Hasta la vista, ENWorld

In the wake of the release of Pathfinder 2, I thought it might be nice to wander over to ENWorld again and see what kind of chatter there was about it.  Y'know, just to get a sense of what people were thinking about it.  Not that I'm interested in the game very much myself—I was (mostly) politely disinterested in Pathfinder 1 when I realized that not only was it going to fix very little of the problems 3.5 had, but it was actually going to exacerbate them, if anything.

Of course, I don't really do ENWorld very much anymore.  I found out again very quickly why.  I had posted a thread months ago asking people to describe for me why they preferred Kara-Tur over Rokugan or vice versa (and threw in as an aside that they could use Paizo's Dragon Empires as a third Oriental Adventures substitute if they wanted.

It had some decent discussion for a while, and although it was an older thread, messageboards are a thing of the past mostly, so it still had some currency from time to time as someone discovered it and posted a few posts and it floated to the top again for a time.  And then, of course, some idiot SJW tried to derail the discussion by going on about how "oriental" might be considered an insulting or racist term or something.  I told him to knock it off, rather politely, I think, because no it isn't and it's derailing the discussion.

Umbran, the only mod left who ever seems to do anything, and man does he do it all, came in with his official "red letter" post telling me not to try and be "junior-mod" and just report the post.  Well, Umbran, I'm not trying to be "junior-mod" and although it might be inconceivable to you, sometimes people can resolve issues themselves without having to go run and tattle to mommy about every single little thing that they don't like.  I know, I know—you really love the self-important feeling of being mommy in this context, so you jealously guard that privilege and don't want people solving their own problems when they "should" be turning to you.  What kind of very sad, socially inept kind of guy needs that kind of validation, though?  I swear, Every. Single. Time. it's Umbran who reminds me of why I don't really frequent ENWorld anymore.  He's managed to almost single-handedly turn the place toxic, either through his own toxicity, or through his support of toxic behavior in others and his constant use of "mod power" to squash any psychologically healthy or functional behavior.  He's such a narcissistic, bratty little princess.

To this he added the idea that this lunatic SJW was right because the APA style guide and a very recent Webster's dictionary added that "oriental" might be considered offensive to some.  Those are not authoritative sources; they are second, third or even fourth removed from the original, but I actually remember watching Edward Said's demagoguery and race-baiting bigotry percolate through the academic literature as he created out of thin air the concept that "oriental" was racist (curiously, Said is, of course, not oriental. He's a Palestinian.)  I can tell you first hand that nobody really takes that crap seriously; he's just a loud, lunatic fringe—a cultural vandal—and because he has an academic post, he has a pulpit to convince gullible people at the style guide and the dictionary that there are actually people who believe oriental to be a racist designation.  There aren't.  There's just Said and his little coterie of fellow Western Civilization hating vandals yelling on the fringes of academic thought.  As historian Nikki Keddie said about it (giving Said rather more benefit of the doubt than he's observable earned):

. . . some unfortunate consequences . . . I think that there has been a tendency in the Middle East [studies] field to adopt the word "Orientalism" as a generalized swear-word, essentially referring to people who take the "wrong" position on the Arab–Israeli dispute, or to people who are judged "too conservative". It has nothing to do with whether they are good or not good in their disciplines. So, "Orientalism", for many people, is a word that substitutes for thought, and enables people to dismiss certain scholars and their works. I think that is too bad. It may not have been what Edward Saïd meant, at all, but the term has become a kind of slogan.

Anyway, once again, I'll be leaving ENWorld in disgust, reminded once again of why the place has become so incredibly insufferable and toxic. I'm tempted to post this stuff there too, but it'll just get deleted.  I don't need to flounce out like a drama queen telling everybody how much they suck as I leave.  It's Morrus's place, and he's delegated Umbran to run it the way that he wants it, and I'm a guest there.  If they want it to be toxic watering hole for SJWs, that's their affair.  Maybe I'll post it without the personal insults about Umbran and his greasy, creepy beta male behavior, but really—do I care that much?  I'm certainly irritated (again) with him and the place in general, but I'm not their dad, and it's not my responsibility to try and teach them appropriate social behavior.  Or anything else, for that matter.