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Dungeons & Dragons & Oppression

photograph of game dice and figurine

On September 2nd, Wizards of the Coast, the company that produces official Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) materials, apologized for offensive content in its lore concerning the Hadozee race released in the most recent Spelljammer: Adventures in Space boxed set. The Hadozee are a monkey-like humanoid race known for their sailing abilities and love of exploring. They have been included in the Spelljammer series since 1990, but recent updates to the lore, as well as some of the Hadozee artwork, prompted criticism that the Hadozee evoked anti-Black stereotypes.

The updates restructured the Hadozee’s origins, stating that the race was created after a wizard captured wild Hadozee and gave them an experimental elixir that made them intelligent, more human-like in appearance, and, as a byproduct, more resilient when harmed. The wizard’s plan was to sell the enhanced Hadozee as slaves for military use; however, the wizard’s apprentices helped the Hadozee escape with the rest of the elixir. The Hadozee returned to their homelands to use the rest of the elixir on other wild Hadozee.

As reddit user u/Rexli178 explained, the main issues players had with this lore were that “the Hadozee were enslaved and through their enslavement were transformed from animals to thinking feeling people,” and that “the Hadozee had no agency in their own liberation.” This, coupled with the fact that anti-Black stereotypes often compare Black people to monkeys, plus the well-known historical racist sentiment that enslavement was necessary for the improvement of the Black race, plus the idea that Black people don’t feel as much pain when harmed, plus Hadozee artwork that seemed to evoke the imagery of minstrel showsplus the fact that the Hadozee were characterized in other places as happy servants of the Elves all came together to paint a picture that many players found damning.

It is worth noting that the critique of the Hadozee lore was not that the Hadozee reminded players of Black people. The critique was that the Hadozee echo anti-Black stereotypes and narratives that have been used to oppress Black people.

Stating that something is similar to a stereotype of a group is not the same as stating that that thing is similar to the group itself; this is especially clear when the stereotype in question is plainly false and dehumanizing.

The recent Hadozee controversy is not the only misstep Wizards of the Coast has made in the past few years — the 2016 adventure Curse of Strahd  contained a people called the Vistani who evoked negative stereotypes associated with the Roma people. At the same time, Wizards of the Coast is slowly trying to change how race functions in D&D, removing alignment traits (good vs. evil, chaotic vs. lawful) and other passages of lore text to allow for greater freedom when constructing a character.

What went wrong with the Hadozee storytelling?

Whether the parallels with real life oppression and negative stereotypes were intentional, it seems clear that this lore pulled players out of the fantasy world and recreated negative tropes associated with anti-Black racism.

How strongly it pulled on those tropes might be a matter for debate; however, I think the more interesting philosophical question here is: How should D&D include stories of oppression into their game materials, if at all? The answer to this question will likely depend upon particular histories of oppression and the details of how a given narrative of oppression is woven in the story, but I think we can say a few things to answer the general version of the question.

The first observation to make is that D&D is a fantasy series. When playing, we want to be able to escape our mundane world and experience the excitement of casting spells, fighting monsters, and just joking around with our friends. Because D&D is a fantasy series, it seems that the stories about oppression that the game facilitates should be sufficiently removed from actual histories of oppression. Even more so it seems that they should avoid reifying oppressive stereotypes in worldbuilding.

Some historical themes can be pulled upon, but WotC should be careful not to let too many of those themes overlap.

If a story maps too closely onto the experiences of oppressed groups that still exist and are still oppressed in some ways, D&D has left the realm of fantasy, doing a disservice to its storytelling and potential for healthy escapism.

And, if a story maps too closely onto oppressive stereotypes that have been used to denigrate certain groups of people historically, that can also set off alarm bells.

It is worth noting, too, that just because a piece of lore does not bring certain players out of the game – because they do not see the parallels to real-life oppressive tropes or narratives – that alone does not mean the lore is passable. The point here is for players of all different backgrounds, including from different marginalized groups, to be able to suspend disbelief and enjoy the fantasy world of D&D. Storytelling that makes it difficult for members of certain marginalized groups to equally enjoy and participate in the game is unjust and can practically exclude people from the game.

Now, this isn’t to say that Dungeon Masters (DMs, or the person who runs the D&D game) should not be allowed to modify or reinvent D&D materials to tell stories that more closely map onto real-life instances of oppression. Some members of oppressed groups might appreciate being able to navigate oppressive frameworks in a world in which they have power and can become heroes. Whether these homebrew stories are exclusionary is another tricky question.

The point is, while players should have the freedom to adapt and change stories, the basic blueprint put out through official D&D materials should be maximally inclusive.

This brings me to my second point — Dungeons & Dragons should not shy away from storytelling that allows players to explore oppressive societies, complex social issues, and other uncomfortable situations that they may face in their real lives. The trick is that the players need to be able to make their own choices about how they want to engage in these issues. And, if the storytelling is sufficiently removed from real-life histories of oppression, that will make it a safer space for players to explore how their characters might respond in those scenarios. In order to include these elements and tell these stories well, it would be good for Wizards of the Coast to hire writers who are familiar with common oppressive tropes and narratives and who could redirect problematic stories in a different direction.

It’s interesting to note that the people who have reacted against the Hadozee controversy and claimed that the Spelljammer material was just fine seem to agree with these two principles. One common reaction appears to be something like “fantasy is different than reality, and we shouldn’t confuse the two.” While the bulk of those reactions insinuate that people are seeing connections between Black stereotypes and the Hadozee that aren’t there, I think that they are roughly in line with the idea that fantasy is something that is distinct from reality and should be kept that way. I take it that those who are critiquing the Hadozee lore are critiquing it for this same reason.

Another common reaction seems to be along the lines of “we shouldn’t get rid of conflict and difficult themes just to make some politically correct folks happy,” which lines up with the idea that D&D should be a space where those scenarios can be explored by all players. I imagine that those who are unhappy with the Hadozee lore would also agree with this principle, so long as players can be active in shaping their characters and experiences and the game does not exclude certain groups of players.

To be inclusive to all D&D players, however, Wizards of the Coast needs to have better representation of people with different life experiences and understandings of the world in their writing rooms. This will not only make for better storytelling, but it will also facilitate gameplay that does not alienate certain players in the room. Let’s hope that Wizards of the Coast as well as the larger D&D community start to head more in that direction.

The Ethics of Escapism (Pt. 3): Searching for the Personal when Everything Is Political

image of Lebron James with "More than an Athlete" slogan

It is beyond understatement to say that anyone could be feeling overwhelmed right now. For over four months, there have been daily protests against the brazenly public murder of Black people by police officers. If the police violence and terrorizing weren’t enough, the often hateful and willfully ignorant responses to calls for change to the system are emotionally draining, constant throughout the year, and can come from surprising places within anyone’s personal circle.

We can add to this ongoing discord the divisive attitudes concerning the pandemic and a rapidly approaching national election — fewer than 40 days away! — where the stakes are presented as the highest in history. The sheer amount of noteworthy news flooding in every day makes it difficult to balance the need to act and stay informed against restorative personal commitments that are needed to reproduce this labor on a daily basis.

In recent days and weeks, there have been loud calls to have a sharper dividing line between what can or should be “political” and what shouldn’t be. There are loud public complaints that the arenas that appear to allow for the sort of personal restoration, now drudge up the very issues that many seek to escape.

At the NFL season opener, fans in Missouri booed the Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans when they stood arm-in-arm on the field in support of racial unity. Angry responses to demonstrations calling attention to the unjust treatment of Black people in the US and in sports have a long history, and the response to the unity demonstration is reminiscent of the hateful response to Colin Kaepernick’s protest during the national anthem four years ago.

Also this year, Naomi Osaka won the US Open’s singles tournament while wearing masks with the names of Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain, Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, George Floyd, Philando Castile and Tamir Rice, all victims of racial injustice. British Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton wore a shirt calling for the arrest of Breonna Taylor’s murderers.

The world of sports is not the only arena where politics is “encroaching.” Media such as movies and TV are including more and more topical content and referential issues. For instance, Marvel series have made more and more direct references to the realm of government and the dynamics played out in our administration. Zac Stanton at Politico claims that escapist content is impossible at this point and recommends “leaning in.” In 2018 at the New Republic, Jeet Heer suggested that avoiding the content of the news would require the drastic measure of avoiding media completely.

The desire to cling to apolitical media and discourse is nothing new, and complaints about political encroachment similarly did not begin with the exhaustion of 2020. But it is difficult to develop an understanding of “political” that can cleanly divide entertainment that has a political message from that which doesn’t.

One sense of the “political” is the realm that you can disagree with friends but remain friends; perhaps in this sense the political denotes the particulars of policies and government, while the fundamentals of friendship can be preserved. For instance, in this sense, the “political” could address specifics of how the economy should work: should we have a progressive or flat tax? What should the brackets be? How should our tax dollars be allocated to different programs? Many can imagine disagreeing with friends over this question, especially given how much we can understand where the values of our friends originate and which issues resonate deeply and differently with each of our loved ones.

Another sense of the political is more robust. “Political” can delineate the role that power has in our society, and the importance that the relationships of power be put to use appropriately. The government wields a huge amount of power in a variety of ways, legislating support for citizens in less fortunate circumstances, articulating parameters of punishments for its citizens, and the standards for individuals to dwell in its boundaries and become citizens. The government further protects and ensures that people are respected and treated with the dignity that morality demands in domains that the public deems its jurisdiction.

When “political” denotes the power dynamics and moral reality of persons in our society, we could understand this domain as one regarding justice. On this understanding, the relevant topics would go beyond the policies that are invoked in the more minimalist sense above – where the political represents the sphere in which two people could agree on “the fundamentals” of morality, yet disagree about politics. Here, the topics and issues of politics or justice, include how people are rightfully treated, how government plays a role in how we should relate to each other in a society, who should be granted rights, how punishments should be meted out, etc.

There is media and entertainment whose content explicitly addresses the issues that are uncontroversially “political.” News is the clearest example, but films and TV shows that include political figures, revolutions, and topics related to our current situations of racist violence, corrupt leaders, and widespread illness also might qualify as “political” media at this time.

However, it is not just the explicit content of the entertainment that we consume that qualifies as political. Our interactions with one another every day reflect a particular power dynamic and moral reality. When the media we consume encourages the dehumanization of marginalized groups of people in our society, it buttresses our current power structures and propagates the unjust relationships in our society, where not everyone is equal and not everyone gets to be respected, safe, and viewed as worthy of the same rights.

The jokes in our movies and TV series whose premises are that fat people are lazy, gorge themselves on food, or are punishments to pursue for romantic pursuits at bars are a matter of politics, propagate an unjust society, or the representation of trans people as individuals “dressing up” as a different gender, or tricking people into dating them, or completely outside of mainstream society, or the overrepresentation of straight white people as the default, and non-white and queer people as struggling, or victims, or uneducated, are all matters of justice, whose continued use helps to prop up an unjust society. Media is saturated with depictions of the moral relationship between the various members of our society, and this composite picture creates and reflects the reality we see.

When people boo at a show of solidarity and inclusion at a sporting event, they are mistakenly categorizing “sports” as entertainment free from the political domain. Setting aside the billions of subsidies the NFL gets from tax-payers, the national anthem sung at every game, the fact that politicians gain political points by throwing first pitches and are seen as more “American” for luxuriating in their overpriced viewing seats, all suggest that sports are political. Players stood for racial unity, faced booing from the fans, and then performed for an unsupportive and aggressive audience in a sport that is notorious for putting its players’ health and safety at risk, which is a matter of justice.

This group of professionals face a history of racism in their organization, working for team owners who are almost exclusively white (and many of whom have deep ties to Trump), and lacking the support from their privileged white teammates during fights for racial justice. Further, 70% of NFL fans are white, and the racist attacks on shows of support for racial equality as well as the brazen display of disrespect for athletes reveals deeper issues in the fandom of the NFL.

On neither understanding of “political” can sports fans genuinely claim political encroachment.

On the minimalist understanding of “political,” where we are restricted from considering questions of human rights and respect, the recognition of racial violence and bigotry falls outside the scope, and there are not grounds for complaint on the basis of political encroachment. Anything that could be considered “political” on this account has always been there, friends simply don’t talk about it.

If, however, we have the more robust understanding of “political,” then all media and entertainment are matters of justice and a question of our obligations regarding the the rights and dignity of ourselves and others. The oppression and violence towards members of our society is relevant to justice and politics, but it is not distinct to particular arenas, or content explicitly about the news. Politics in this sense is a part of all domains of life, and friendships, entertainment, etc. are part of politics. Relationships with those close to us would not be very healthy or successful if they included deep disagreements over who was worthy of rights and dignity. Entertainment is politically laden and potentially unjust when it exploits the labor of marginalized groups, as many sports do. Similarly, when pernicious stereotypes saturate visual media and reinforce dehumanization and bigotry, this is a political issue when politics is understood as justice.

Whether we understand politics in the minimal sense or as the domain of justice, there is no clear boundary cordoning it off from between the various aspects of our lives. Entertainment, as tied up in our experience of the human condition, has always been (and will always be) “political.”

 

Part I – “The Ethics of Escapism” by Marko Mavrovich

Part II – “Two Kinds of Escape” by A.G. Holdier

The Ethics of Escapism (Pt. 2): Two Kinds of Escape

photograph of business man with his head buried in the sand

Shortly before Labor Day this year, polling data of the American workforce indicated that a majority (58%) of employees are experiencing some form of burnout. Not only was this an increase from the early days of the pandemic (when the number was around 45%), but over a third of respondents directly referenced COVID-19 as a cause of their increased stress. Reports on everyone from “essential” workers, to parents, to healthcare professionals and more indicate that the effects of the coronavirus are not merely limited to physical symptoms. Ironically, while the steps taken to limit COVID-19’s physical reach have been largely effective (when properly practiced), those same steps (in particular, self-imposed isolation) may be simultaneously contributing to a burgeoning mental health crisis, particularly in light of additional social pressures like widespread financial ruin, state-sanctioned racial injustices, and a vitriolic election season.

Indeed, 2020 has not been an easy year.

Nearly a century ago, J.R.R. Tolkien — creator of Gandalf, Bilbo Baggins, and the whole of Middle-Earth — explained how fantasy stories like The Lord of the Rings not only offer an “outrageous” form of “Escape” from the difficulties people encounter in the lives, but that this Escape can be “as a rule very practical, and may even be heroic.” In his essay On Fairy Stories, Tolkien asks, “Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if, when he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?” It is true that Escape from reality can sometimes be irresponsible and even immoral (for more on this, see Marko Mavrovic’s recent article), but Tolkien reminds us to avoid confusing “the Escape of the Prisoner with the Flight of the Deserter” — the problems of the latter need not apply to the former.

There are at least two ways we can distinguish between Tolkien’s two kinds of Escape: epistemically (rooted in what someone seeks to escape) and morally (concerning one’s motivations for escaping anything at all). Consider how a person might respond to the NFL’s decision to highlight a message of social justice during its games this season: if they are displeased with such displays because, as Salena Zito explains, they “are tired of politics infecting everything they do” and “ just want to enjoy a game without being lectured,” then we might describe their escape as a matter of escaping from information, perspectives, and conversations that others take to be salient. Depending on how commonly someone engages in such a practice, this could encourage the crystallization of their own biases into an “epistemic bubble” where they end up never (or only quite rarely) hearing from someone who doesn’t share their opinions. Not only can this prevent people from learning about the world, but the “excessive self-confidence” that epistemic bubbles engender can lead to a prideful ignorance about reality that threatens a person’s epistemic standing on all sorts of issues.

If, however, someone instead wants to avoid “being lectured at” while watching a football game because they wish to escape from the moral imperatives embedded within the critiques of the lecture (or, more accurately, the slogan, symbol, chant, or the like), then this is not simply an epistemic escape from information, but an escape from moral inquiry and confrontation. Failing to care about a potential moral wrong (and seeking to avoid thinking about it) is, in itself, an additional moral wrong (just imagine your response to someone ignoring their neighbor trapped in a house fire because they “just wanted to watch football”). In its worst forms, this is an escape from the responsibility of caring for the experiences, needs, and rights of others, regardless of how inconvenient it might be to care about such things (in the middle of a football game or elsewhere). Nic Bommarito has argued that being a virtuous person simply is a matter of caring about moral goods in a manner that manifests such caring by instantiating it in particular ways; much like the people who passed by the injured Samaritan on the road, escaping from reminders that we should care about others cannot be morally justified simply by selfish desires for entertainment.

Both of these are examples of Tolkien’s Flight of the Deserter: someone who has a responsibility to learn about, participate in, and defend the members of their society is choosing to escape — both epistemically and morally — from reminders of the duties incumbent upon their roles as social agents. But this is different from the Escape of the Prisoner who simply desires a temporary reprieve to unwind after a stressful day. In the absence of immediately pressing issues (like, say, your neighbor trapped in a house fire), it seems perfectly acceptable to take some time to relax, de-stress, and recharge your emotional reserves. Indeed, this seems like the essence of “self-care.”

For example, the early weeks of the first anti-pandemic lockdowns happened to coincide with the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, a Nintendo game where players calmly build and tend a small island filled with cartoon animals. For a variety of reasons, quarantined players latched on to the peaceful video game, finding in it a cathartic opportunity to simply relax and relieve the stress mounting from the outside world; months later, the popularity (and profitability) of Animal Crossing has yet to wane. You can imagine the surprise, then, when this gamified Escape of the Prisoner was invaded by Joe Biden’s presidential campaign, who elected to offer virtual signs to players wanting to adorn their island in support of the Democratic candidate for president. Although it would seem an exaggeration to call this a “lecture,” insofar as someone complains about “just wanting to play a game” without being confronted with political ads, there seems to be nothing morally wrong with criticizing (or electing to avoid) Biden’s campaign tactic — probably because there is no inherent obligation to care about a politician’s attempt to get elected (in the same way that there is a duty to care for fellow creatures in need).

So, when thinking about the ethics of escape, it is important to distinguish what kind of escape we mean. Attempts to escape from our proper moral obligations (a Flight of the Deserter) will often amount to ignorant or shameful abdications of our moral responsibilities to care for each other. On the other hand, attempts to (temporarily) escape from the often-difficult burdens we bear, both by doing our duties in public society and simply by quarantining ourselves at home, will amount to taking care of the needs of our own finitude — Tolkien’s Escape of the Prisoner.

In short, just as we should care about others, we should also care for ourselves.

 

Part III – “Searching for the Personal when Everything Is Political” by Meredith McFadden

Part I – “The Ethics of Escapism” by Marko Mavrovich

The Ethics of Escapism (Pt. 1)

photograph of Green Bay Packers stadium lightly populated before game

The NFL will imprint “End Racism” and “It takes all of us” in the end zones of stadiums in lieu of team logos. NFL Commissioner Roger Goddell stated that “the NFL stands with the Black community players, clubs and fans confronting systemic racism,” a commendable sentiment. The NFL will also allow coaches and officials to wear patches embroidered with “social justice phrases or names of victims of systemic racism.” Many coaches have signalled their support for the league’s latest policies and its general shift towards allowing sociopolitical issues into the game. Adam Gase and the entire coaching staff of the New York Jets will wear “Black Lives Matter” throughout the 2020 season. Mike Tomlin, head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers, used this summer’s protests to speak with his team about social justice while also calling out the league’s lack of diversity. Even Bill Belichick, who is famously averse to “off-field distractions,” has welcomed these social justice conversations into the locker room. The NFL is but one example of the invasion of sociopolitical movements into entertainment.

The politically blank pages of one’s life are disappearing. No longer can one turn on late-night television to escape politics. No longer can one watch post-game interviews without being reminded of the social discord. No longer are Academy Award acceptance speeches devoid of political advocacy. These spaces are politicized. While late-night talk show hosts, athletes, and actors have undoubtedly revealed their politics and championed social values in the past, such revelations were notable because they were atypical. Now, they are the norm. As comedy writer Blayr Austin notes, “There’s never a moment reprieve from the chaos of news.”

Perhaps this transformation of those previously unscathed spaces of entertainment ought to be celebrated. There are at least three reasons to think so. Firstly, the entertainers — athletes, musicians, actors, and business personalities — are members of society, too. It may be unfair to expect them to silo their personal political preferences from their public work so that some of their fans can enjoy an escape from the so-called “chaos of the news.” But while entertainers are not entirely removed from society’s ills, they enjoy a comfortable arm’s length distance from it and the everyday reality of average civilians. Secondly, entertainers may be necessary catalysts for the desired change. But of course, the flipside is also true: entertainers may be necessary catalysts for undesired change (See my piece, “Novak Djokovic and the Expectations for Celebrity Morality”). Thirdly, some may argue that their silence will only serve to perpetuate the social ills debated today — systemic racism and racism injustice come to mind. But using this argument as a reason to compel entertainers to be political would obligate entertainers to “speak out” and raise awareness on a whole host of ills without any sense of how the ills should be prioritized, while also assuming that the classification of some social developments as “ills” is always beyond doubt. Ending racism and sexism are goals we might all agree on, but are inclusion riders equally unobjectionable? This third reason is also problematic because it conflates permissive conditions with obligatory participation. While silence on a social ill may permit the ill to continue unabated by criticism, silence is not an instrument of enacting that ill. In other words, silence is not the act that propagates the ill — even if it permits the ill to occur — which is an important distinction to understand when discerning proper responses to social developments.

But what about the fans who may find this blending of social justice and politics with entertainment suffocating (even if they do are sympathetic to the cause)? Is it wrong for them to feel that way? Is it wrong for a fan to seek a 3-hour reprieve from the omnipresent sociopolitical tumult by watching football? There are at least three reasons to think so.

Firstly, the ability to escape from the omnipresent sociopolitical tumult is not a luxury that every individual enjoys, especially if that tumult intimately affects an individual; therefore, the escapist fan should not want such an escape or, at least, the vehicle of entertainment (e.g. the NFL) should not address his or her escapist desire (e.g. not be reminded of the unjustified police killings and destructive demonstrations while watching the game). Yet the principle that underlies this reason would imply behavioral and attitudinal changes that others would find ridiculous. I should not complain to my landlord about the malfunctioning A/C in my apartment because, after all, some people suffer in far hotter climates without it. I should not want to go to the gym to clear my head because some people do not have access to gyms or other means of clearing their head. These examples are absurd, but so, too, is the argument.

Secondly, the fan should not be critical of the blending of social justice and politics with entertainment suffocating because he or she is not obligated to watch. Social media plays host to some version of the following exchange: “I don’t like how political football/the Tonight Show/the Oscars has gotten!” which is invariably followed by the retort: “Well, you don’t have to watch!” But of course, such a statement does not resolve the conflict. Suppose the conflicted spectator only watches professional football and finds pleasure in the 21 weekends of games from September to February. To tell him or her “You don’t have to watch!” is akin to saying “You don’t have to participate in your favorite hobby/interest/game/mode of necessary relaxation!”

Lastly, the fan should be held to the same standard as the entertainer: to be silent — to escape — only serves to perpetuate the existing ills that have fomented the never-ending barrage of news and the social fractures, therefore it is wrong to seek the reprieve. Do not sports, late-night talk shows, and award shows celebrating cinematic achievement pale in comparison to the problems yet to be resolved in our community? Maybe so. But does this mean that one is wrong to seek a political-free zone of entertainment? If the answer is yes, then it seems we must always be on-watch, always be advocating, always be consuming the news, always be active in resolving all of society’s ills, and always be denying ourselves an escape — however short, however trivial — from our contentious, divisive, and oft-disappointing reality.

 

Part II – “Two Kinds of Escape” by A.G. Holdier

Part III – “Searching for the Personal when Everything Is Political” by Meredith McFadden

Cottagecore and the Ethics of Retreat

photograph of a Texas homestead at dusk surrounded by wilflowers

Over the past few months, many Americans have turned to bread-making to stave off the boredom and helplessness of quarantine. The craze for bread-making eventually reached a point where flour mills were unable to keep up with the sharp increase in demand for their product, leaving grocery store shelves barren. But bread-making is just one strand of a much more intricate lifestyle movement which began taking shape about a year before coronavirus.

Cottagecore,” as the trend is called, is partly an aesthetic and partly a set of ideals for “the good life.” The word “cottage” references country living as embodied by the self-sufficient and aesthetically pleasing cottage, and the slang/suffix “core” indicates a genre or category. Much in the same way that people are dedicated to certain genres of music, online communities have sprung up around certain aesthetics; one popular example is the “academia” aesthetic, which celebrates elements from 19th-century fashion and architecture that have become associated with higher education (think old leather books, marble busts, and tweed blazers).

Cottagecore also has an online community, and a glance through the cottagecore tag on Tumblr or Pinterest will give you a good idea of its aesthetic interests: frolicking goats, woven baskets bursting with ripe tomatoes, rough-hewn wooden furniture, and of course, loaves of bread. Everything is bathed in a golden haze of sunlight, or at least in a sepia-toned filter. But cottagecore also encompasses fashion, art, and even entertainment. For example, a budding genre of video games has both capitalized on and helped further cement the aesthetic and philosophy of cottagecore. In smash-hits like Stardew Valley, Harvest Moon, and to a lesser extent, the Animal Crossing series, the player leaves behind a hollow life in the city to start over in a close-knit rural community. Gameplay elements include conversing with and sometimes even romancing the locals, operating a self-sufficient farm (often through a variety of cottage-industries, such as farming, fishing, baking, and raising animals), and basking in the pristine beauty of nature. There isn’t a way to win or lose these games, or a villain the player must defeat in order to advance the plot. The closest thing to an antagonist in Stardew Valley is a Walmart-esque corporation that the player is gently encouraged to drive out of business in favor of a mom-and-pop general store.

As the Stardew Valley example shows, cottagecore is at least partly rooted in anti-capitalist sentiment. It presents an escape from the drudgery of industrial urban life, a sort of reverse rural-flight of the imagination. As Shania O’Brien optimistically puts it,

“This budding aesthetic movement paints the picture of an idyllic landscape and prioritises the simple pleasures in one’s life. Cottagecore turns its nose up at sixteen-hour workdays, at the fast-paced anxieties of late-stage capitalism, at toxic masculinity. It rejects the connections we make under these systems, labelling them inauthentic facsimiles of genuine relationships.”

At first glance, it’s difficult to discern what might be morally objectionable about a pretty moodboard on Pinterest, or what is morally objectionable about the philosophy behind that moodboard. However, indigenous people have pointed out that cottagecore is overwhelmingly white, and often unknowingly perpetuates settler colonialism. Specifically, critics argue that the aesthetic idealizes the American homestead as a beacon of self-sufficiency rather than the legacy of brutal Westward expansion. It’s worth interrogating why so many are tempted to romanticize rural life, and whether or not retreating from the problems of capitalism is worthwhile or desirable.

While cottagecore is certainly a trend of the moment, idealizing the countryside has been a common practice throughout human history. In response to the industrial revolution, many 19th century artists, like Jean-François Millet, began taking peasant life seriously as an artistic subject. The genre of “rural naturalism,” which depicted an ideal version of farmers and laborers going about their daily lives, reflected the artists’ sense of alienation from nature as well as a growing urban market for sentimental depictions of peasant life. The late 19th-century Arts and Crafts movement, which was spearheaded by socialist artists, also celebrated individual craftsmanship over the products churned out by urban factories.

Rural idealism in art is perhaps best embodied through Thomas Cole’s five-painting series titled The Course of Empire, completed in 1836. The first painting depicts an untouched and frightening wilderness, which is transformed by human cultivation into a tranquil rural paradise in the second painting. This second painting is clearly meant to represent the ideal state of mankind, which is a sharp contrast to the next two paintings in the series. These depict a decadent and immoral urban environment, as well as its apocalyptic destruction. The final painting shows the ruins of the now-unpopulated city, suggesting that desolation is inevitable when humanity leaves rural Arcadia behind. Although Cole’s series depicts a pseudo-Roman city, it was created explicitly to critique 19th-century American capitalism, and clearly reflects growing fears about urbanization and the decadence of empire.

America has always had a unique and explicitly political version of rural idealism. Thomas Jefferson, a foundational proponent of agrarianism, wrote in 1785 that “Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country & wedded to its liberty and interests by the most lasting bands.” This statement was echoed by prominent American naturalist A.J. Downing, who succinctly explained in A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening in 1841 that “There is a moral influence in a country home.” Living in the country simply made you a better person, because you stood at a remove from the vulgar commercialism and social mixing of the city.

As Jefferson saw it, rural life isn’t isolated from the nation, but integral to it. Country, after all, can mean either a tract of rural land or a state, and thinkers like Jefferson sought to collapse the distinction between the two. In that sense, one could argue that modern rural escapism isn’t so much about retreating from reality as it is about taking part more fully in political society. However, this example also reveals a paradox of self-sufficient rural living. Jefferson’s farmer is both self-sufficient and tied down by civic responsibilities, both in society and outside of it. Also, of course, Jefferson has conveniently ignored the existence of the slaves who did the actual planting and tilling on his plantations, and the indigenous populations who lived there before him. Much like European artists of the 19th century, Jefferson is clearly promoting a certain kind of rural living as ideal with a self-serving political agenda. For artists and politicians alike, rural people were considered the “true” citizens of the state, the stable and honest antithesis to the cultural confusion of modernity.

20th-century escapees to the countryside certainly saw their rural retreat as political. The 1960s saw droves of educated middle-class city-dwellers retreating to rural communes with hopes of creating socialist utopias, as Jenny Odell touches on in her book How to Do Nothing. However, Odell found that the communes of the 1960s “exemplify the problems with imagined escape from the media and effects of capitalist society, including the role of privilege.” She explains that these communes, though ostensibly committed to egalitarianism and the rejection of privilege, often replicated the very structures they sought to escape. Women ended up doing all the dishes and menial housework, and because communes were primarily white, very few people of color were able to take part in the utopian project. Once again, it becomes apparent how difficult it is to truly escape society by returning to “the simpler things.” Furthermore, only those with privilege are able to enact their fantasies of escape. One famous historical example of this is Marie Antoinette’s Hameau de la Reine, a highly aestheticized mock peasant village built on the grounds of Versailles where the queen (who could be considered an early proponent of cottagecore) would pretend to milk cows and grow cabbages. Rural escapism almost always involves some element of privilege, evidently. Ironically enough, shots of the queen running through meadows and playing shepherdess in her hamlet, as depicted in Sophia Coppola’s 2006 Marie Antoinette film, are very popular in the cottagecore community.

The cottagecore movement borrows a vague moral sensibility from 19th-century agrarianism and marries it with socialist idealism, embodied especially by the communes of the 1960s. Much like those communes, cottagecore isn’t especially interested in those who already live in rural communities, unless they’re romanceable options in a video game. The “noble peasant,” an invention that was problematic to begin with, has disappeared from this configuration, because cottagecore is more about the desires of citydwellers than the needs of the communities they yearn to join. Cottagecore is political in that it is a response to alienation, an attempt at mapping out possibilities for a life without capitalism. But it still has a ways to go before it can truly live up to O’Brien’s description.

It’s unlikely that the damage of colonialism will be significantly worsened by Pinterest mood boards and jars of sourdough starter. There is also no evidence that young people are actually acting out their fantasies of rural retreat, so clearly cottagecore is more of a sensibility than an actual spur to change. As Odell argues, the impulse to mentally retreat from capitalism is both admirable and deserving of skepticism. As she says, “Some hybrid reaction is needed. We have to be able to do both: to contemplate and participate, to leave and always come back, where we are needed . . . To stand apart is to take the view of the outsider without leaving, always orientated toward what is is you would have left.” Much in the same vein, O’Brien suggests that “You can aesthetically participate in cottagecore, but more importantly, you can also incorporate its sentiment into your praxis by engaging in mutual aid, in environmental politics, in feminist activism. It is pointless to dream about wildflowers and serenity when you are doing nothing to bring that world closer.” Escapist fantasies can be an impetus to change, so long as they allow us to find new and more authentic forms of connection with others.

The Ethics of Apocalypticism

Jesus is usually thought of as a major ethical teacher (the famous slogan “What would Jesus do” is a major testament to this), but most of his preaching was not so much about how we should live, but rather, what will happen in the upcoming apocalypse. Yes, he gave a lot of ethical advice, but as Albert Schweitzer frequently reminded us, his ethics must always be understood in the context of apocalypticism. Jesus was, above all, a doomsdayer.

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Belief in the Paranormal: Harmless Superstition or Moral Escapism?

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Despite increasing secularism around the globe, belief in ghosts and other paranormal phenomenon remains prominent in many cultures. 42% of Americans believe in ghosts, and 52% in the United Kingdom. Many more believe in ghosts in other parts of the world, particularly in Asia, where ancient cultures still thrive – superstitions and all. Regardless of whether or not ghosts are real, belief in the paranormal has important societal functions. Belief in the paranormal helps humans assign order to an increasingly chaotic world, create social bonds, and even boost physical and mental function (another reason to keep knocking on wood.) Although belief in the paranormal can seem like a harmless pastime, is there a downside to having superstitions?

Shortly after WWII, Winston Churchill had a paranormal experience in the White House. Stepping out of the bathtub, he was reportedly confronted by the ghost of Abraham Lincoln. Singular paranormal experiences such as Churchill’s can be explained by stress, fatigue, and dim lighting. Could this paranormal experience have been triggered by the stress of leading the West during WWII? People who experience paranormal phenomenon on a daily basis are less easy to explain, and are now said to be “shielding” themselves from feeling out of control. In times of chaos, the human brain searches for patterns of meaning, and humanity’s anthropomorphist nature wants to assign control to seemingly random or unexplainable events. It is easier for the mind to imagine a tragedy being caused by malignant spirits than by complete randomness. Arguably, using belief in the paranormal as a shield functions similarly to playing immersive video games or watching television dramas every week.

In folklore there is a method of storytelling called ostension, or legend-tripping. In this style of folklore, storytellers act out the legend they reiterate. Ghost hunting is arguably a type of legend-tripping. Similar to folklorists re-telling a legend, participants take the task of unveiling the truth about ghosts quite seriously. This immersive legend-tripping experience can become a distraction from everyday life, which has both positive and negative consequences. One example is that belief in the paranormal offers a reason for traumatic events like disease, death, and natural disaster. Holding such a belief helps one feel more in control of the world around them. However, holding such a belief could make it harder for someone to face the unpredictable world around them.

However, if ghosts are eventually proven to be completely fake, an entire structure of meaning will break down. Justin McDaniel, a professor of religious studies at the University of Pennsylvania explains just how important this structure of meaning is for many cultures: “People in Asia have kept their belief in ghosts despite the rise of science, skepticism, secularism, and public education… Even hyper-modern and liberal Scandinavia has a high percentage of people believing in ghosts.” Even with the advancements in science to explain phenomenon that was previously considered to be paranormal, including out-of-body experiences and sleep paralysis, paranormal explanations persist. Sleep paralysis is still interpreted as a ghost experience in Hong Kong, Thailand, and Newfoundland, Canada. The belief in the paranormal functions as an important structure of meaning that unites people around the world, whether it is through watching a favorite television show in the United Kingdom or sacrificing and eating a hog at a family ceremony in Asia.

Despite these important social functions, the downside of belief in the paranormal is the growing inability to mentally process an uncontrollable world. Pursuing the paranormal through television shows, weekends out ghost hunting, or holding superstitions about disease and disaster is a form of escapism that can have negative consequences in the long run. For example, a family with a child suffering from epilepsy may choose to perform an exorcism versus getting medical treatment, which may have negative consequences for the child. Also, an individual who believes natural disasters are caused by a deity may blame themselves for natural disasters, thinking that the deity is angry with them. Both of these are examples of how belief in the paranormal, particularly in its potential forces on the world around, can be more harmful than believing the world is ruled by happenstance.

Christopher French, a professor of psychology at the University of London, comments on the reasons people choose to believe in the paranormal: “There is also the emotional motivation for these beliefs. The vast majority of us don’t like the idea of our own mortality. Even though we find the idea of ghosts and spirits scary, in a wider context, they provide evidence for the survival of the soul.” Belief in the paranormal can be a way to escape one’s own mortality, which contributes to a Western perspective on death, one of fear and avoidance. Furthermore, holding superstitious beliefs and pursuing answers about the paranormal takes away time that a person could spend on important tasks in the present as opposed to the afterlife. Ghost hunting takes away time one could spend volunteering at a local non-profit or participating in political activism. However, one could also argue that ghost hunting is as harmless a hobby as browsing social media or scrapbooking. If ghost hunting is considered a form of escapism that is detrimental to one’s connection with reality, other hobbies arguably could have the same effect.

Although many psychologists explain paranormal encounters as minor hallucinations or dim lighting, belief in ghosts does not seem like it will dissipate in the near future. At the University of Virginia’s School of Medicine, the Division of Perceptual Studies investigates phenomena that current scientific methods cannot explain. Dr. Jim Tucker at DOPS focuses on finding evidence that human personalities persist after death by examining children who report memories that are not their own. One young patient started having horrific nightmares at the age of 2 about plane crashes, and started reporting memories consistent with a WWII fighter jet pilot. Some would explain this phenomenon in the child as minor brain damage, a plea for parental affection, or shielding from growing up. Others would hail this example as modern day reincarnation. Although opinions are still divided on the existence of ghosts and other paranormal phenomenon, it is clear that belief in ghosts has important cultural functions that should be taken seriously.