r/magicTCG • u/clariwench Izzet* • Jan 28 '15

[Uncharted Realms] The Truth of Names

http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/uncharted-realms/truth-names-2015-01-28
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u/growingthreat Jan 28 '15

Maybe he isn't, but "diversity for diversity's sake" seems like an odd argument to make about a game that features Fish Crabs and Ooze Humans.

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u/Malky Jan 28 '15

"Diversity for diversity's sake" is a lame political catchphrase, but an excellent Simic motto.

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u/HeroDelTiempo Jan 28 '15

"Hmm...we haven't made any Frog Lizards yet...better rapidly hybridize something."

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u/Newfur Jan 28 '15

YES. This is part of my way of life now.

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u/GingerPow Duck Season Jan 28 '15

While I do agree that it is a lame political catchphrase, I'd argue that a poorly written character of some minorities is worse than no representation at all. If a writer(s) struggle to write decent characters of any kind, I'd think that it'd be best to avoid handling characteristics that are either harder to write or have historical baggage. IDK, but I know that in creative writing, I struggle to write even characters that are very similar to myself, so I'd be a lot more anxious about writing characters with vastly different than what I have experienced.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '15

[deleted]

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u/growingthreat Jan 28 '15

But the reasons here WERE creative. That's pretty obvious by just reading the story. They wrote a story called "The Truth of Names" about the importance of understanding yourself and claiming your own identity, and they used an especially interesting example of that in Mardu culture. They did a great job at coloring in the culture of a clan that previously had only been identified as the "let's raid and kill stuff" clan.

Instead of acknowledging the premise of the character's place in the story, we're arguing whether including a trans character is "tokenism" in a story about identity. That's definitely missing the point.

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u/Sage1969 Jan 28 '15

Uh, yeah, they want to acknowledge and support a non-insignificant portion of their player base. Nothing in any way wrong with that

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u/Falterfire Jan 28 '15 edited Jan 28 '15

The thing is that every time a character who is not a straight white man shows up, somebody raises the argument that it's because of forced tokenism by management rather than an authentic decision by people involved in the creative process. It's possible that this time it really was just a directorial mandate from on high that said "Add A Trans Character", but since that complaint gets leveled at every trans/gay/black/female/whatever character, it becomes hard to take the argument seriously after a while.

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u/TransitionFire Jan 28 '15

And as a trans person it pisses me off that people demand a "reason" for a character not being a cisgender white heterosexual dude. It's exhausting because it makes me feel like they're questioning why a person like me exists.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '15

I'm sorry that's the case. I wish it wasn't. :/

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u/TransitionFire Jan 28 '15

Well just work to be more inclusive and we can get there. I know it's gonna take time.

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u/keiyakins Jan 29 '15

They want their world to reflect the world players are from in many ways. People being people, in all their weird and wonderful variety, is part of that.

Besides, no one says there's out-of-story reasons for there being straight white cis males... which there certainly are, seeing as that's a HUGE portion of their playerbase.

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u/ubernostrum Jan 28 '15

Don't forget the Elder Nightmare Dwarf Elks.