It is not often that I bring my Atheism into my posts over here. I mean in D&D my preferred classes to play are clerics, druids, paladins, and witches; all pretty much the exact opposite of my own beliefs (or lack thereof). So my blog reading is fairly split between RPG blogs and Science and Atheism blogs.
It's nice when they combine.
Case in point with the latest "scandal" with the play "She Kills Monsters."
Briefly, the play, written by award-winning Qui Nguyen, centers around a recently orphaned girl, Agnes, who wants to learn more about her younger sister Tilly by playing the D&D adventure Tilly had written. In the process, she learns more about her sister and Tilly's struggles with being bullied for being gay. The play happens both in the real world of Agnes and the game world where Tilly was Tillius the Paladin. People from the real world are also represented in the game world. For example, Tilly's girlfriend Elizabeth "Lili" becomes "Lilith" in the game. Cheerleaders are Succubi, and so on.
This in and of itself is worth talking about. A well-received play featuring how a young woman comes to know her late sister a little more and her friends from playing Dungeons & Dragons. It is sweet and actually wholesome.
So, of course, some religious asshole is going to have a problem with it.
Enter said asshole, Jeff Lyle, and his cult at Good News Gathering.
I found out about his fuckery from Hemant Mehta over at The Friendly Atheist. I guess for "God" reasons, Jeff Lyle wanted the play canceled. Because that is what religion does. And he succeeded. Sot of.
Here is a local news report discussing it.
It is 2021. Why are LGBT issues still being censored? Why are Dungeons & Dragons-themed media still being attacked by the right-wing members of the religious community?
When I say "politics" are an important facet of my gaming THIS is what I mean. The optics here are...well EXACTLY what we have been seeing forever. Some white, hetero male sees something HE doesn't like, especially since it is a.) female focused, b.) has magic /occultism/demons involved, and SHOCK c.) might have a LGBT character in it HE decides that NO ONE ELSE can see it either.
That's original fucking cancel culture right there.
But, just like all great D&D games, when our hero is down the party comes in to save the day!
In this case, the "party" is a Go Fund Me page set up to take the play off-campus so they can still perform it. As of this writing, it has raised $13,762 of its original $5,000 goal! That is great!
So yeah. If you have a couple of bucks and want to send the message that this is not the Dark Ages, nor the 17th Century nor even 1982 anymore, then give it to these kids.
The Go Fund Me is here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/save-she-kills-monsters-hillsboro
Yeesh. There's even (according to what I'm reading) a "Young Adventurers" version of the play, which apparently removes the explicit language and lowers the ages of some characters, but I'm betting Lyle's puppets on the board didn't offer that as a more acceptable option if the language was such a problem. Makes it utterly transparent that this is about policing sex lives along with erasing LGBT+ folks. Vile.
ReplyDeleteProbably as hypocritical as the Christian god too, I'll bet that cult has multiple members who've engaged in out-of-wedlock sex this Lyle sap seems to resent so much. Likely more than its share of adultery, STI cases and unplanned teen pregnancies too - the frequency of all of which are directly associated with the piss-poor sex education and communication of needs the uptight religious types always suffer from.
On a lighter note, being an atheist in D&D would be even crazier than believing in a deity in the real world. Show me a god that can and does grant its followers the ability to create miracles on demand and I'll happily admit it exists and might even be worthy of my veneration - after shopping around the other divine types for to see which one fits my needs and personal moral code best, of course.
I do have a character that is an atheist. His point of view of Gods are they are only mortals that had acquired enough power. Just because they are powerful doesn't mean they are worthy of worship or adoration.
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