Goblin Oppression; fact or fiction?

[The Pilgrim]

1: The Giant is also writting a story were goblins are treated as monsters because they are goblins and the justification for that is that goblins are listed as usually evil in a book despite the fact that The Giant hates that kindof thing - but he hopes to subvert it.

And he does subvert it by presenting the people who "treat goblins as monsters just for being goblins" as antagonists and villiains that are opposed and stopped by the Heroes.

And subverts it further by stablishing a World in which average people don't operate under the principe that goblins or other non-pc races are there just for XP fodder, but acknowledge them as people.

2: The Giant is writting a story were some goblins are evil because they do evil things and where good people oppose them for those evil things, these evil goblins then claim oppression because evil people often seek justification for their actions and do they have limited justification (which is why they started on the evil path they are on), but they have blown that justification way out of proportion and applied it to any situation where they feel it gives them an advantage.

Ding!

I considered that and dismissed it because having the entire goblinoid plot revolve around supposed discrimination only to have it be the result of evil people trying to dismiss the consequences of their own actions would send a horribly twisted message about how people who rebel against racism are merely troublemakers who are falsely trying to justify their behaviour.

Given that Rich has gone on record as to state that he wants to make it clear that racism is bad having that be the message someone could read in his story would be shooting himself in the foot so hard that the bullet burrowed through the planet, burst out on the other side, flew around the planet and hit him in the other foot.

Seriously, you can't send a much worse message than "People who claim to be standing up against racism are lying bad guys" and I don't think Rich is naive enough to think that nobody would read his story that way if the discrimination thingy ended up being false.

EDIT: Also I feel like people who are opposing the discrimination plot are not actually being fully objective when judging whether the story portrays that message properly.

So...

First, you are acknowleding that you are projecting your personal stuff into the comic.

Then, you are demanding that the comic's message must adhere to your personal beliefs.

After that, you accuse others of not being objective in their judgings.

And finally...

Yes, but the message "Racism is real even if some people use it as an excuse for their behaviour" is still significantly better than "Racism is false and only used as an excuse by bad guys to justify their behaviour."

Besides I'm one of the people who's betting big that Redcloak is going to be brought around, in which case the final message of the story isn't going to be "Lying guy justifies bad behaviour with claims of oppression".

... according to you, the best way to deliver the message that "racism is bad" is by conceding some measure of validation to the most racist character present in the story.

Maybe you should approach the comic with an open mind, instead of forcing it to adhere to your personal mindset.

I have my beliefs too. But when it comes to analizing the story, I try to do it according to the mindset of the author creating it, not according to mine.

[Metastachydium]

Someone please explain to me how reading „[t]he primary purpose of Redcloak's characterization is to specifically prove that this point [i.e. D&D is a world of black and white morality] is completely and utterly wrong. That D&D cannot and should not begin and end at black-and-white, and indeed already doesn't, if everyone would just learn to look at things a little more complexly” as ”Redcloak is an unambiguously Evil, whining, lying terrorist who is obviously wrong” is not a stretch, to put it mildly.

[Jason]

Yes, under other circumstances the fact that we've found more examples of the villains causing trouble for the goblinoids than anyone else would be a convincing argument, but Word of God trumps everything. It's why it's called Word of God.

Uh, no, not really. "Word of God" is called that because it comes from the creator of the work. It is a statement of the author's intent, not a statement of what is actually in the work.

Word of God does not "trump everything." Dan Brown can say "99% of [The Da Vinci Code] is true. All of the architecture, the art, the secret rituals, the history, all of that is true..." and his saying that does not make it true. Not even a little bit.

Word of God is useful for understanding what the Giant's intent is, but not what is actually in the work. And Word of God can sometimes change or have been misleading in the first place.

I think it's reasonable to say that Rich Burlew intends that goblin oppression is real, but I also think it reasonable to say that there aren't many concrete examples of it in the comic. Especially if we confine ourselves to the online comic.

I also think it reasonable to believe it possible that this oppression was not in fact begun by the gods at the creation of the goblins, isn't really the primary obstacle keeping goblins from living happy and fulfilling lives at present, and that it will not be made to instantaneously go away by blackmailing the gods, which are all things that Redcloack says he believes.

[Worldsong]

Uh, no, not really. "Word of God" is called that because it comes from the creator of the work. It is a statement of the author's intent, not a statement of what is actually in the work.

Word of God does not "trump everything." Dan Brown can say "99% of [The Da Vinci Code] is true. All of the architecture, the art, the secret rituals, the history, all of that is true..." and his saying that does not make it true. Not even a little bit.

Word of God is useful for understanding what the Giant's intent is, but not what is actually in the work. And Word of God can sometimes change or have been misleading in the first place.

I think it's reasonable to say that Rich Burlew intends that goblin oppression is real, but I also think it reasonable to say that there aren't many concrete examples of it in the comic. Especially if we confine ourselves to the online comic.

I also think it reasonable to believe it possible that this oppression was not in fact begun by the gods at the creation of the goblins, isn't really the primary obstacle keeping goblins from living happy and fulfilling lives at present, and that it will not be made to instantaneously go away by blackmailing the gods, which are all things that Redcloack says he believes.

All of these are good points, and they miss the point.

The first point misses because I didn't state that Word of God is an objective truth for things outside of the setting of the story. Within the story however it is, and this entire argument is about a certain aspect of the setting Rich created. Yes I didn't add that clause last time but that's because it didn't occur to me someone would nitpick that.

The second point misses because the possibility that Rich in the future states that he changed his mind or that he gave the wrong impression is not something that could feasibly be used to construct valid arguments in the present. That's just saying "Nothing is certain so we might as well not bother."

The third point misses because this argument isn't about whether there are concrete examples in the comic of oppression or not. The argument is about whether the oppression is real with one side arguing that because they find the examples in the story insufficient evidence it's not real, and the other side saying that Word of God has confirmed the oppression as being real (with it making little sense if it wasn't real).

The fourth point misses because the argument also isn't about whether said oppression is caused by the gods or not. Again, it's about whether the oppression is real in the first place.

None of these points actually address the position, namely that the oppression is almost certainly real because Word of God has said/implied as much, and within the confines of the story Word of God is law. If the author says "Dragons exist in this setting" then you can go read their entire work and point out that not a single dragon gets mentioned and the author can still say "Yeah, I didn't write about any of them, but they do exist in the setting." And that would be objectively true.

[The Pilgrim]

None of these points actually address the position, namely that the oppression is almost certainly real because Word of God has said/implied as much, and within the confines of the story Word of God is law. If the author says "Dragons exist in this setting" then you can go read their entire work and point out that not a single dragon gets mentioned and the author can still say "Yeah, I didn't write about any of them, but they do exist in the setting." And that would be objectively true.

And, as others have pointed out, Word of God has never confirmed that "oppresion of the Goblins" is real in the OOTS world.

Word of God has critiquized the approach of "it's a monster, we can just kill it" on RPG gaming and fantasy writings. OOTS, being in origin a parody of D&D, reflected that position to critiquize it. And critiquized it by exposing those with that position as antagonists and villains that oppose the heroes, who don't share that approach.

As the comic grew more serious, The Giant went the next logical step, which is to develope a world in which the statement is not true. The moral standard of the OOTS is racism being considered anti-social behaviour.

Note that If OOTS were, as you want to belive, just a monothematic author's tract on racist oppresion symbolized in the goblinoids, then logic dictates that the goblins would be the protagonists of this story, not the antagonists, and that the latter scene wouldn't have been about Durkon and a newcomer character giving Redcloak a moral lecture debunking his whole narrative.

The heroes still fight the goblins, but do it for reasons beyond them being goblins.

[Jason]

The first point misses because I didn't state that Word of God is an objective truth for things outside of the setting of the story. Within the story however it is, and this entire argument is about a certain aspect of the setting Rich created. Yes I didn't add that clause last time but that's because it didn't occur to me someone would nitpick that.

I respectfully disagree. Word of God is not objective truth for the work until the points or concepts it addresses actually appear in the work. Word of God can change or be misleading, so until it appears in the work it cannot be regarded as set in stone, so to speak (and even then, the author could decide to revisit something already revealed and change it).

George Lucas did not originally intend for Darth Vader to be Luke's Father. Even after Darth Vader claimed he was, George could have decided that Vader had been lying. Once Luke's parentage was confirmed in Return of the Jedi then it became "truth" for Star Wars. It was not "truth" before that point, no matter what George Lucas had to say about Luke's parentage.

The third point misses because this argument isn't about whether there are concrete examples in the comic of oppression or not. The argument is about whether the oppression is real with one side arguing that because they find the examples in the story insufficient evidence it's not real, and the other side saying that Word of God has confirmed the oppression as being real (with it making little sense if it wasn't real).

Until it's demonstrated in the comic it isn't true, because Rich can still change his mind. The author can say the cat is alive, but the "objective truth" is the cat is neither alive nor dead until the box is opened.

[Dion]

I blame Worf for this discussion.

I'm 100% serious about this.

Worf, who was basically a Space Orc, was the first major character on TV from an evil species that became a non-evil PC.

And everyone watch STTNG said "Oh boy, I want to play a big strong non-evil space orc! Now I have a +5 strength bonus. Hab SoSlI’ Quch! But Goblins don't have a bonus to strength, so they're still just for XP farming. Silly little useless goblin. NuqDaq 'oH puchpa''e'?"

[NihhusHuotAliro]

My take is that Goblin Oppression is real, but not nearly as distressing to me as the fact that making Lizardfolk into accessories is common enough for Haley to use "You'll make a very nice handbag" as a threat to Gannji.

Also, I had Gouda cheese for the first time a few days ago, and am now convinced that, if the balance inclines, it inclines such that the true victims are those cultures who do not have access to Gouda.

The Gnomes are clearly not oppressed as they have all the best hats.

[Dion]

The Gnomes are clearly not oppressed as they have all the best hats.

People are not wearing enough hats.

[Lethologica]

The comic has intentionally left plenty of room for interpretation. In a way this better reflects present reality than either narrative would on its own - strongly held, highly divergent narratives on contentious issues appear to be the political order of the day, after all.

[hamishspence]

"Non-combatants" is a different thing from "children and infants".

Not in the context of the "nits make lice" phrase. That is, unambiguously, a justification for killing children - compared to "nits" - on the grounds that they will, metaphorically, "grow up to be lice".

[Worldsong]

I respectfully disagree. Word of God is not objective truth for the work until the points or concepts it addresses actually appear in the work. Word of God can change or be misleading, so until it appears in the work it cannot be regarded as set in stone, so to speak (and even then, the author could decide to revisit something already revealed and change it).

George Lucas did not originally intend for Darth Vader to be Luke's Father. Even after Darth Vader claimed he was, George could have decided that Vader had been lying. Once Luke's parentage was confirmed in Return of the Jedi then it became "truth" for Star Wars. It was not "truth" before that point, no matter what George Lucas had to say about Luke's parentage.

Until it's demonstrated in the comic it isn't true, because Rich can still change his mind. The author can say the cat is alive, but the "objective truth" is the cat is neither alive nor dead until the box is opened.

Yeah no.

Word of God can change or be misleading, but we can't use that as a valid argument because then we might as well throw our hands up in the air.

If George Lucas had stated that it was a lie all along and that there was no connection between Anakin and Luke then that would be the end of it. Of course at that point the fans would be justified in asking what the hell was going on for everything in the story to point in literally the opposite direction, but if George insisted on it being a lie and gave no indication of being anything but serious on the matter his statement would be the truth, because the story is his creation and his Word is God.

If Word of God states something then that is the truth about the setting until either it's been proven that Word of God was lying or joking. If the author changes their mind that just means the truth has changed because it's a fictional story and the details are not set in stone. Of course it is possible for the author to use parts of the story to send the message 'I was lying/joking' but that's going to have to be a little bit more blatant than what we've got here, because frankly all these claims that the story proves that the goblinoids aren't oppressed have been very unconvincing. I mean they basically boil down to "But I haven't seen the oppression happen for myself yet" which is just ignoring the fact that it's a big world and if all the oppression happened off-screen it would still be real for the setting and it would still mean that the majority of the goblinoids suffer from it. We just happen to follow the villain who is powerful enough to not suffer daily oppression and, like, two settlements who seemed to be doing pretty well in spite of the global discrimination of goblinoids.

If it takes magic to imagine that maybe we happen to be looking at cases where the discrimination is at its minimum and Word of God is still accurate about the setting in its entirety then I am a flipping wizard.

EDIT: As another thought, Star Wars might have been directed by George Lucas but it was a group project by virtue of it being a film. If there's one thing which can bring Word of God into question it's the presence of other people during the creation of the product who might have added their own ideas. In Rich's case that doesn't apply because unless I've been gravely misinformed Order of the Stick is his creation and his alone.

[Lord Raziere]

Also Lord Raziere has been doing a respectable job digging through the comic and side content looking for interactions between monster races and PC races and I feel like the claim "I just don't see any examples of monster races suffering from discrimination" is false.

Thank you. However I'm going to continue it regardless, as its always good to reread OOTS and this analysis has been been giving me a new perspective on the story, that and its always good to be as thorough as possible when doing things like this, and I still have 2-3 books to go.

That and this next one has Familicide in it. Which is too relevant to not analyze, but we'll get to that in...

Spoiler: Don't Split The Party Analysis

Show

Evil Adventuring Party:
While Roy is in the afterlife, a group of evil adventurers come attack and they are dispatched, one them is Drow, but again I doubt they count as a monstrous race anymore, but it does tell us that evil adventurers are normal enough that them going to attack Celestia for the xp is so common that Roy's grandfather doesn't even bat an eye at it. Not even the afterlife is safe from adventurers coming to kill you. This is relevant to the analysis because: whats to stop evil adventurers form attacking the goblin afterlife? the dwarven afterlife? ANY afterlife? they don't care who they have kill to get stronger, they're evil. which lends support to the fact that monstrous races may be oppressed- and that its Evil adventurers doing the oppressing.

Those Four Other Nations:
All four nations Hinjo mentions as allies are depicted as human, with no indication of other races monstrous or non ruling or being in them

Therkla:
I'm just gonna have a section for her here to note various things:
-A half-orc is serving as ninja for a human noble. historically ninja come from lower classes as they used a lot of tools that peasants did just repurposed to be more versatile, so its probable that this is the highest Therkla could rise in Azure City's socio-economic hierarchy.

Sea Trolls:
Hm, if the land monstrous races have it bad, imagine how bad the aquatics have it: no fire, no paper, no wood....just nothing that would make civilization unless you have powerful magic going on. Kubota manipulating them to attack Hinjo isn't even him making deals, its just charming them to follow Kubota's orders through an imp. and if Kubota, a noble from a city of paladins could be a devil worshiper without anyone know imagine what nobles in other cities could be hiding...

Human Slavery in Gobbotopia:
Meanwhile, humans are outright chattel slaves for the hobgoblins, complete with a whip while they are dressed in rags. Yeah this is pretty bad. But at least Redcloak didn't go full genocidal on them. Notably there is exchange between three hobgoblins where one questions the sense in whipping them and the other two either joke about it or laugh at their pain and claims to make them go faster, and of course in a story when you whip an elderly person there is a 60% chance for heroes to show up and they do. It implies that at the hobgoblin questioning the sense of it is not entirely on board with it even though whipping them is his job, I don't think it makes it okay, but it is kind of interesting to note. Also Redcloak could've decided to make these humans into zombies to do these tasks instead but didn't.

Imported From Greysky City:
One of the boxes says its imported from Greysky City, and another has text I couldn't make out unless I zoomed in real close and it turns out the other one I think reads "Gouda, Product of Cliffport" which means that Gobbotopia is doing economic trade with these cities in peace. considering these two cities are the ones we know most about aside from Azure City, and those other four nations not helping Hinjo, its pretty clear a precedent has been established that the nations around aren't willing to step up to help and are in fact trading with the hobgoblins

Flumphs and Monster Safety:
I haven't been commenting on these two, but it seems like these two flumphs were doing well in Cliffport during War and XPs, while now they are in Gobbotopia with a pamphlet claiming its "monster safe" but are complaining that it meant "evil monsters" which means that while monsters distinguish between good and evil monsters, the rest of the world probably does not.

Haley and the Smugglers:
There is a cutaway panel where Haley is negotiating prices with a lizardfolk and presumably duergar smuggler, which might mean these races often turn to a life of crime because they are stereotyped as evil and thus can't get legitimate jobs. considering that Right Eye was a rogue, this might continue the trend of certain classes being cutoff to people without the opportunity to pursue them.

Celia and the Hobgoblins and the Gnome:
Its notable that Celia is the only one here who doesn't want to kill the hobgoblins. she is not an adventurer, she doesn't know how they work, and doesn't see killing the hobgoblins as acceptable- she wanted to by them without a single one dying. This is the only person we've seen express this, but Celia is also one of the few people in OOTS who isn't an adventurer of some kind- though one must remember, Celia comes from the elemental plane of air. things probably work differently on that plane since most adventurers simply can't fly, and thus most air elementals are safe from adventurers coming in and killing people. At the same time, Celia is a paralegal who is did study law to work on the material plane so she has good knowledge of whats considered legal action and thus whats acceptable among most people, and most people aren't adventurers, which implies that while adventurers are the foundation of the world's economy and get paid to kill things, most people don't do that in this world and would consider what they as immoral, even in a situation where Haley is right that they are at war with a power that has conquered land that isn't legitimately theirs.

oh and then Belkar murders a gnome right after that, to put this into stark relief that Belkar demonstrates that there is adventurers who don't care about good causes or anything and thus is just looking for any excuse to kill and loot things.

O-Chul and Redcloak:
I'mma ignore the whole sick games Xykon games does to O-Chul, because the interrogation scene is more important.

Redcloak says "I know exactly what I'm doing and whats at stake" (not as accurate he'd like to believe) then when O-Chul says allowing RC to win would be the safety of the grave and Redcloak just says "glad we're on the same page!" which implies that Redcloak as he was then didn't care whether "equality" was actually achieved but rather that his enemies all died so he could get what he wants. O-Chul then tells him to go to hell, Redcloak oddly enough goes on a tangent about how the Snarl will simply unmake them then threatens to do the experiment where he pushes humans off the tower to see if the group of the Snarl will give him any data that he might want (a very low chance indeed) O-Chul attempts to lie his way out of it, but fails.

We then have the part where Redcloak rants to O-Chul with Occam's Razor reasoning, seeing the paladin order's oath as ridiculous, and concludes that the Sapphire Guard must have some secret knowledge buried in him, but O-Chul points out that its simpler that he simply does not know everything. which shows us something important about Redcloak: he is a logical person but he is also stubbornly logical and won't change his mind until someone can definitively prove that he is acting illogical. another manifestation of his sunk cost fallacy, perhaps?

Red cloak say its gives him no pleasure to end their lives, then O-Chul says if he was free he'd kill Redcloak and free those people but his words can't do anything since he knows nothing leading to is this exchange:
"How? how can you condemn fourteen of your own people like that? Don't their lives-their very souls-mean anything to you?"-Redcloak
"They mean everything. more than you know. But I must endure their senseless loss nonetheless"-O-Chul
"humans I've come to expect your lack of respect for the lives of my people, but I'm still continually amazed at how little you value those of your own. your nothing but savages. amoral savages."-Redcloak
Redcloak is probably thinking of his village at this moment. the senseless loss HE had to endure, and now encountering someone who is enduring the prospect with more grace than he did. So he either denies what he is witnessing or he doesn't understand it and mistakes what O-Chul says as callousness wrapped up in piousness.

Of course, sociologically speaking....there might be other factors than good and evil at play here.O-Chul living in a city with good trade, safe walls, and so on has probably lived a better life than Redcloak even if he joined the military, as he would have more positive experiences and teachings to draw upon to make sure he get through death and pain, while Redcloak is from a small village of goblins in constant threat of being attacked by humans and probably other species as well including other monstrous races, and thus would come from a culture where everyone is personally known to each other and thus Redcloak felt each loss of his original village much deeper than one would think, while his hobgoblins he had "million is a statistic" mindset going before his revelation and thus caring for them better- basically a better upbringing means better emotional support to handle the pain, and Redcloak never got that- only a Plan that promised not just revenge, but future prevention of what he went through. thus Redcloak never developed a proper way of dealing with loss. I'd imagine most other monsters wouldn't fare much better with such feelings as a random ogre troll orc, or what have you wandering the wilderness will have nothing but their muscle, natural powers and anger to rely on when their mothers dies to some adventurer's blade, and revenge doesn't leave a lot of time for doing something productive like figuring out farming.

then Redcloak makes the guards take the prisoners back to the cells without killing them, thinking himself "merciful" for not doing what he threatened to do to them. Again we come close to Redcloak nearly slaughtering innocents, but not actually succeeding or going through with it. Between this and the slaves, there might be a little shred of mercy in Redcloak....
....But then next comic shows that O-Chul's lack of knowledge hasn't been the point for some time, his torture is just means to buy time for Xykon to wait so that Redcloak can get the legitimacy of Gobbotopia going, then tells Jirix about Xykon is not to be trusted and doesn't care about the goblin race- that he is only a tool for RC's end. its notable that RC has a subjectivist viewpoint on the matter of the current conflict, suggesting that probably doesn't care much for the cosmic labels of good and evil since he says "those who call themselves good" which probably means he doesn't buy the cosmic alignment thing- which makes sense, given that the paladins the holiest most paragon of people kill your entire family and friends I'd wager he has good reason to not hold alignment in high regard, and I doubt many other monstrous races would disagree- having a good alignment doesn't feed you or protect you from adventurers after all. I'd wager that to Redcloak he has his own form of morality that serves his needs and purposes and isn't interested in the whole "angel vs. devil" thing and regards the Lawful Evil label as incidental.

O-Chul and Monster-San:
Best friendship. O-Chul is one of the most moral people in the comic for a reason, though Xykon and Redcloak are clearly mistreating him. MITD is literally in a box thinking these people are his friends and being led on because his childish nature.

The Island Orcs:
The orcs live on an island in the middle of an ocean. I'm not an expert on how people get on islands like these or how they live, but it doesn't seem like these orcs got a good deal with this land? thought at least they'd be safe from most adventurers, even pirate campaigns generally only do one island for an arc then skip off to the next one.

Snuggly Green Cutie Pie:
Here we have a subversion: Therkla reveals she is half-orc and the orcs says that implies an ugly backstory, we cut away to an orc mother and human father couple being in love and the father calling his wife a pet name to a level of diabetes. Therkla then says "try growing up with it" implying she found her parents doing that embarrassing. However the set up still implies the usual "orc rape" backstory that people come up with to make the half-orc edgy, implying that it might be known enough to be commented on in a genre-savvy roundabout way, even if it doesn't happen in this world. the orcs certainly aren't told what actually happened by Therkla. Though from what Redcloak implies in his speech more recently that its the humans being attracted to everything that leads to half-orcs like any other half-anything, and that orcs are more accepted as a result. Though.... "accepted" might be a strong term given what we can see of the orc and half-orc characters we see throughout the comic....you'll see what I mean.

The Oracle's Deaths:
Its notable that Oracle getting killed happens often enough that he has lizardfolk resurrecting him on a schedule. notably I think the orange-robed lizardfolk is the only monstrous wizard I've seen in the comic so far, or at least only monstrous spellcaster.

The Thieves Guild Boss:
To get back to the matter of orcs and half orcs.... between Thog, that one stable hand keeping horses, the island orcs Therkla, and Bozzok, it seems a lot of orcs and half orcs are given bad or lower rung jobs that people don't want to do, or are tribal. the highest job we've seen an orc or half-orc holding so far is a criminal one, so I wouldn't say that orcs are equal with humans either. being someone's thug is acceptance in the sense that your working for them, but not really "equal" with them- they are the ones in control after all. and this might be a reason why Redcloak doesn't want to go the orc route to equality, because he sees it as not real progress, but as trading suffering and slaughter for servitude and crime. sure you can technically say the orcs have it "better" but only if you ignore how the ones we see end up being exploited by those that rule over them: Nale when push came to shove, left Thog to rot in jail, and his plans generally assumed that Thog'd be doing the risky parts where one gets hurt while Nale gets the victory, Kubota had a backup plan in case Therkla turned against him and poisoned her without a second thought. I find it unlikely that any other orcs half or full are in any real position of power.

Black Dragon's Revenge:
The black dragon having waited for the right moment, ambushes V and pins them down with an anti-magic field and their strength then tells V what they are going to do in revenge: eat their children, seal them into necromantic gems then vanish. Already we see an escalation from V's killing of a single dragon to the black dragon trying to kill both her children. And thus by thinking on this, I've realized a theme: revenge in this comic, is often disproportionate. Redcloak didn't stop with just the sapphire guard- he destroyed their entire city. the black dragon isn't willing to settle for one child but to kill both, then bind their souls into gems then leave to hide them somewhere for all eternity. Roy's quest to take down Xykon is an exception to how revenge actually works, because all the other examples involve many people paying the price for one or the few. Not that it would make it any better if it was proportionate, but there is a definite theme of such events leading to not just a continuation of hostilities, but an escalation of them.

After all, would these monstrous races, living in caves and the wilds have any education, the socialization, the support to be taught how to properly get justice or help to solve their problems? No, they are people with nothing but their strength to rely on and thus to their strength they turn to solve their problems, to deal with their emotions. As hallucination Shojo would say: they do not live among Society. they are people who don't play the game, because no one invited them to come to sit down and play, or taught them how. that doesn't change the fact that what they do is wrong. but it does mean that options are scarce when one and their friends are family are hunted down and killed as matter of economic trade. Of course....the escalation does not stop there.

Also the Black dragon tells of her husband dying to some other adventurers to be made into armor. So yeah...that happened to, and contributes to the hate. perhaps in a way, she is also avenging her husband by proxy.

Familicide:
And here it is. V's act of genocide so shocking that its one of the most memorable moments of the comic. If this was Homestuck, it'd have [S] flash with some music like "Carne Vale" or "Megalovania" playing as accompaniment while the dragons get killed by pink lightning.

It is perhaps the greatest possible escalation V could've gone for and the worst thing she could've done to the black dragon: she not only killed her, she killed every dragon that could possibly claim to be her descendant or relation, no matter what age or whether they were even born. This spell is the ultimate logical end result of killing an entire family to make sure no one can avenge you. A quarter of all black dragons have been killed, without regard for who they were or what they've done. Unforgivable, and V realizes it when the Soul Splice is done.

But! Want me to point how its actually worse than you thought? No? Too bad. See, Familicide is not a Vaarsuvius invention....but the invention of a long dead necromancer Haera. one of the souls. This necromancer was once alive long ago, was someone who got to epic level and create the Familicide spell at some point. Even worse: why did Haera invent this spell in the first place? You don't make a spell to literally kill everyone who could possibly be related to the target for no reason. Which means Haera at some point used this spell at least once before this, at some point in the past. and we will probably never know why. We might be better off not knowing exactly what it was used for and who died as a result. Or how many times it was used before this. And to top it off? This is an evil unconnected to Xykon or the Sapphire Guard. They have nothing to do with any part of this. You want an example of oppression happening to a monstrous race unconnected to the lich? Look no further than genocide in a can being unleashed on black dragons and potentially who knows how many other people in the past.

And if the existence of this spell doesn't prove that such oppression exists....I don't know what does. This is a spell that could've been used on any number of monstrous races to thin their numbers for adventurers to beat them back, a spell that only exists because someone at some point thought "I'm too lazy to hunt down every single family member of my enemies by hand, so I'm just research a spell to kill them all in an instant for me!" seriously, thats screwed up. The fiends wouldn't have cared if that were the case, and even a logical elf like V in the right circumstances used it for their purposes. Sure we don't know why it was made, and sure its only known by one person. It could've been used to end some human dynasty or something, but the potential remains, especially when the fiends get the soul back, who knows what the next use of it will be? The means to genocide people's bloodlines in an instant is in the hands of demons whose goal is to literally make the world worse for the sake of it. Because all they want is destructive unnecessary conflict, and whats more destructive and unnecessary than killing people over racial prejudice? Than Familicide?

It wouldn't surprise me if the fiends were the ones perpetuating such racial conflicts. After all...they are outsiders as well. They influence the material plane in their own way. Redcloak blames the gods, but has he considered the fiends and that the evil gods specifically might be to blame? Tiamat's demand is that five good dragons die for every one that died to Familicide. That is another escalation. One that I doubt Bahamut would take lying down. and the IFCC says if their plan works such a slaughter will be trivial. Trivial! And who else would send imps to monsters to convince them to even more evil than they already were? to act on their base instincts? Who else would benefit from encouraging people to kill each other over minor differences? Not the good or neutral deities, hopefully. But the IFCC and the Lower Planes do benefit from causing such conflicts and meaningless bloodshed, and Sabine has gone on record saying V's case isn't that special- that they've tempted paladins before. Imagine how easy it must be to tempt so many monsters living in such bad conditions into being evil! IFCC are just the master artisan salesmen dealing out premium offers...for some goblins or orcs living out there constantly in danger of dying? guys like that would be overkill. you'd just need imps and much more basic offers. like knowledge of where to go and who to kill for more food. fiends thrive on tempting people in their worst or lowest moments, and for monsters in this world....their lowest moments may just be their entire lives.

[Worldsong]

Thank you. However I'm going to continue it regardless, as its always good to reread OOTS and this analysis has been been giving me a new perspective on the story, that and its always good to be as thorough as possible when doing things like this, and I still have 2-3 books to go.

Oh I'm definitely in favour of you continuing. I'm more saying that even with the work you've done so far it's already evident that there's enough examples of monster races being in a bad spot if you combine it with Rich saying as much.

So you know, keep up the good work.

[Jason]

The mere existence of the Familicide epic spell is not evidence that goblins are systematically oppressed in Stickworld. We have no information of why Haera created this spell of if he ever actually used it while alive, or how he intended it to be used.
It may have been Haera's "nuke" - intended to keep his (possibly just as PC race as he was) enemies at bay because of just how horrible it is, but never actually used.
The idea that it was intended to be used by parties of adventurers to thin out monstrous races or that the fiends will make sure it is used to do so in the future racial conflicts is pure speculation.

The reason Familicide is in the story is so that Vaarsuvius could do something truly horrible with unforseen consequences and learn and become a better person as a result.

[danielxcutter]

Some of that is reading a bit into it, if you ask me, but still has enough valid points.

Also, I have a different opinion on Redcloak threatening O-Chul there.

Redcloak in the strip where he talks to Jirix afterwards, and in recent strips as well, shows that he has... well, at least some expectations for the Good alignment, even if he'd never admit that to himself.

He's not surprised that they'd treat the lives of his people as worthless, which is also why he doesn't really think that "Good" is really good, but he still thinks they'd care about their own people.

Look at how he reacts when O-Chul doesn't cave in. He expects O-Chul to do the "Good" thing and spill the beans in exchange for the lives of the prisoners, and honestly he might have if he'd actually known.

I think deep, deep down, Redcloak craves the justice and righteousness he and his people were denied long, long ago, on that fateful day.

[Bunny Commando]

The Island Orcs:
The orcs live on an island in the middle of an ocean. I'm not an expert on how people get on islands like these or how they live, but it doesn't seem like these orcs got a good deal with this land? thought at least they'd be safe from most adventurers, even pirate campaigns generally only do one island for an arc then skip off to the next one.

Just a thought: the Azurites and what's left of the OotS are willing to establish a diplomatic and trade relationship with the Island Orcs. I do believe it's worth noting that the Azurite leadership chose the diplomatic route.

The Oracle's Deaths:
Its notable that Oracle getting killed happens often enough that he has lizardfolk resurrecting him on a schedule. notably I think the orange-robed lizardfolk is the only monstrous wizard I've seen in the comic so far, or at least only monstrous spellcaster.

Malak says he was the shaman of his tribe when he was still alive; other than that, there's little evidence that in the Western Continent Kobolds and Lizardfolks are discriminated. Most probably it's the influence of Tiamat that guarantees a good treatment of these races.

Thanks for your analysis!

[danielxcutter]

Just a thought: the Azurites and what's left of the OotS are willing to establish a diplomatic and trade relationship with the Island Orcs. I do believe it's worth noting that the Azurite leadership chose the diplomatic route.

To be fair, there's little stopping Hinjo(a proper paladin) from doing so. I'm not sure if the nobles would have been as accommodating if they could get away with it.

Malak says he was the shaman of his tribe when he was still alive; other than that, there's little evidence that in the Western Continent Kobolds and Lizardfolks are discriminated. Most probably it's the influence of Tiamat that guarantees a good treatment of these races.

Thanks for your analysis![/QUOTE]

The reptilian races probably aren't any worse than the others, yeah.

[The Pilgrim]

Some of that is reading a bit into it, if you ask me, but still has enough valid points.

Also, I have a different opinion on Redcloak threatening O-Chul there.

Redcloak in the strip where he talks to Jirix afterwards, and in recent strips as well, shows that he has... well, at least some expectations for the Good alignment, even if he'd never admit that to himself.

He's not surprised that they'd treat the lives of his people as worthless, which is also why he doesn't really think that "Good" is really good, but he still thinks they'd care about their own people.

Look at how he reacts when O-Chul doesn't cave in. He expects O-Chul to do the "Good" thing and spill the beans in exchange for the lives of the prisoners, and honestly he might have if he'd actually known.

I think deep, deep down, Redcloak craves the justice and righteousness he and his people were denied long, long ago, on that fateful day.

Redcloak is the Number #1 Hyprocrite in the Comic. He scorns O-Chul for "not caring for the lives of his own people" because Redcloak himself doesn't cares for the lives of his people. Letting aside the scores of goblins he has let Xykon murder for leisure, we have how he casually disposed of the lives of the Goblin Polymorphed Spy or the Goblin Elder Artisan. Redcloak is just projecting his own faults on O-Chul, which is typical hypocrital behaviour.

Minrah rubbed that fact on his face in the last scene. "You don't care about them, you just feel bad about not caring".

[Dion]

Redcloak is the Number #1 Hyprocrite in the Comic...

You’ve probably hit the nail right on the head.

This strip has two types of bad guys: first there are the “I’m evil and I know know it (clap your hands)” folks who existed in book one, like Xykon and Belkar.

And then there are the “I’m evil and I don’t know it because I think my actions are justified” folks who were either introduced or heavily retconned after book two, like Tarquin, Miko, and and Redcloak.

In books where evil people know they’re evil, the morality is very simple.

But in books where evil people don’t know they’re evil, you end up in morally grey situations with all sorts of justification, equivocation, and sometimes nobody is right and everyone is wrong.

And we have a huge problem as human beings, because we seem to literally have some structure in our brain - some physical nodule baked into us through evolution - where we falsely believe that in any situation someone is right and someone is always wrong.

So, whenever we find some morally ambiguous situation, we are biologically programmed to search for the people and things that are wrong, with some deep animal urge that tells us once we find and eliminate all the people that are wrong, everyone left over must be right.

And this part of our brain that we inherited from long ago, that makes us cast the diseased and broken and toxic things out of our nest, is confusing the way we see the story.

We see that redcloak is diseased and toxic, and so we automatically assume that once we eliminate him from our environment what is left over is clean and good.

And, that’s not how the real world works, and that’s not how the story that we’re reading works.

The idea that the world is good because redcloak opposes the world and redcloak is evil is something that we’ve been programmed by our biology to believe. But it’s not how the world in this comic works.

[The Pilgrim]

You’ve probably hit the nail right on the head.We see that redcloak is diseased and toxic, and so we automatically assume that once we eliminate him from our environment what is left over is clean and good.

And, that’s not how the real world works, and that’s not how the story that we’re reading works.

The idea that the world is good because redcloak opposes the world and redcloak is evil is something that we’ve been programmed by our biology to believe. But it’s not how the world in this comic works.

Very true. Just removing Redcloak will not make everything go okay. However, Redcloak still needs to be removed for a resolution to be reached between the reasonable parties in both sides. Much like the outcome of O-Chul's backstory, where the toxic people in BOTH sides got removed, then peaceful resolution was achieved.

I must also say that I find "oppression" a tricky category to judge things, because everyone can be an oppresor depending on the point of view. Of course, one can find clear examples of "oppression" in the actions of the Sapphire Guard prior of O-Chul and Hijo joining it. But one can find also clear acts of "oppresion" in the way Redcloak tolerates Xykon to treat the goblins, or in the way the Hobgoblins are now treating the human azurite population.

That's why I find "cycle of violence that needs to be broken" a more useful category to understand the webcomic than "unilateral oppression that must be stopped". And no, it doesn't goes against Word of God to suggest that The Giant is writting against racism from a "cycle of violence that needs to be broken" perspective rather than from an "unilateral oppresion that needs to be stopped".

[Dion]

Redcloak still needs to be removed for a resolution to be reached between the reasonable parties in both sides.

Can you expand on this?

What does it mean to “remove” redcloak? Remove him from what?

[Keltest]

Can you expand on this?

What does it mean to “remove” redcloak? Remove him from what?

The equation? Redcloak is a problem actor who disrupts attempts to reach peace by his mere presence in the negotiations. Kill him, banish him to another plane of existence, stick him on an island with a hut and a fishing rod, get him a girlfriend who knows better than to let him go talk politics to people, whatever it takes.

[Dion]

The equation? Redcloak is a problem actor who disrupts attempts to reach peace by his mere presence in the negotiations. Kill him, banish him to another plane of existence, stick him on an island with a hut and a fishing rod, get him a girlfriend who knows better than to let him go talk politics to people, whatever it takes.

Are you suggesting this cycle of violence can be solved by... killing redcloak?

[Keltest]

Are you suggesting this cycle of violence can be solved by... killing redcloak?

What about the thousands of other people who have either suffered violence, perpetuated violence, or both?

Would they also need to be “removed from the equation”? What would that look like to you?

I think killing Redcloak is one of a number of potential ways to move forward in the peace process. It isnt the only way, as evidenced by my off the cuff list of alternative fates that would prevent him from causing problems without killing him, but it is A way.

And yes, if youre going around instigating violence, making you stop doing that is a necessary step in ending that violence. I dont really understand why you seem to be taking issue with that.

[understatement]

I don't think there should be an issue to removing Redcloak (aka killing him) if push comes to shove - the safety of the world does come first, and Roy makes it clear on his position.

The issue presented in this thread's original sentiment, though, is if goblin oppression exists. The heroes aren't going to address that by saying "well, you [goblins] made up the oppression, so you should collectively blame yourself for all your problems."

[Dion]

And yes, if youre going around instigating violence, making you stop doing that is a necessary step in ending that violence. I dont really understand why you seem to be taking issue with that.

No, I have to admit, I honestly don’t understand what you’re saying.

You are claiming that violence is a viable and just way of solving this problem.

Once you’ve decided that violence is an acceptable solution, then your decision about WHO should acceptably be allowed to perpetuate that violence is an extremely strong indicator of YOUR prejudices toward the situation. You should perhaps examine that prejudice.

[Keltest]

No, I have to admit, I honestly don’t understand what you’re saying.

You are claiming that violence is a viable and just way of solving this problem.

Once you’ve decided that violence is an acceptable solution, then your decision about WHO should acceptably be allowed to perpetuate that violence is an extremely strong indicator of YOUR prejudices toward the situation. You should perhaps examine that prejudice.

I think you may need to go re-read what i said, see if that helps clarify. I'm not sure how you got from what i said to "killing Redcloak will fix everything." Redcloak is actively inciting the violence. He needs to be stopped for the violence to stop. Killing him will stop him. It is not the only way to stop him, other methods will work, many equally effectively. But killing him will do it too. Likewise, it wont automatically bring peace and joy to all. Theres more work that will need to be done after that. But that work cant start while Redcloak is around interfering in the process.

To use a metaphor, you need to stop the bleeding before the healing can begin, and redcloak is actively preventing that.

[The Pilgrim]

Are you suggesting this cycle of violence can be solved by... killing redcloak?

Redcloak has already engineered his own doom. He painted himself into a corner when he transformed Xykon into a Lich, and has been fleeing forward ever since. His best bet to get rid of Xykon would have been to accept Durkon's offer and side with the Order, but he just burnt that bridge.

Redcloak has repeatedly chosen to stay with Xykon to the endgame. But the endgame involves Xykon discovering Redcloak has been lying to him all along about The Plan, so even if Team Evil manages to get into position to execute The Plan, it's likely to end poorly for Redcloak.

Now, if the Order defeats Xykon without killing Redcloak, that might put Redcloak in a position to accept a negotiation, as Julia pointed out. However, at that point Redcloak would be irrelevant, as he would simply be signing peace terms imposed on him by force. And anyway it's probable that, down to that situation, Redcloak chooses to enact his Plan B: Get the World destroyed.

[Dion]

He needs to be stopped for the violence to stop. Killing him will stop him.

I’m not saying you can’t end a cycle of violence with more violence. Truth is, V got it right. At a certain point, a big enough bomb fixes just about everything.

HOWEVER, I’ll argue any violence is not a solution for oppression. And, ultimately the problem I believe we are talking about in this thread is oppression.

One of the most common symptoms of oppression is the group doing the oppressing isn’t actually opposed to violence. Instead, the oppressor believes that they have some moral right to decide WHO gets to perpetuate that violence.

As soon as you say “group A has the moral agency to sanction violence, and group B does not”, then you’ve assigned a higher moral agency to group A and it perpetuates the oppression.