Is the Civ series racist?

[Tee Kay]

Now, granted, it's hard to imagine a situation in which there exists in 2012 a sovereign and independent Iroquois Confederacy, but it's not at all beyond imagining that the Iroquois as a political entity might still exist in some coherent form.

Technically it still exists.

Anyway, colonial accounts pointed to large numbers of European colonists (not to mention freed Africans or runaway African slaves) immigrating into Indian territories and adopting Indian cultures. On a large enough scale, this could have produced mestizo/metis/maroon cultures, but ones which developed on an Indian base with European/African influence instead of ones which developed on a European base, which could be strong enough to resist concerted conquest and colonisation effort from highly organised and populous Western states. It will still be a very long shot, given the circumstances. I'm not not reducing Indians to "a feature of the landscape". I'm just stating that, in fact, European dominance was indeed assured given the circumstances.

I agree that the representation of colonisation in EU3 is a disgrace, though. I have started modding the game with the expressed intention of improving this.

 

[Danielion]

Racism has become cool these days.

 

[AdamCrock]

First of all : Very wrong word for it

Racism has nothing to do with Civ series. Racism is a term for race discrimination - not Civ/nationality discrimination dude ! Besides all Civs starts equally (unless You play a history scenario than unequality is understandable and legitimate). How can Civ be discriminating and history not ? Conflict and warfare are as human as human can be so that "conquering" thigs is perfectly logical and understandable. Slavery for example played a huge part in mankind's history so it's the part of the Civ series too. Personally I think nothing in this game is offensive unless some crazy "discriminationalism" fan says otherwise hehe

 

[metatron]

But they tend to not be very historically accurate at all. They fail to portray anything outside of Europe as being anything other than "punching bags" to be trampled on and fall behind. This is especially the case with EUIII.

You are not supposed to play it without a decent mod.

Anyways what I was saying is that Paradox pays absolutely no attention to anywhere outside Europe. Those countries merely exist to get quashed by the high and mighty Europeans, and hopelessly fall behind unless they "westernize".

i.e. no basis in actual history

Paradox doesn't pay any attention to stuff in Europe either...
Let there be France. Let it be blue. Let it have lilies.
Done. Next.

You are not supposed to play it without a decent mod.

 

[sophie]

Racist? Meh, no. Disgustingly Euro/Eurasiocentric? Definitely. Also I have a lot of problems with the word "civilization", but I admit that's a battle I'm never going to win. Anyway, fun game all the same. Likewise EU3.

 

[Leoreth]

I think they specifically chose the term civilization for the game's entities because of its lack of coherent definition. A deliberately incoherent term allows for inconsistencies such as Roman, Greek and Byzantine "civilizations" in the same game.

 

[Nick Carpathia]

Well, a better description of what you're playing as is a political entity, but political entities are motivated by short term individual goals instead of an immortal godking.

 

[Patroklos]

Xerxes curses your presumption!

 

[Bugfatty300]

Definitely racist. I'm disgusted by the Afrocentrism that Civ shoves down your throat.

 

[Goodfella]

I mean in essence, all it ever does is dividing people whether it's due to geographical isolation, religion, history etc, and make these factions fight each other then "conquer" one another.

Doesn't that mean it's historically accurate?

 

[Traitorfish]

Only if you have an unreasonably grim image of history.

 

[Leoreth]

Well, a better description of what you're playing as is a political entity, but political entities are motivated by short term individual goals instead of an immortal godking.

But at the same time, you control the same ... thing over the course of 6000 years, which is older than any political entity by a long shot.

 

[aelf]

Civ4 is racist against the French because all of its unique assets suck.

Ehhhh

 

[Leoreth]

Yes ...?

 

[Lone Wolf]

I'd rather have Musketeers then Panzers.
That's why I say that it's rasist against Germans

 

[Leoreth]

Let's just say I didn't choose this example to avoid looking like a whiny nationalist

 

[innonimatu]

But at the same time, you control the same ... thing over the course of 6000 years, which is older than any political entity by a long shot.

Not if you use Rhye's mod.

Damn stability!

 

[Gatsby]

Not racist, but culturally biased since it is a product of the cultural context in which it arose. Civ is therefore a reflection of that cultural context, and perhaps that reflection reveals a racist element to our culture.

One think I think Civ definitely does reflect is our modern Western cultural mythology about humanity being on an ever-upward March Of Progress from the caves to the stars. The desire to 'share' that progress with the rest of humanity has had a lot to do with Western racism from colonial times onward.

 

[Joecoolyo]

You are not supposed to play it without a decent mod.
Paradox doesn't pay any attention to stuff in Europe either...
Let there be France. Let it be blue. Let it have lilies.
Done. Next.

You are not supposed to play it without a decent mod.

Blech, I hate the idea that modding is supposed to solve all of Paradox's problems. They should be able to release a decent game that doesn't rely on mods, instead of a half-hearted one in which they ship off half the work to the fans.

The mods to be honest, aren't all that great either.

 

[amadeus]

As has been said, it isn't racist and it's a product made for Western markets so the emphasis will be on Western culture, references, etc.

There are many Japanese games that are totally Japan-centric and never see the light of day outside Japan because they're only developed for this market and have little chance of seeing widespread interest outside of the country.

One such game is...

Japan Bashing for the PC-98.

The game is only playable as the Americans and only between the years 1980-1992. The objective is to stop the Japanese "takeover" of the U.S. by issuing anti-Japan edicts and spreading anti-Japanese propaganda. Progress is measured in the sushi:hamburger ratio displayed on the map of the U.S.―if the U.S. loses all of its hamburgers before 1992, the game ends. And according to the site I got the pictures from, once the hamburger is flipped to sushi, it cannot be flipped back to a hamburger.

"Japanese animation is cultural aggression!"

("Nihon no anime ha, bunka shinryaku da!")

The game probably wouldn't have gotten a lot of followers had it been translated and distributed outside the country.