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The alt-right attack on the Netflix Witcher makes me feel a bit uncomfortable about CDPR
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so cultures doesnt need representations? Slavic people are rarely represented in western media (outside of russians) ... so does this mean that they dont deserve to be represented because they have the right skin pigment that deserves to be represented?
and even inside slavic culture ...there is huge difference between poles, russians an czechs for example
Is USA (which I assume you refer to) the only country people live in the world?
Black people can be slavic. Have some decent reading comprehension.
race does not equal culture
Racism towards blacks specifically is a world wide problem. Don't pretend it ain't.
Well, we visited Katowice, which is near Krakow. It's a city of almost 300,000 people. I have a hard time believing that.
No. There's like 2. In one chapter of one book.
And the author's issues with CDPR is not related to that minor change at all. IIRC, he's just upset that the franchise is now known more for the video games (that he didn't have much input on) rather than the books he created.
It doeant bother me. If the books never portrayed anything other than white characters then the game ahould have only whites. I would say the same if the books only had black chacters. Then the games wouldn't need white or any other type if characters. nothing wrong with staying close to aource matefial.
No, this generalisation is not fair to the genre, Sapkowski or CDPR at all.
You can talk and tackle real-world problems from more than one angle in fiction. Allegories are one of them. People in a predominantly white and Slavic country like Poland might be more open to approach racism from this fictional angle because non-white people are and their struggles might appear impalpable to them.
Yes but my culture was and still is predominantly white and it is portrayed like that. Nobody said that there were not POC during the ages on these lands but expecting that every piece of media that uses it as a base has diversity is wrong in my opinion.
You dont have to ask me, Sapkowski was behind the Universe, in the books there are like 1-2 non-white people and The Witcher series is based on the books, of course you wont find a huge amount of diversity if the Universe dont have any.
They added a black merchant from Ofier. In the books Ofier is mentioned one time and the region is lockated across the sea.
You guys missed my point entirely.
I stated the game managed to address racism and intolerance without needing actually any other 'human races' pretty well.
If anything, it bodes well for the next game.
I read a couple of the books back when the Witcher 2 came out. I remember it being way more diverse than the actual games.
Is this show based on the games or the books? I'm assuming Andrej still owns the rights to The Witcher universe as a whole, where CDPR just owns it in the form of videogames?
Is this show based on the games or the books? I'm assuming Andrej still owns the rights to The Witcher universe as a whole, where CDPR just owns it in the form of videogames?
Its a friggn joke isn't it. People should be happy about it.
1) learn the meaning of censorship before whining about it. Not a single thing discussed in this thread has muttered anything that could be interpreted as us wanting to censor CDPR. None of this has anything to do with censorship.
2) art isn't above criticism. Art can be racist/bigoted and we have every right to criticize the makers of it for being so when applicable
3) games are not made in a vacuum in this day and age. Global players need to take some responsibility with stuff like pushing for more diverse representation. CDPR is a global player, they can't feign ignorance. The least they could do is at least tell the nazi shitstains of humanity who use Witcher as some champion of white supremacy to fuck the right off.
4) games are rarely made as some kind of "pure" vision of its creators. A lot of politics go into decisions like the gender and skin colour of characters (often to the detriment of the creators' will). Often creators actually WANT to make more diverse creations but are blackballed by executives/publishers for shitty reasons. Guerrilla Games needed to FIGHT against Sony to get to make a woman the main character of Horizon. Sony originally wanted them to change her into a man.
Why is it so hard to believe? Poland is almost 100% white. A lot of people don't really travel much. Besides, you haven't encountered every single citizen of this city. I live in a city of similar size and I see people of color maybe once per month here and there. Like, why is it so hard to believe that some parts of the world aren't multi-cultural yet. Poland wasn't really an attractive place for migrants in the past economically speaking.
The genre was literally popularized by Tolkien, a gigantic racist. Fantasy has a long and shitty history of racism, while also trying its damndest to avoid having people of color.
Lmao predominantly white means poc still exist. Just because you are a majority does not make you more important than the poc also within your culture. AND LMAO shit TONS of people are saying that exact fucking thing.
And honestly, every piece of media should have diversity. Diversity causes only good, literally no harm comes from it. Arguing that diversity shouldn't be encouraged is being complacent because you personally are already represented and you dont give two shits because you already got yours.
I apologize if I'm misinterpreting what you're saying there, but are you basically stating that only white people can be labelled racist?
Are there really enough people with the sort of checklist you describe to be a problem on the same scale as Nazis and hence warrant the same response of sticking one's head in the sand (thus promoting the status quo that Nazis are more comfortable with)?
Okay a few things:
1. I don't think CDPR's lack of inclusion in the games means they're confirmed racists. Just to get that out of the way.
2. The Witcher games certainly have a diversity problem and could use more inclusion. Anyone arguing it's unnecessary or that the books weren't inclusive either are missing the point - diversity in media is a good thing and should be encouraged. I don't care if the books barely have any people of color, nor do I care that fantasy as a genre tends to ignore this issue as well. It won't get better if creators don't make a point for it to get better.
3. Anyone coming in to staunchly defend CDPR's inclusion in the Witcher series by pointing to ONE DLC are so far off the mark it's not even funny. What's the excuse for not having more of that in the base game or the rest of the series?
1. I don't think CDPR's lack of inclusion in the games means they're confirmed racists. Just to get that out of the way.
2. The Witcher games certainly have a diversity problem and could use more inclusion. Anyone arguing it's unnecessary or that the books weren't inclusive either are missing the point - diversity in media is a good thing and should be encouraged. I don't care if the books barely have any people of color, nor do I care that fantasy as a genre tends to ignore this issue as well. It won't get better if creators don't make a point for it to get better.
3. Anyone coming in to staunchly defend CDPR's inclusion in the Witcher series by pointing to ONE DLC are so far off the mark it's not even funny. What's the excuse for not having more of that in the base game or the rest of the series?
Is that raw number or proportion? Because 223 is 49% of 457. Meanwhile, a quick look gives me that 72.4% of the US considers themselves white alone, 12.6% black alone, and 2.9% to be two or more races. Definitely not 50/50.
Innocent white people are not being shot on sight, get the fuck out of here
so... would you want a game where e.g. daniel vavra achieves his own vision?
This is a really tone deaf statement towards a game dev in a country that had nazi's mow down their people due to viewing them as subhuman followed by ethnic cleansing campaigns by Stallin and preceeded by empire's that viewed them as second class citizens at best.
This is not to say Witcher game series shouldn't have more color in them, but come on man let's not act like the Poles havent been under the bootheel of tyranny and oppression for the better part of the last 250 years or so.
That was not the original statement. "Are white people getting killed en mass" ... "no" (by police), and well, they are. There is definitely a problem that needs to be addressed (reform) for law enforcement.
I mean the answer is easy if you just throw away morals. "I have something (white people in media) and now you want to take it away from me?"
I apologise before I even wrote something, but is it wrong that we Slavs (you can add one character in between of "v" and "s") have our own culture and that we like do our own stuff. I don't think that this means that it does anything with politics, we are grateful that after of years and years of oppression we can have our own culture projected to the games and stuff. I am not really liking Poland, since i have terrible experience being there, but that is beside the point, when you look at Poland history, they really don't have it easy....
As for "diversity", diversity is not only color of your own skin, but far more than that. We never enslaved whole Ethic group of people, nor we wipe pretty much native inhabitants of the land. So since this forum is so American-centric, I kinda get your point, but the diversity is far more than color of your skin. I am not saying that in the fantasy should not be a person of different ethnicity that white, not at all, but we don't really have this thinking in ourselves. I would be totally down to have black Geralt, he would probably have more badass voice, which is what I want in games. But let's say that Mafia, the originally Czech Franchise (created by "someone" which should not be named in here) is one of the few games which had black protagonist and no, I don't think the game gave a proper justice to him, since it was basically Ubisoft's wet dream of game, but the premise was intriguing to say at least. I really wanted to like the game, but it was a lots of uninteresting filler. But Lincoln Clay, was badass protagonist, want more.
I maybe kind of lost my point, but what I wanted to say is that, how many time Slavs in game are presented as Russian speaking dumbasses? Even the last Deus Ex, which is located in Prague, you know the capital city of my country, was really piss poor job, but well at least some of them speak actually Czech, but....that's about it. So should I shout like our people are under-represent it in video games? Maybe, but I just don't do it since I feel like companies in different locations has the right to present their own take with they own culture, without being criticised by the lens of American people.
That is my take on this.
By the way, why is such a problem to have multi-culture, multi-language game? You know something like Inglorious Bastards, where you get this different languages and I would really appreciate this. I can read subtitles, you know and it would be something interesting, everything is aim for anglo-saxons and it's really annoying, so I fully support CDPR on this. And no, Poland is not an America.
As for "diversity", diversity is not only color of your own skin, but far more than that. We never enslaved whole Ethic group of people, nor we wipe pretty much native inhabitants of the land. So since this forum is so American-centric, I kinda get your point, but the diversity is far more than color of your skin. I am not saying that in the fantasy should not be a person of different ethnicity that white, not at all, but we don't really have this thinking in ourselves. I would be totally down to have black Geralt, he would probably have more badass voice, which is what I want in games. But let's say that Mafia, the originally Czech Franchise (created by "someone" which should not be named in here) is one of the few games which had black protagonist and no, I don't think the game gave a proper justice to him, since it was basically Ubisoft's wet dream of game, but the premise was intriguing to say at least. I really wanted to like the game, but it was a lots of uninteresting filler. But Lincoln Clay, was badass protagonist, want more.
I maybe kind of lost my point, but what I wanted to say is that, how many time Slavs in game are presented as Russian speaking dumbasses? Even the last Deus Ex, which is located in Prague, you know the capital city of my country, was really piss poor job, but well at least some of them speak actually Czech, but....that's about it. So should I shout like our people are under-represent it in video games? Maybe, but I just don't do it since I feel like companies in different locations has the right to present their own take with they own culture, without being criticised by the lens of American people.
That is my take on this.
By the way, why is such a problem to have multi-culture, multi-language game? You know something like Inglorious Bastards, where you get this different languages and I would really appreciate this. I can read subtitles, you know and it would be something interesting, everything is aim for anglo-saxons and it's really annoying, so I fully support CDPR on this. And no, Poland is not an America.
But there weren't all just white humans. They were dopplers, elves, mages, etc. People who were persecuted and their oppression figured prominently in the main story. I think it's unfair to say that CDPR was insensitive to racial issues when it was practically at the forefront of the game's narrative. I'm just going off what I've played up to Skellige.
No, I'm saying that the leading oppressors are still white people in power
None, none at all?
You know you are lying with this statement.
We just had one dox'ed/SWAT'ed and killed several months back. Such short term memory with your race baiting comments.
Yeah I never understood this. They have chars with ridiculous american accents (no offence) which shows they don't care about true immersion in that type of setting but no other races???
It's worth noting that Poland is a very racist country at the moment. In Europe this is also true for England, Austria, Italy and Hungary.
It's worth noting that Poland is a very racist country at the moment. In Europe this is also true for England, Austria, Italy and Hungary.
That's a different claim. I don't object to the games not having that. I personally don't care. What I object to is your claim that "is a fantasy universe based on germanic/slavic/celtic folklore and myths, of course you wont see black people there."
There's no "of course", and plenty of authors have such characters there. The idea that germanic/slavic/celtic folklore story = only white dudes is bad, reductive, and dumb.
You don't have to have such characters, but acting like you automatically don't is simply dumb. People sixty(!) years ago already knew better.
Like I said before, creating white allegories for racism with little to no actual poc involvement is exploiting a real life people's plight for entertainment while comfortably refusing to give them any representation. That is racist.
People are usually talking about 1) the number of POC shot in comparison to the relative amount of them vs. white people and 2) the situations in which POC are shot in comparison to when white people are shot. Of course the absolute number of white people shot by police is higher, they outnumber black people by a lot, but when you compare the number of black people shot by police to the number of black people in the US, that's when the numbers skew clearly in one direction. And there are far more cases where completely innocent black people are shot because badly trained, possibly racist cops use excessive force when mistaking a mobile phone for a gun or where shooting the black person is overuse of force (a black man, even if a criminal, who is running away is not a threat that requires a gun to solve)
In my defense, I did put "just to piss these guys off" in my post :P
User banned (3 days): hostility, personal attacks, history of similar behaviour
I'm not having this argument with you, racist.
He actually kind of looked like black Geralt in Ragnarok.
Would be pretty amazing to be honest... but then I can't for hte life of me get the Tower movie out of my head. That was bad
Not disputing that.
You do not need to explain for him. His follow up responses say plenty of his narrative.
And we are done here.
"White people can't be victims of police" Whose the racist one here?
I wanted to see it so bad because he was in it, but I keep hearing nothing but bad things about the movie itself which kept me from devoting the time, lol.
I wasn't familiar with the backstory of it, so just as a general movie goer... it was very forgettable and not good.
I don't know who this daniel vavra is,but I would like that he is able to create a game with his original vision and then decide for myself whether it's worth of my appreciation or not. What I would not like,was that this person or any other person to not be able to create his own vision or form of art expression because he is censored by political/racial motives,whether it's coming for right or left ideologies. That's what I want.
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