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Roleplaying within Real World Events?


AKNyx
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During my time in RP, I've noticed a weird grey area of what people can and cannot write out when it comes to historical events throughout the years.

 

Personally, for me, there aren't too many that I'd avoid writing if only because I feel there's a sort of...grace period. A time when you shouldn't write about something because it's just happened, it's still fresh in people's minds, it's something still regularly discussed. While I know people have their own boundaries of what is and isn't acceptable (as well they should, as we're all different and wonderful), I can't help but wonder why some are judged harshly for the setting they choose to pursue. Just as an example, in the past, there've been heated debates about not writing something aboard Titanic due to the loss of life. But then, those same people were fine with writing out past wars.

 

So, I bring it to you fine individuals. What's your take on what is and isn't acceptable to write about, when it comes to real life events in history?

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I think it depends on what is written about it or how the character interacts with it.

 

Having a character that arranged 9/11 is pretty disrespectful but having one that assisted in rescue efforts much less so.

 

Most events that would be referenced are so much bigger than any one person I'd say as long as they aren't trying to make history about them or being a douchebag with it they should be good. 

 

But I also don't allow people to play real people, so they can't be Kennedy's assassin made a vampire or whatever. 

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History should be shown as it was, based on research. I agree with Rune.

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I view it the same way as I do comedic subject matter. It's either all fair game or none of it is. 

 

It isn't a writer's job to tread eggshells around a potential reader's delicate sensibilities. Someone is always going to be offended by something, that's entirely on them. If they don't like a subject matter, then its their responsibility to avoid it. They've got no right to force their hang ups on anyone else, or whine because another individual doesn't share them. Subjective whines from people who can't take responsibility for themselves shouldn't impact anyone's choice of writing material. 

 

A lot of the lines people like to draw have little merit beyond creating a comfortable dissonance. Some of the same people who would have no problem role playing something based on V for Vendetta in which homosexuals, atheists, non-protestant/catholics, and political dissidents are being rounded up into concentration camps, used in cruel experiments and then exterminated would find something based on the holocaust in poor taste.

 

Those same people will read books like Number the Stars, Night, and Once or watch films like The Boy in the Striped Pajamas and Schindler's List for entertainment. There's no actual difference between any of those subjects or mediums, just brittle false perceptions concocted to make people feel good about themselves.

 

One might argue that the listed materials are meant for reflection and education (ignoring that intent and utilization don't necessarily correlate); but then the same argument could be made for role playing the subject matter. One could even make a stronger case for the latter, because it involves delving into levels of psycho and sociological depth that are not experienced as a second hand viewer. 

 

And again, intent is all relative. Maybe the person is just interested in the subject, and they want to explore. Maybe its their way of coping with a trauma experienced during or because of a certain event. Maybe they're just exorcising personal demons in a non-violent outlet. 

 

Personally, I'm going to poke around and explore whatever subject matter (historical, real life or otherwise) I desire; and I'm going to approach it in the way that works best for me. That's my business. If someone else has an issue with it, good on 'em; that's their issue to deal with.

Edited by Dragon
grammatical error
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My general opinion of it this is: if there are people alive who lived through it, or if there are people who are alive who are connected to those who have lived through it then I won't rp it. (I find films that have been made covering 9/11 to be in poor taste, in part because such a short time passed from the event occurring to when the films were made. I refuse to watch them.)  This means that I won't rp any historical event that's occurred in the past 50 years because there are people who experienced it first hand, or people who've seen the effect it's had on people who experienced it first hand. This of course, this only applies to real events that have been traumatic. I've no problem with rping events that aren't, or having the traumatic events in the background of the world I am rping in. Rping real people unless they have been gone for 100 or more years is also something I wouldn't do as it seems a strange thing to do.

Edited by Icewolf
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@Dragon I believe that not all stories are meant to entertain. Some are told to educate, to inform or to change minds.

 

Futhermore, I believe that visual mediums like film have a greater impact on you than novels because of the audio and vision that the production team thrust on you. It's relatively easy to kind of soften or censor scenes in a book as needed, harder in a film. 

 

(By greater impact I just mean in terms of how the visual and auditory stuff hits you, not emotional impact. The most affecting WW2 scene for me is still in a novel.)

 

Because of that, I don't find it hypocritical for people to want to avoid certain subjects in one medium and not another. 

 

Which brings me to RP, for me RP is solely about entertainment and fun. It's not a space that lends itself to education etc (maybe it could be?) For that reason, I arch an eyebrow at say people wanting to RP the holocaust because what's fun and entertaining about that?

 

Are there people who actually want to, though? I feel like this example is kind of straw mannish.

 

Ultimately though, you do you. I have my own personal limits. I might think what other people choose to RP is poor form, but just because I don't get anything from it, doesn't mean that they're immediately doing thing because they don't appreciate the nastiness of thing. 

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3 minutes ago, Kit the Human said:

Are there people who actually want to, though? I feel like this example is kind of straw mannish.

 

Little extreme, maybe, hardly a straw man. 

 

People have used it as a plot setting, yes. I doubt you'll ever find a site built around it, but I've definitely seen it

 

 I have done role plays based on events portrayed in The Great Raid, depicting the Bataan Death March  No one ever had any complaint about that, nor do most people shed a second thought about other World War II settings in general - though what happened to soldiers in the trenches, and civilians impacted by those events was often just as horrific. the BDM may not have occurred on as large a scale as the Holocaust, but events were comparably awful; soldiers were herded into bunkers and burned alive, starved to death, beaten and slaughtered arbitrarily. 

 

Yet WWII in general is often seen as a perfectly acceptable historical setting to entertain oneself with, WWI even more so. Hell, even Vietnam is generally viewed as fair game for role plays and comic book material (The Punisher, for example, originated from the Vietnam conflict when he was created) in the 70's). 

 

If one steps back and actually look at things objectively, a lot of role play subject matter that most find perfectly acceptable is literally only a noun or so away from being something most people would consider absolutely horrid. Just a noun. 

 

Supernatural vs Hunter settings are a common example. A lot of members here on RPG-I like to entertain that setting. 

Consider this sugar-coating-free example: 

 

  1. Bill is a hunter who kills werewolves, because they are werewolves. A werewolf killed his mother, and therefore Bill believes that all werewolves are bad and should be exterminated. 
  2. Bill is a hunter who kills black people, because they are black. A black man killed his mother, and therefore Bill believes that all blacks are bad and should be exterminated. 

 

Despite the subject matter of both examples being identical, involving individual X adopting a murderous vendetta against group Y because of a singular negative experience, most people will read the first scenario without blinking whilst their jaws will drop in horror at the second. 

 

Point is, regardless of being fully fictional or based in reality, we're still using an appalling concept that does very much exist as a historical reality as a form of banal entertainment (in both scenarios, as I will refer to the infamous werewolf and witch hunts that still happen to this day).

This is what I mean by creating comfortable dissonance to make ourselves feel better. Role players use torture, murder, sexual assault and all manner of awful, real life crimes, to create a platform of casual amusement - but that's totally okay because "fiction".

 

I just don't see where anyone has right to take any kind of moral high ground here. A subject being outside of one's personal limits is perfectly fine - criticizing and judging those who don't share those limits isn't - he without sin cast the first stone and all that  noise. 

 

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To me, this can be divided into two categories... past and present. I'm kind of of the same mind as @Rune here.

 

The past is all fair game if it's well researched and accurately reflects reality as much as possible... it should be done mindfully and tactfully. But I'm not going to judge people too harshly for simple errors if it's clear they're putting thought into it. ...The one area playing real life historical events get's tricky is if people start making up past reality. So, say they create a character that is a vampire and was Caesar in the past. If they write past threads and he leads his country in a way that's not real, it can throw everyone's history out of whack. That's usually why I limit people playing people in political power in the past or famous people who can shape the world. Because it's a world we need to stay constant for everyone and I don't want people mucking with it.

 

The present is a bit more of a fine line. Like if someone wanted to have their character attend a Trump rally with a Make America Great Again hat on I wouldn't care... but airing one's political leanings may make them more or less popular as a player. For the same reasons as noted above, I wouldn't let anyone play the president or someone in his administration because their actions would effect everyone. We keep most characters that could shape the world confined to NPCs that staff control.

 

At the same time, my site is set in NOLA, and if they were to suddenly suffer a mass shooting or terrorist attack I'm not going to host a site event reacting to that reality out of respect. I don't think I'd stop my members from doing it as long as it was respectful, but I could see how it would upset people. I probably couldn't stomach reading the threads myself and I just don't know that anyone would actually do that... Do people do that? Honestly, that's a scenario I've never encountered.

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I think one reason people feel more squeamish about RP than films or novels, is that RP is often seen as an excuse for self-insert characters, rightfully or not. I'm not talking just about that awful Mary Sue, but about the fact you're assumed to relate to your character one way or another. So playing an entirely fictional Bad, Bad Guy? Eh, that's a legitimate outlet for your darkest desires or something. But playing a literal Nazi? That's Serious Business and mustn't be touched!

 

Personally I don't agree. RP is first and foremost creativity - especially so for forum RP, that often has at least some low-key literary intent. There are people who must cheer for their characters, but others just enjoy writing a story and a person, as laudable or abhorrent as they may be. 

 

So I don't think there are topics that cannot be approached, although there are topics that require more sensitivity (not unlike the way you shouldn't be insulting when portraying minorities, mental issues, etc).

 

As a side note, setting such as dystopias, fantastic racism, etc, aren't always just escapism - if done with some insight, they're a way to reflect on real issues such as freedom, diversity, human nature in general, while using a speculative medium instead of a realistic one.  So while writing about a alien zombie dictatorship may be more escapistic than writing about literal fascism (because alien zombies and weird kewl weaponz!), food for thought is still there, and there may be unfortunate implications. So, depending on the setting, the werewolf hunter mentioned above might be little less disturbing than their literally racist counterpart. True, you aren't picking on an existing group of real people, but the underlying dynamic is the same. Which isn't a reason to censor the topic, just to reflect on what you're actually describing.

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With thingd in the far past, you aren't going to run into anyone directly involved with them. No one rping served with Napoleon...

 

But there is no way of telling if your partner lost someone in more current events, which is why I say they should be treated with a level of respect. The chances of it are pretty slim, yes, but if I ran into.someone using their happy fun times to pretend to be my sister's murderer it's bound to make the entire situation uncomfortable and potentially bring about problems depending on the people involved. 

 

Should we be allowed to do whatever because we're adults? Sure. But that doesn't mean we should do it just because we can.

 

It, like pretty much everything else, boils down to not being a dick and treating others with respect. And maybe a healthy dose of common Sense and decency.

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I have a character who's Korean, was a comfort woman (sex slave) for the Japanese army against her will, had an officer fall in love with her and sent her to Japan, only for her to survive the Hiroshima bombing. Her big power is to drive people to commit suicide through written song often in humiliating, strange, or shaming ways. In turn, she receives a random life threatening injury.

 

Yet, she's not a villain per say. She deliberately targets people associated with rape, mass murder, etc. She also loves video games, is directionally challenged, and had a niece figure she loved. She also used this niece as she was a singer. The point of the character is to examine what it means to lose everything, be abused, the codependent nature of victim and perpetrator, the urge to survive, and the drive for vengeance and how it corrupts people. It's also to examine the dual roles people can possess: how one can be kind and loving but also use and murder people.

 

The amusing thing is on one site where I asked if I could create this character, at least one of staff was clearly uncomfortable. I got the impression it was the driving someone to suicide part. This was a site where one of staff played Lucifer and there was an event a few months prior where two characters were tortured by a villainous group with it showcased on the internet.

 

That's the thing I've long noticed with rpers as @Dragon has noted. So many love murder hobos, but the second you add weight to it somehow whether it be ties to history, actual -isms, rape, suicide, people start freaking out. My mom and my uncle died two years ago within twenty four hours. My mom died at her boyfriend's, but my uncle died on the couch at the home we shared. I found him. Why can't I write that? It could be cathartic and an interesting piece if I was writing through a character with a very different life experience. If I can or someone who was raped can, why can't someone who survived a recent event?

 

I consider the best fiction to be a reflection of reality, essentially fun house mirrors or photographs zoomed in on specific details. I'm attracted to certain scenarios and concepts. Also certain genres I'm more likely to want explore certain things. The character I mentioned above is meant for a modern fantasy or dystopian site where I want to explore the darker side of humanity. Exploring scenarios and concepts are fun for me.

 

How I approached getting the above character approved was the first time discuss it with staff. The second time, since I knew how she worked better, I wrote up a straight proposal meant for staff. It was for a 'Make A Wish' site event, so it was public. In the proposal I made it clear that I would not have her kill any real life figure or a thinly veiled one and I would mark threads/posts that dealt with these topics with any and every warning I could think of. I also stated if I violated these, staff could punish me for it. Lastly, I put a note at the bottom stating that since this was an open proposal, that any member who was uncomfortable with it could talk to staff and I would be willing to change things or just outright drop it.

 

I do agree such topics should be handled with respect, but you also won't know that until you actually approve said concept. Knowing the member in how they handle similar situations and concepts in the past helps. On the member side, talk with staff, and/or write up a proposal. If you as staff strongly think no event should be mentioned before X amount of years, be clear about that in the rules.

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I think anything goes, as far as settings, personally. Where I would get really weird is if you started trying to role play as the real survivors and victims. Those are real people and you don't have permission to use their lives, most likely. Obviously you shouldn't try to.... force... someone.... to role play in those settings (how could you even?), but if you're good with it, you do you. I like to have empathy for all parties involved - not sympathy, but empathy - and I like being able to play things that have weight. Playing with taboos is something I really enjoy as is, and while I think it's important that all parties KNOW what they're getting into and can make an educated decision for themselves as to whether or not to continue, it's not anyone's right to tell me what I can and cannot write - as long as I write it respectfully, by not romanticizing things OOC (the character's perspective is another matter). 

 

On 1/28/2018 at 3:53 PM, Mistress Of The Obvious said:

So many love murder hobos, but the second you add weight to it somehow whether it be ties to history, actual -isms, rape, suicide, people start freaking out.

I agree with that, based on what I've seen. Many people like to write something "edgy", but when actual feelings and deep thought and emotion get involved, it's no longer "cool" and "fun" and "lighthearted" - because murder is, right?

 

I don't personally play historical RPs because I just have no interest in doing so, I prefer fictional worlds, and I like playing with magic, but there are plenty of things that people will get squicked out about what I write. My second character on TNI was Kenny Villein. His app did not immediately make it obvious how awful he was, because I was uncertain about how deep into the rabbit hole I'd be allowed to go. He got a LOT of people fawning over him because "oh he's a serial killer that's so cool, also Tom Hiddleston". Then I got more comfortable and realized that I could really write pretty well whatever I wanted, so I started to flesh out the details. I don't get many plot offers for Kenny anymore, and I think a big part of the reason is because I'm real about how fucked up he is. I don't try to shield him by claiming "oh I mean, he's a murderer, but he's not THAT bad" or any other such thing. He does horrible things, and I'm not shy about them. Why should I be shy about acknowledging that horrible things have happened in the real world? Shouldn't we be sure to remember those things, so we can try to prevent them from happening again?

Edited by Raven
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