'Tournament of Rapists' hysteria hits the Big Time!

Right-wing news website Brietbart.com has published an article about the Tournament of Rapists dust-up. You can read it here. It's mostly a factual account of the crusade launched by the Brigades of the Outraged, Onebookshelf's response, and the appearance of a new mob of unreasoning, hysterical people.

You can't tell, but it goes to 11.

While the Brietbar writer (Allum Bokhari) gets more things right than the majority of those I see still commenting about the "controversy"--fanatical dingbats at either end of the spectrum whose main objective it seems is to keep outrage alive and to encourage "action" not against the publisher of the offending product but rather against Onebookshelf.com, a company that hundreds of publishers and thousands of independent creators use to distribute their products online--he has picked up and amplified their favorite line; That Tournament of Rapists is a game.

The offending product was not a game. Period. I really wish people would stop parading their ignorance around. I don't care what "side" of this "fight" they're on. I'm not terribly surprised that the Brigades of the Outraged don't know what it is they're actually outraged about--why let facts of reality get in the way of a good riot?--but lately I've been seeing equally ignorant blather from people who should know better.

It's gaming brilliance, but NOT a game.

Tournament of Rapists is not a game. Not even close. It was a supplement to a setting that uses the same game engine that many NUELOW Games releases use. It's the same game engine that the popular Pathfinder Roleplaying Game uses. All of our publications are produced, to a greater or lesser extent, by virtue of the Open Game License. But Tournament of Rapists was no more than a "game" than Modern Basics: Jungle Action or Feary Tales are games. They are supplements. They are part of a vast tapestry of available roleplaying supplements, tiny threads that have no meaning or purpose beyond the game they tie into.

If bug-eyed, would-be morality police (followed closely by equally hysterical freedom of expression supporters) hadn't seized on Tournament of Rapists as a way to further their respective agendas, this thing would have sold half a dozens copies and then slipped into oblivion... maybe selling one or two additional ones each month. (I am assuming something as niche-of-a-niche as this would sell on the level of items I consider failures here at NUELOW). In other words, no one would have known or cared of its existence. Certainly, there wouldn't be shrieking mobs of ill-informed assholes calling for "action" against literally thousands of creative people who had nothing whatsoever to do with Tournament of Rapists.

I have, as they say, a dog in this fight. NUELOW Games has an exclusive distribution agreement with Onebookshelf.com. Back in 2011, when we were reviving NUELOW, I emailed Warehouise23.com (another online distributor/retailer of games) to see if they would carry us... and Warehouse23 couldn't even be bothered to give me the courtesy of a reply. Onebookshelf, on the other hand, has always been responsive to my questions as a publisher, They also mostly leave me alone to manage my own little store that is serviced on their sites. Just like they do with everyone else who publishes and distributes through them.

I like that freedom. I like the fact that they treat me as if I matter, even though my company is strictly small-fry. (We never have strong enough sales to make to the left-hand listing of publishers on the front page, and we rarely break the Top 50% of best-selling publishers in a month, except for the niches we serve where we are usually in the Top 5%... but that's a sign of how small the audience is for what we produce rather than a measure of success). However, the freedom that I have to release what I want, when I want, and how I want--within certain well-defined technical quality parameters--is what the mob of would-be censors want to put a stop to. I've seen some of the greater idiots issue demands for Onebookshelf to approve releases before they go up, because of the "rape game" that, as I spelled out above, never existed.

Onebookshelf came up with a policy to handle "offensive content" that should satisfy any reasonable person. You can read it here if you like.. It provides a way for the outraged to inform management of their displeasure, and it spells out the steps that Onebookshelf's staff will take in response to said outrage that is fair to publishers and the hyperventilating alike. It's a policy that more or less keeps business as usual, but adds a safety valve to the process.

Naturally, it didn't appease the most fanatical of the self-righteous crusaders. They continue to stir up their mobs, who continue to swallow their half-baked cow chips and fantasies about a "rape game.' That is not particularly shocking to me, as I long ago observed that the worst thing you can do is to let the self-righteous leaders mobs of the perpetually offended sense weakness; nothing will satisfy them.and they will just keep coming. All you can do is make sure they don't have convincing arguments for the intelligent and sane majority out there.

Aw, hell. Another Internet Mob. Is there an unending supply of halfwits out there?

But. to my surprise, the sensible policy of Onebookshelf inspired another group to encourage minions to go on a rampage of boycotts and general stupidity. "Onebookshelf has given into the mob," they claimed. "Onebookshelf is going to censor our game! Look! They already banned that game over there--the rape game, you've been hearing about! Take your business elsewhere!"

Yeah... certain publishers, proclaimed libertarians, and self-described and self-appointed defenders or roleplaying games were now using the same fucking approach that the self-appointed morality- and thought-police were using. People who should know better, who should be able to recognize a "business as usual" policy, were stirring up new mobs of uniformed halfwits that, in the long run, could only have the effect of damaging everyone's business. To make it worse, they were just as unable to tell a "game" from a "supplement," as the Brigades of the Outraged.

There are morons to the left of me, and there are idiots to the right. Which brings me back to the top.

The Breitbart writer got his facts wrong, just like the Brigades of the Outraged. It's rather embarrassing for him that his article is under a headline stating "Social Justice Warriors Attack Tabletop Gaming, Get Their Facts Hopelessly Wrong," since he accepted the total white-wash that Skortched Urf put forth about Tournament of Rapists AND he picked up the distortion that it's a "game." I would have much preferred this article--which is well-intended and exactly in the place where reasonable people should stand on the topic of Onebookshelf, the hundreds of publishers served by it, and Tournament of Rapists--wasn't marred by the distortions spewed by those who want to make it more difficult for me to publish what I want, and for you to buy what you want for your gaming groups.

Well... thank you for reading. Do come back some other time when I may actually have posted some fun game content--most likely not a game, though. Just something that can be used with a game. If you made it this far, however, you must either be a real fan, or really bored. In either case, perhaps I can interest you in some of the products carried by Onebookshelf that I have contributed to for NUELOW Games, TSR, Wizards of the Coast, White Wolf and several others? Your purchase will be a symbolic and actual victory over the rampaging Internet Warriors. Click here to see a selection of what is available.

Please? Everything you buy helps me and other creators pay rent and eat.

The Brigade of the Righteous goes after the wrong eff'in targets. Again.

Last week, I made some comments about a particularly unpleasant roleplaying game supplement that was being offered for sale in an extremely hamfisted way. You can read that post here.

In the days since, some shortsighted publishers did show up to posture, but there were also numerous successful attempts at stirring up mobs of self-righteous gamers with virtual torches and pitchforks, in an effort to "make them pay" (as one delightful person put in at one blog) for DARING to publish something they didn't like/found offensive.

The Brigade of the Righteous. (Artist's Rendition)

As is almost always the case, these mobs consist mostly of morons who are offended third-hand--they are offended just to be offended, and they don't even have the slightest clue what it really is they're supposed to be offended over. (Otherwise, so many of them wouldn't be referring to Tournament of Rapists as a "rape game." And, as is almost always the case with self-righteous, ill-informed idiots, they are venting their rage at completely innocent bystanders.

These Brigades of the Righteous are calling for every pure-hearted soul to boycott the Onebookshelf sites (RPGNow, DriveThruRPG, DriveThruComics, DriveTruFiction, DriveThruCards, and the WargameVault), while they themselves are swearing blood-oaths and deleting their accounts on the sites so that they may forever be purged of evil. What these fuckwits don't seem to comprehend is that they are visiting their righteous revenge on HUNDREDS of independent publishers and THOUSANDS of writers and artist who had nothing to do with Tournament of Rapists.

NUELOW Games is strictly small-fry, but I actually rely on the income the sales generate to make ends meet. I also have half-a-dozen contributors to whom I pay (admittedly paltry sums of) royalties. They had nothing to do with Tournament of Rapists, nor did I. So why do the self-righteous Web Warriors feel the need to "make us pay"?

Deserving of boycott?

Hell, if the objective is to honor diversity and inclusion and punish the wicked, wicked misogynists, NUELOW Games can even be considered to be on their side. After all, we've produced the only complete collections of series written or drawn by some of the few women who were active in comics during the 1940s (Ginger and Snap, Complete Golden Age Oddballs: Angela & Miss Espionage). We've also produced the only complete collections of comics series starring strong female heroes (Iron Lady, Tara: Marauder of the Spacelanes, Warrior Maiden Starlight). And then there's Science Sleuths, the first three volumes of which starred a woman scientist/superhero, and a pair of characters who are not only strong women, whose adventures meet the Bechdel Test, and who are a same-sex couple. I think we checked almost every box on the Inclusivity Form with that one.

Deserving of boycott?

So... what exactly did my contributors and I do to the Brigades of Righteousness that they need to "make us pay"? Or are they just too dumb and wrapped up in the giddy feeling of outrage that they don't see they're hitting far more than the target of their anger?

Please don't let these calls for boycotts amount to anything. Take a look at what NUELOW Games has to offer and get yourself something good to read from RPGNow, DriveThruComics, or DriveThruFiction. If there's nothing you like from us, browse around. You're bound to find something... among the tens of thousands of offerings that aren't Tournament of Rapists.

UPDATE
Onebookshelf has announced a new policy for dealing with "offensive" content. I think it's a good one. You can read it here.

I'm not easily shocked, but... holy hell!

Some of you may remember my commentaries on the #Gamergate: The Card Game mini-controversy. (If not, you can read them here.)

As you read this, the morally upstanding publishers who threatened to yank their products from Onebookshelf sites must have fired off emails to everyone at the firm, even more purple-faced with rage and indignation. Because, surely, a straight-faced roleplaying game sourcebook about an extreme fighting tournament centered on raping the opponent is something they'd far less want to be associated with than a satirical card game?

I am talking about Tournament of Rapists, the latest release from Skortched Urf Studios/Otherverse Games.

... wait? What?!

I first saw hints about this OGL d20 System supplement via vague posts in my Facebook feed about an hugely offensive new release on the Onebookshelf sites. No one was linking to it, so I went looking at DriveThruFiction (since that was the only site that links were being provided to. But I couldn't find any new releases out of the ordinary--some things that *I* wouldn't have published and that *I* wouldn't have bought were there, but nothing worse than dozens of other similarly themed "adult" products that are released on a monthly basis.

And then a post by Erik Tenkar (of the "Tenkar's Tavern" blog) came into my Facebook feed. It was about the product Whose Name People Dared Not Mention: Tournament of Rapists.

Holy hell. My first reaction to the sparse sales text was, "Well... it's a shocking title, but I guess it's a good subject for an adventure that revolves around crushing, killing, and otherwise bringing to justice the evil monsters involved with such a fighting ring."

Then, once the "wait... WHAT?!" reaction subsided, I looked at the sales blurb again. Tournament of Rapists is not an adventure. It's a source book. And it doesn't appear to be source book about a monstrous group that exists expressly to be destroyed, but one on an activity that player characters can be part of, in an affirmative sense.

We thought we were risque

Holy hell. When we here at NUELOW threw "adult feats" on this blog as a gag, we giggled like the immature people we are. When Hundal proposed we put them and other content in a little product titled Modern Basics: Feats of an Adult Nature poking fun at people who think sexuality needs to be front and center in RPGs, as well as at publishers who make it a marketing point, I worried that maybe it was too risque and possibly more offensive than funny.

Compared to Tournament of Rapists, our little booklet looks more harmless than a Family Circus or Dilbert cartoon. Even our straight-faced releases that touch on sexual themes in gaming (like Devils in Petticoats and Modern Basics: Feats of Seduction and Subterfuge) are basically PG or PG-13... as opposed to what appears to be a hard R or NC-17 with the Skorched Urf book.

I don't understand the appeal of a game source book themed around sexual violence. I can't imagine conceiving, writing, or publishing such a thing. The most monstrous of villains in my games are the ones who molest and rape victims--they are targets for player characters to arrest or kill.

But will they let her compete?

Now, I am admittedly making at these comments and judgments about Tournament of Rapists from a position of ignorance. For all I know, the book is slanted in a way that makes it impossible for PCs to join in the "fun" of Ultimate Rape Fighting. I have not read the book, nor have I looked at any of the setting material it expands upon--a place called Dark Tokyo. (Someone out there is more than welcome to set me straight if I'm making incorrect assumptions.)

Well... over the next few days, we'll be seeing all sorts of posturing and threats coming from morally outraged publishers. Unless... they really were motivated in their crusade against #GamerGate: The Card Game by far baser impulses than just the desire to play Morality Police?

As far as the apparent target audience for Tournament of Rapists? I am worried they might have taken offense over the things I've published that make fun of their desire to have sex front and center in their games. Please don't rape me.