Is Civ3 Racially Biased?

[Dravazed]

Something I noticed in Civ II and again now in Civ III, is that the faces of citizens of the Zulus are always shown as Caucasian. I don't know how to account for this other than a lowest-common-denominator racism on the part of the designers. I mean, they pride themselves on sophistication in so many ways...I am truly surprised that they seem not to have considered this. Don't you suppose if they were aware of it, the citizens of (at least) the Zulus might have looked a bit more like...the people of that culture? The same principle applies, of course, to the Chinese and the Japanese.

Anyone else notice this?

 

[Carver]

Firaxis probably figured that for the Japanese and Chinese, few people would notice. As for the Zulu, I guess they were too lazy to create another set of faces just for them. Although, if they add another "black" civ in the expansion pack they should probably give a little attention to this.

 

[Thunderfall]

Well, the Settlers unit in Civ2 is black.

 

[Pointman]

First off. I think you are severely misusing the term racism. What you are doing is a cheap way of getting attention to your thread.

Dictionary.com said
rac·ism Pronunciation Key (rszm)
n.
1. The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
2. Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

racism

n 1: the prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other races 2: discriminatory or abusive behavior towards members of another race [syn: racialism]

Do you see racism as explained above in Civ 3? Well i sure don't.


The simple reason why Zulus are shown as caucasian is that Firaxis were lazy and didn't want to create more faces.

I present you occams razor.

What seems to be the simplest answer:
a) A designer at Firaxis, being the only one in charge of making happy/angry faces for city management screen, is a racist. He wants to get his message of hate across and chooses to represent Zulus as caucasian. "That'll show them negroes" he thinks snickering to himself.


b) The entire team at Firaxis, even Sid Meyer is a vocational Racist. And to get their message of hatred across they order the face-making guy to have all the faces in Zululand be caucasian. "That'll show em" Sid Meier bellows.

c) Firaxis is running low on time. Beta is out, and a release is expected in 2 weeks. Bob, who is the designer in charge for creation of city faces and other things gets a memo:

BOB
We need those city faces to be done ASAP. we also need you to get the animations for workers, riflemen and galleons working, they are buggy. Then can you please document all the data transfer for the AI diplomacy. kthxbi.

the Boss

they pride themselves on sophistication in so many ways...

Good thing they have Sophistication to fall back on when "bug free quality products", "realism", and "excellent AI" doesn't quite work out



Your pick man


Paranoia, cha-cha-cha!

 

[Zouave]

Funny, ironic thread.

The reality is that Firaxis was pathetically Politically Correct in making so many leaders female, and depicting Cleopatra (Greek heritage) as dark-skinned.

You want "racism" try those stupid-looking Oriental workers with the red hats on - they looklike Al Jolson in blackface.

Shaka was a murderous maniac anyway. If they needed an African king it should have been Menelek or Samori.

 

[Stuka]

Hear Hear...

 

[The Troquelet]

Cleopatra was actually an 8th generation Macedonian, I believe....

 

[Selous]

what is wrong with muderious maniacs? ... and i think there should be more women in the game ... actually i think there should be a male female leader for every civ

im supprised that no one said anything about the americans? ... i thought that was quite lazy

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by The Troquelet
Cleopatra was actually an 8th generation Macedonian, I believe....

Yea, a direct descendant of one of Alexander's generals, Ptolemy, who was one of the winners in the Diadochian (Successors) Wars, the others being, as I recall, Antigonus and Seleucus.

Hannibal wasn't black either. And I miss a Carthaginian civ. Wonder if I can mod one if I can find the right heads online. . .

 

[Northstar5757]

Historians still havn't come to a complete agreement on cleopatra's skin complexion, so it's pretty cheap to complain about something like that. Unless she is wearing a mask faraxis is in the wrong either way by such logic....

 

[The Troquelet]

When you call Shaka "murderous" you have to remember he is included in the same game as Julius Caesar, Catherine the Great, Xerxes, and Mao, all of whom also deserve the title, but you don't see it being applied to them very much...

 

[Northstar5757]

Very good point Troquelet

Of course don't forget Stalin, at least I think he's still the Russian leader for civ3.

 

[Benjamin Miller]

Originally posted by Zouave
Funny, ironic thread.

The reality is that Firaxis was pathetically Politically Correct in making so many leaders female, and depicting Cleopatra (Greek heritage) as dark-skinned.

You want "racism" try those stupid-looking Oriental workers with the red hats on - they looklike Al Jolson in blackface.

Shaka was a murderous maniac anyway. If they needed an African king it should have been Menelek or Samori.

Stop contradicting yourself! First you say Firaxis is too PC, and then you say they are racist? Make up your bloddy mind!

And I have many ethnic-Greek kids at my high school, and their skin is about the same shade as Civ3's Cleopatra. European does not equal ultra-pale.

 

[JoseM]

Originally posted by Benjamin Miller


Stop contradicting yourself! First you say Firaxis is too PC, and then you say they are racist? Make up your bloddy mind!

And I have many ethnic-Greek kids at my high school, and their skin is about the same shade as Civ3's Cleopatra. European does not equal ultra-pale.

why do u have to flame?? do u had to flame to express yourself?

 

[damunzy]

Originally posted by JoseM


why do u have to flame?? do u had to flame to express yourself?

I don't believe that Benjamin Miller's post would count as a flame. He didn't insult Zouave he just yelled a bit.

I believe that Zouve was sarcastically pointing it out.

All of that said let's try to keep the discussion civil. I would hate to have to close another thread b/c of a misunderstanding.

Edit: Changed the thread name from "Is It Racism?" to "Is Civ3 Racially Biased?" to keep the shock factor down.

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by Benjamin Miller


Stop contradicting yourself! First you say Firaxis is too PC, and then you say they are racist? Make up your bloddy mind!

And I have many ethnic-Greek kids at my high school, and their skin is about the same shade as Civ3's Cleopatra. European does not equal ultra-pale.

Learn to spell.

You described yourself as "deranged".

Learn some manners.

Don't yell. Of course doing so on the Internet means you will never risk your teeth.

And no Greek ever had a complexion such as Cleopatra has in Civ III. And I just rechecked her image.

Now don't miss anymore classes in Global Studies.

 

[damunzy]

Originally posted by Zouave
Learn to spell.
You described yourself as "deranged".
Learn some manners.
Don't yell. Of course doing so on the Internet means you will never risk your teeth.
And no Greek ever had a complexion such as Cleopatra has in Civ III. And I just rechecked her image.
Now don't miss anymore classes in Global Studies.

I was going to delete your post and give you a warning Zouave but you have PMs disabled and since there is no other way to warn you besides jacking the thread I feel that the problem has escalated past warning. For disregarding my post I am giving you 24 hours to cool off. You are banned from 0200 21 April 2002 to 0200 22 April 2002.

 

[GeneralTacticus]

I've only ever known one person who was ethnically Greek (my teacher in Grade 6 at primary school), and IIRC her skin was actually darker than Cleopatra's. So what's the problem w/ cleo having tanned skin? Besides, she would have lived in Egypt for her whole life, and I would think that Egypt would be sunnier than Australia.

 

[Selous]

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
I've only ever known one person who was ethnically Greek (my teacher in Grade 6 at primary school), and IIRC her skin was actually darker than Cleopatra's. So what's the problem w/ cleo having tanned skin? Besides, she would have lived in Egypt for her whole life, and I would think that Egypt would be sunnier than Australia.

i thought that statment was quite odd ... then i saw u are from melborne england would get more sun than melborne?

but anyway .... i think it is quite lazy of firaxis ... not racist ... this should be addressed in a patch ... make a few more culture groups

and on a side note ... what would the legalities of using user created civilizations in an upcomming patch? to add so many new civilizations for bugger all work... im sure those respective people would be honoured to be included in firaxis new patches?

 

[Akka]

Is It Racism?
Something I noticed in Civ II and again now in Civ III, is that the faces of citizens of the Zulus are always shown as Caucasian.

I don't know if the world is becoming paranoid as a whole, but I'm kind of tired about people jumping all over the place, looking for things that could be considered "racism".

1) I don't see how reprensenting an ethnic with the face of another is racism. It's just amalgam.

2) The reason is extremely simple : each "culture group" (mediterranean, mid-est, european, asian and american) has got its own faces. What happen is just that Firaxis put the Zulus in the mid-east culture group, as it's the closest one. And then they got the faces of mid-east group (Persia, Babylon), which means that they look more caucasian than they should. You can yell that they should have made a African culture group, but this neverending "it's racism ! Look !" stuff is just tiring.