of pressuring them to conform to our ideals of normal, while also appropriating their culture for our amusement.  For a semi-recent example, think Justin Trudeau in blackface for an Arabian Nights party.  This does not show respect to their culture.  How would people in India feel if they saw Churchill wear a dhoti?  How about Native Americans if Andrew Jackson(or any American President) wore a Native American War Bonnet(feather headdress)?  It wouldn't be received well.

 

I think having a static avatar wear the clothing of so many different cultures could definitely cause some problematic images, especially when that avatar is so culturally unambiguous.

 

I hate raising a problem without a suggesting a solution, but it’s hard because I love the idea of the avatar system. Something like changing skin color and hair with every new culture defeats the whole point of customizing your own avatar.

 

I don’t have a good answer, but I bring this up in the hopes someone else might.

If your worried about cultural appropriation you shouldn't be part of the internet go take your woke concerns somewhere else.

alexkohuis wrote:

Ps. I know this is technically slippery slope fallacy , maybe even ad hominem. That being said, grow some balls and stop being offended by everything. 

If you had read my earlier posts you would have seen that I said explicitly that I am not offended in an way:

AdeimantusCaird wrote:

3. There are two different issues I have with this claim. The statement that this conversation carries "zero substance", as you put it, means that you don't believe cultural appropriation can be harmful. Do you not believe that respect is intrinsically valuable and that we ought to respect other cultures? Secondly, your claim that either of us currently feel uncomfortable is an invalid claim, disproved by dordier's first post.

So thanks for projecting your own discomfort with needing to recognize social issues. Must really suck to sympathize for the marginalized, huh?

sresk wrote:

If your worried about cultural appropriation you shouldn't be part of the internet go take your woke concerns somewhere else.

Oh man, real-world politics, in my 4X game? Never would of thought that would be important to deal with. If you really didn't want this topic to be boosted or discussed further, you simply could have not commented so it drowned in the endless sea of posts, but here we are.

Trolling - do not feed the troll thread

Sublustris wrote:
So, is there anyone personally offended here yet by avatar and its clothing, or is this whole discussion is based around over-sensitive assumptions of white american men?

I'm not, and I'm willing to bet people from other cultures aren't offended either. This is just a game, made with the best of intentions. It's not aiming to misrepresent, offend or present stereotypes. I do have the maturity to discern that, and I'm sure the overwhelming majority of people that will play this game have that as well. This discussion will lead us nowhere, and quite frankly, if there's one thing that can be considered offensive about this, it's the fact that white men are telling me and people from other cultures why we too should find this problematic. It felt kinda like mansplaining to me.

MetallicGeranium wrote:

Sublustris wrote:
So, is there anyone personally offended here yet by avatar and its clothing, or is this whole discussion is based around over-sensitive assumptions of white american men?

being a chinese person, I thought it was actually pretty funny to have Victor dressed in various asian looking robes over the course of the playthrough - It really suits him, since he tends to look like a skinny, scruffy little schnauzer (wet fur), and the robes make him look less malnourished and more imperious.

Thank you for speaking up @MetallicGeranium , it's awesome to hear that you can see it as a humorous thing.  This is the kind of response I was hoping for.

I've seen a lot of people talking about how it's not a big deal, and I would like to agree. What I'm not seeing is a lot of people from cultures who have been marginalized speaking up.  

It's no mystery or surprise to any of us that western European countries(and their colonies) have had a large impact on pushing the world in one direction and have tried to define what "normal" is.  Seeing a response from someone who isn't descended from there is helpful.

To be honest to put it in context. Wearing different cultural clothing on an avatar is an acknowledgement of multiculturalism that exists in today's world. Also up till the early modern era. Most cultures were fluid in where people came from to be part of it. For example, I can point to Mameluks or even Ilkhans of Persia. Even the Roman empire had emperors of different 'race' as we call it now. 

 Great, more of that North American neo-colonialist cultural imposition. There's nothing wrong with the avatars, these kind of games are always about rewriting history, here, Germany could be a south american superpower that was colonized by black ghanian vikings.

 This kind of mentallity ruined a lot of good things already and fixed 0 problems, could you guys be so kind to not do it at least here? Thank you.

Cultural appropriation concern in such a game, is the same as a discrimination concern in a sorting algorithm.

MetallicGeranium wrote:

EriKEK wrote:

more of that North American neo-colonialist cultural imposition.

Aye aye, the assumption that North American sensibilities should hold ultimate sway over what the rest of the world believes and experiences is pretty damn offensive. 

It's not an assumption, if you have read the thread you'd know it to be a correct statement.