How did you deal with the “degenerate” ape men in the Doors to Darkness scenario book

[Bebs]

Good day, newer GM giving CoC a test and looking forward to my games ahead. I’m actually a professor and covered Lovecraft a bit in my literature course, including the racism and discriminatory bits. Overall, I like how Chaosium has mentioned this is a part of the lore and one to be learned from as problematic, yet I feel it could be a tad more prominent.

Now, after that preface I was looking at running several stories from Doors to Darkness since it is for newer GMs, and players. It looks like it has some awesome variety in regard to styles of sessions! I love that Chaosium puts such consideration into printing and easing players in.

Then I hit the “degenerate ape men who are decedents of slaves, and….. “ dammmmmn, I was a bit taken aback this would be left in. “How do I handle this? I guess just leave it out entirely or don’t run this ever?” Was my first reaction, especially with everyone aware of the racism seeped in to Lovecraft that has to be handled with care? 
 

Any other GM? (Keepers?) have this issue pop up in some way? Am I misinterpreting something maybe? 

Edited September 28, 2023 by Bebs

[Bill Mize]

I think that you could put something in the discovery section of the scenario that mentions people going missing, as opposed to directly calling out the slaves and their handlers.  Instead of the slaves, it could be just various and sundry folks. Hunters, trappers, folks who live on the outskirts of town, homeless people, etc. It's an easy fix, I'm thinking.

 

- Bill

[g33k]

20 hours ago, Bebs said:

Good day, newer GM giving CoC a test and looking forward to my games ahead. I’m actually a professor and covered Lovecraft a bit in my literature course, including the racism and discriminatory bits. Overall, I like how Chaosium has mentioned this is a part of the lore and one to be learned from as problematic, yet I feel it could be a tad more prominent.

Now, after that preface I was looking at running several stories from Doors to Darkness since it is for newer GMs, and players. It looks like it has some awesome variety in regard to styles of sessions! I love that Chaosium puts such consideration into printing and easing players in.

Then I hit the “degenerate ape men who are decedents of slaves, and….. “ dammmmmn, I was a bit taken aback this would be left in. “How do I handle this? I guess just leave it out entirely or don’t run this ever?” Was my first reaction, especially with everyone aware of the racism seeped in to Lovecraft that has to be handled with care? 
 

Any other GM? (Keepers?) have this issue pop up in some way? Am I misinterpreting something maybe? 

I haven't seen the book, so I can't be sure if it fits, but...

Honestly, I'd put in some explicit mythos-content, if I wanted to preserve this element.
Someone... the Mi-Go? ... explicitly got involved with genetic engineering:
 * Maybe returning their victims to a state from a million-ish years ago?
 * Maybe hybridizing the human victims with gorilla's, and/or other Great Ape species?

Etc.
 

[Sam E.]

21 hours ago, Bebs said:

 

Then I hit the “degenerate ape men who are decedents of slaves, and….. “ 

The "and" part there is very important:

"These pathetic creatures are descended from the slaves and their smugglers ... "

[John Hall]

The Darkness Beneath the Hill from Doors to Darkness is pretty problematic. 

The slave-trade history is embedded deeply into the storyline, so it's not easily excised, but it's a thought-provoking touch. No matter how you cut it, though, suggesting that anyone is a degenerate ape man, regardless of heritage, smacks of racial superiority.

One suggestion would be to turn the Ape Men into undead Reanimates of the slaves and smugglers (see page 111 in the Malleus Monstrum), but with the stats and behaviors of the creatures kept from the DBTH scenario. As Bill noted, you could also add into that mix people who have gone missing for centuries with the Reanimates having clothing and features from a broad spectrum of times and cultures. 

I'm not into censorship, or rewriting someone else's work because I may not agree with it, but I think most people are able to objectively read Lovecraft's works as products of a specific time and society and enjoy the sum of them while conscientiously drawing a moral distinction between past and present attitudes. Sadly, DBTH does not have this shield of time. Having come out in 2016, the argument can strongly be made, "they should have known better." Does it rise to the level of book-banning? No. Does it rise to the level of maybe giving it a pass as a Keeper looking for a night's entertainment for a group of friends in its current state? Yes. Can it be fixed with a little revision? Absolutely.

 

[Mjollnir]

If you don't like the themes of Lovecraftian horror, why do you play Call of Cthulhu?

[John Hall]

Mjollnir,

I don't know that it's so much a matter of not liking the themes of Lovecraftian Horror, as addressing the unfortunate stereotypes prevalent in much of adventure fiction in the late 19th and early 20th century and determining how to address those stereotypes in a social setting like a game, where others might be offended.

Whether discussing Kipling, Haggard, Howard or Lovecraft, or any number of writers, the trope of the "civilized" Anglo Saxon versus the inscrutable, mysterious, dangerous, and feral "native" has not aged well. This is not to say that these books and short stories should not be read and enjoyed. Quite the contrary. I like reading Lovecraft and Howard. I just happen not to share their sentiments on certain subjects. 

Bebs is making a reasonable request, asking for suggestions about DBTH, to mitigate some of its more offensive elements. I think there's a lot that can be enjoyed in the scenario, and mechanically it's a good way of introducing new Keepers and Players to the game, but I personally would not run it as is. It's up to the Keeper to gauge his or her own group and adjust the game so that it's fun for them. 

[Mike M]

Hi. The text and some of the art of The Darkness Beneath the Hill has actually been revised and updated since the original print edition - updated pdf available for download from Chaosium.com/drivethru (wherever you originally purchased the book/pdf). 

We removed/rephrased some problematic terms that skewed the scenario away from its core plot - that of the machinations of the serpent person, who is the core "villain" of the piece.

Further to this, we are in the process of revising and updating all the scenarios in the book. We felt that after nearly 10 years, the material would benefit from further updating some of the language, including incorporating leads/clues to make running the scenarios a little easier. This is ongoing at this time, with a second edition coming out when it's ready. 

Thanks for the comments, all of which we take seriously, and we endeavor to improve and ensure everyone can enjoy our games. 

[Sam E.]

Hey, Mike.  Just taking a look at the updated version.  I think it still captures of the horror element of humans who are twisted by evil forces, while avoiding the potentially racist concerns of "degenerate ape men."  Nice job. 

[g33k]

On 9/28/2023 at 9:43 PM, Mjollnir said:

If you don't like the themes of Lovecraftian horror, why do you play Call of Cthulhu?

HPL's themes of cosmic horror & creeping dread are one thing; HPL's small-minded racism is something else.

[Zac]

8 hours ago, g33k said:

HPL's themes of cosmic horror & creeping dread are one thing; HPL's small-minded racism is something else.

I have been asked a few times to try out CoC but I can never get past the picture of HPL on the inside covers. I really wish that Chaosium would just ditch him entirely and focus on Mythos adventures and leave HPL in the ashcan of history where he belongs. 

[EricW]

HP Lovecraft's degeneracy themes are a little more nuanced than straightforward racism.

Just as we have the climate crisis, people of HP Lovecraft's time had the Eugenics crisis.

Charles Darwin might have created a sensation with his theory of evolution, but Darwin's cousin Francis Galton started the Eugenics crisis, when he hypothesised that the softness of modern life might have caused a catastrophic failure of natural selection for humans. Thanks to the softness of modern life, genetic weaklings were surviving and reproducing, weaklings who could never have survived in a more natural setting. Followers of Eugenics worried this accumulation of weakness might lead to human extinction.

Whites were believed to be the pinnacle, the least degenerated race, because of the obvious material achievements of anglosphere cultures compared to everyone else of the time.

The history of quite how big this movement became was kindof forgotten in the aftermath of WW2 - the horror of NAZI Germany abruptly made it very embarrassing to be associated with the Eugenics movement, so people just stopped talking about it. But in their heyday the Eugenicists managed to organise 3 major international conferences to discuss their alleged crisis - in a time when you had to travel by steamship to get anywhere. People from all over the world attended conferences in 1912, 1921 and 1932.

The people involved in these conferences in many cases were serious scientists - people like Ronald Fisher, widely considered to be the father of modern statistics, was an ardent Eugenicist. The conference report of the 1932 conference makes disturbing reading, an insane amount of scholarship went into this pseudoscience. 

I personally believe a great deal of this period has been covered up as being too embarrassing for the participants. There was a politician who was an ardent admirer and correspondent with the Eugenicists of Britain and the USA - Madison Grant, author of "The Passing of the Great Race", was so flattered by this fan, he included his feedback in the blurb of his book. "This book is my bible" - Adolf Hitler. US and British Eugenicists gave Hitler a great deal of financial help during his rise to power, they hoped he would turn Germany into a showcase for their ideas. But very little evidence of what must have been an extensive body of correspondence has survived to today. 

HP Lovecraft used this widespread popular concern about a Eugenics crisis as a narrative plot point. Just as the X-Files provides a compelling fictional explanation for why people keep seeing flying saucers, so HP Lovecraft provided a compelling fictional explanation for why non whites were allegedly degenerating so quickly - it was because of their foul religious practices, and the corrupting influence of their association with otherworldly deities!

People of the day kept asking Lovecraft if the mythos was real - Lovecraft’s stories explained their prejudices a little too well.

Come to think of it, the X-Files pretty much recycled HP Lovecraft's degeneracy theme, though they stripped away some of the racism. All those alien hybrids or vicious mutants - very HP Lovecraft, yes?

How should we handle these themes today? Obviously there is no requirement to do anything which makes anyone uncomfortable. Personally I feel I can enjoy the stories and plotlines, while appreciating the historical context of some of the sub-narratives is sometimes an uncomfortable fit with today's values, but I completely understand if other people have different feelings towards some of the material.

Edited October 17, 2023 by EricW

[Zac]

1 hour ago, EricW said:

HP Lovecraft's degeneracy themes are a little more nuanced than straightforward racism

I am not sure what the point of this is? Surely "nuanced" racism is still racism?

[EricW]

9 minutes ago, Zac said:

I am not sure what the point of this is? Surely "nuanced" racism is still racism?

The villagers consorting with deep ones in "The shadow over Innsmouth" were white. The people responsible for cleansing the original nest of deep one hybrids were non-white pacific islanders.

Wizard Whateley, the wicked degenerate whose scheme almost wrecked the world in "The Dunwich Horror" was white.

Lovecraft was using Eugenics tropes to make his stories more interesting to readers, harnessing a high profile social issue of his time. It wasn't straightforward racism. People who opposed degenerate consorting with mythos monsters were the good guys, white or otherwise. Those who enabled or facilitated such consorting were the bad guys, white or otherwise.

[Zac]

10 minutes ago, EricW said:

Lovecraft was using Eugenics tropes to make his stories more interesting to readers

His own rabid racism notwithstanding?

[EricW]

49 minutes ago, Zac said:

His own rabid racism notwithstanding?

Sure, he wrote a bunch of racist letters in personal life. But I find it interesting that white people aren’t automatically the heroes in all his stories.

There is a claim in Wiki that his views changed quite radically towards the end of his life, he became a socialist.

He was a brilliant writer of fiction, he trolled his entire fan base by presenting a fictional explanation for their prejudices so compelling they kept asking if the mythos was real. Who knows what the guy really believed.

[Zac]

1 hour ago, EricW said:

Who knows what the guy really believed.

You do know that it is okay to be a fan of the fiction and the Mythos universe without apologizing for HPL and trying to make him into something he isn't. You can just say "these are great stories but the writer was a racist crapbag". 

[g33k]

59 minutes ago, EricW said:

... I find it interesting that white people aren’t automatically the heroes in all his stories ...

But non-whites were almost always a problem, "degenerate" if not overtly evil -- not heroic!
 

1 hour ago, EricW said:

Sure, he wrote a bunch of racist letters in personal life
...
he trolled his entire fan base
...
Who knows what the guy really believed.

Given that he wrote personal letters to personal friends, it seems obvious that he was presenting his personal opinions.
You'd need some really compelling evidence to convince us of any other conclusion.

Your rhetorical "who knows" seems disingenuous, excusing or apologizing for obvious racism, which a tremendous amount of scholarship has concluded was quite genuine.

===

But, in case you're simply optimistic about this well-loved author:

HPL wrote of the "monstrous and nebulous adumbrations of the pithecanthrepoid and amoebal . . . suggestive of nothing but infesting worms or deep-sea unnamabilities" in discussing "Italo-Semitico-Mongoloid" people of the Lower East Side -- these quotes are from his personal letters to friends, describing his personal experience of New York.

His own wife wrote, “Whenever we found ourselves in the racially mixed crowds which characterize New York, Howard would become livid with rage. He seemed almost to lose his mind.”

[EricW]

I'm not in any way trying to excuse racism, sorry if I gave this impression. Appalling cruelty has been done and continues to be done, because people believe vile things about others which simply aren't true. HP Lovecraft may himself have perpetrated some of this cruelty because of his racist beliefs.

But I like to question, to understand - sticking a label on called "racist" and pigeonholing the issue doesn't help with this sort of understanding. 

I think it's important to consider the context of the times. Was HP Lovecraft a racist because he was just a hateful person? Or did he simply absorb the learnings of the time - a time when school teachers, academia, church leaders, politicians preached the gospel of Eugenics, the vile and completely untrue claim that colored people were a threat to the future survival of humanity?

What about his later conversion from being a typical conservative of his times, to embracing socialism? How did this affect his views? Why did this happen? Was his "anger at being in mixed crowds" because of conflict he felt in himself, which was eventually resolved when he abandoned conservatism? Was his anger because he tried to reconcile contradictory feelings towards others? Or was he just as much of a racist after he converted to socialism?

Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.

What blind spots do we have in our lives? What can lead to an awakening from such blindness?

Because I guarantee there are things all of us, myself included, believe are true, which our descendants will look back on as being as inexplicable, foolish and cruel, just as we look back on the racists and Eugenicists of the early 20th century. But just maybe by understanding other times, and learning how awakenings occurred from past mass delusions, we might gain some sliver of insight and understanding into our own failings. 

Edited October 18, 2023 by EricW

[g33k]

This is a fine sentiment, and I agree with it:

23 hours ago, EricW said:

I'm not in any way trying to excuse racism, sorry if I gave this impression. Appalling cruelty has been done and continues to be done, because people believe vile things about others which simply aren't true...

But what follows... not so much.

I will be frank:  a lot of your other points look an awful lot like somje of the classic apologetics for racism & HPL (not accusing YOU of racism, but suggesting you may be reading uncritically from such sources):

23 hours ago, EricW said:

...

I think it's important to consider the context of the times. Was HP Lovecraft a racist because he was just a hateful person? Or did he simply absorb the learnings of the time - a time when school teachers, academia, church leaders, politicians preached the gospel of Eugenics, the vile and completely untrue claim that colored people were a threat to the future survival of humanity?

What about his later conversion from being a typical conservative of his times, to embracing socialism? How did this affect his views? Why did this happen? Was his "anger at being in mixed crowds" because of conflict he felt in himself, which was eventually resolved when he abandoned conservatism? Was his anger because he tried to reconcile contradictory feelings towards others? Or was he just as much of a racist after he converted to socialism?

...

The "of his time" argument has been broadly debunked.  Yes, there were worse racists "of the time;" but HPL's own friends, own literary peers -- his own wife! -- found his racism to be notable for the time... to be problematic for the time.  People today making the "just representative of his time" argument read to me as either being ignorant of the facts, unwilling to face the the facts, or overtly denying that the facts are problematic.

His later "conversion" -- as best I can find -- was primarily socio-political, not racial.  On race, he never (that I can find) recanted his views on blacks, etc; only saying that "... the Germans [be] more German, the French more French, the Spaniards more Spanish, & so on."

Please re-read what you wrote, above:  you actually descend into random pop-psych "contradictory feelings toward others" which is wholly invented  in regards to HPL. Please show me anything from HPL's own writings -- or from those who actually knew him -- to support that this was ever any part of his experience or his thought.

HPL has passed away; we cannot query him, we cannot open his eyes, we cannot rehabilitate him to a less-hateful stance.  We can only judge him by the things that he wrote, and by what others who knew him thought of him, and reflected in their writing.

I am open to the evidence... but have nowhere seen what you describe.  And without such evidence, I'm going to see unsupported arguments as merely an effort to excuse HPL's self-evident racism.

Again:  I'm not accusing you of these ideas, but suggesting you may need to read more-critically when you see them.  Racists are getting damnably-good at wedging the door open to advance their agenda (q.v. the "Overton Window").

But this:

On 10/17/2023 at 5:37 PM, EricW said:

Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.

What blind spots do we have in our lives? What can lead to an awakening from such blindness?

Because I guarantee there are things all of us, myself included, believe are true, which our descendants will look back on as being as inexplicable, foolish and cruel, just as we look back on the racists and Eugenicists of the early 20th century.

is pure diversion; it's called "whatabout-ism," where "what about this" & "what about that" is used to divert from the uncomfortable issue at hand.
Undoubtedly, we are all blind to some of our weaknesses, both individuals and group blindness/weakness.  That does not excuse us from facing up to the discomfort.

HPL was horribly racist.  We cannot change the past.

But when we play CoC, we can do it with recognition of those themes in his work, and we can choose not to perpetuate them at our tables... and/or to query and repudiate them.

 

[EricW]

20 minutes ago, g33k said:

...

His later "conversion" -- as best I can find -- was primarily socio-political, not racial.  On race, he never (that I can find) recanted his views on blacks, etc; only saying that "... the Germans [be] more German, the French more French, the Spaniards more Spanish, & so on."

...

 

Again:  I'm not accusing you of these ideas, but suggesting you may need to read more-critically when you see them.  Racists are getting damnably-good at wedging the door open to advance their agenda (q.v. the "Overton Window").

,,,

HPL was horribly racist.  We cannot change the past.

But when we play CoC, we can do it with recognition of those themes in his work, and we can choose not to perpetuate them at our tables... and/or to query and repudiate them.

 

I'm not accusing you of being a racist either g33k - nice that we can have a civilised conversation without throwing such slurs at people who hold different views.

There was certainly a period when HP Lovecraft was horribly racist, but there are plenty who believe these views tapered off after he embraced socialism, though I agree there is no smoking gun in the form of an apology letter for his past views. 

Like you say, the guy is dead, so we'll never know for sure.

[g33k]

55 minutes ago, EricW said:

... there are plenty who believe these views tapered off after he embraced socialism, though I agree there is no smoking gun in the form of an apology letter for his past views...

It went beyond "racism," he was broadly anti-immigrant (including vs. white immigrants); if they came, he wanted them to assimilate as fast as possible.

He admired, so far as I can tell, only the upper-class English (some thought he even consciously modeled himself on them)... and even there, he preferred the 18thC variety!

I think it was primarily the anti-immigrant views where he "tapered off," as witness his exclusively endorsing only European nationalities.  He also seemed to be "OK"(ish) with native peoples who stayed in their native areas; apparently his travelogues to Quebec included some of this.