Is Blizzard racist? Or was it an unknown mistake?

Halfbreed13

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Apr 21, 2009
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Negrow?
What, like negro?
Like black in spanish.
I am truly and utterly confused as to what the problem is.
 

Naheal

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Sep 6, 2009
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Ashtovo said:
didn't yahtzee say something about a knee-jerk reaction to perceive racism? you should only start to worry when they break out the afros and fried chicken.
This would be MUCH more entertaining.
 

Mr Fatherland

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Nov 10, 2008
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Well, unless they have an afro and look like the travelling minstrels, I don't think anyone will have a problem.
 

George Palmer

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Feb 23, 2009
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Was Blizzard even the first ones to use the word "Worgen"? I'm pretty sure I heard it used well before WoW ever came out.

I think its just a coincidence. Besides anyone can find something offensive or racist about anything. If you want to see it, it will be there.
 

PsychoPete

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Sep 9, 2009
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To solve this problem you could just ask Blizz to remove that last "N"
Cause i dont think Worge is racist


then again... whats a Worge?
kinda like a Dirge?

idunno anymore!!


(secretly hopes none of the Snilbog get offended)
 

Slycne

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Feb 19, 2006
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CuddlyCombine said:
No, no, no, and no. Unless Blizzard has been planning this for eons, the term contains no racism other than that perceived by the reader.

For those interested, I'll give you the nerd analysis, backed up with facts from World of Warcraft.

*The Norse term for wolf was vargr, which was anglicized by the Anglo-Saxons into "warg".
*Lord of the Rings author J.R.R. Tolkein, a philologist, used the term to name the wolves of Middle-Earth.
*Blizzard scooped this up and turned it into "worg" for their Warcraft universe (everybody rips off Tolkein).
*Just as werewolves are a derivative of wolf, worgen is a derivative of worg.

I'm pretty sure I have that right. Either that, or Blizzard has been scheming to create racism in the name ever since the Vikings were around.

EDIT: damn, I sound like a nerd. Let it be known that I know all of this because I play Warcraft and also happen to be taking a course that is devoted to studying monsters in ancient times. Please don't hurt me.

EDIT #2: Also, after running this through some translation filters of the ancient Scandinavian language descendants (Swedish, Danish etc.), worgen means "to choke" in Dutch (which is interesting, since 'wargaz' meant 'strangler' in Proto-Germanic.
To expand further - The term negro, literally the Spanish word for the color black, was first used to describe Africans around the 1440s when the Portuguese landed in Africa trying to find a sea route to India. Old Norse fell out of use in the 1300's, but that still means the term predates the racial usage of the word by at least 100 years.
 

Clashero

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Aug 15, 2008
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Oh my God! I speak Spanish, and I use the word "negro" to refer to anything of the colour black! I'M SUCH A RACIST!
 

CuddlyCombine

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Sep 12, 2007
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Slycne said:
To expand further - The term negro, literally the Spanish word for black, was first used to describe Africans around the 1440s when the Portuguese landed in Africa trying to find a sea route to India. Old Norse fell out of use in the 1300's, but that still means the term predates the racial usage of the word by at least 100 years.
Not to mention that the Spaniards would have been completely isolated from the Norse for at least another 200 years (until the first explorers starting reaching America).

Clashero said:
Oh my God! I speak Spanish, and I use the word "negro" to refer to anything of the colour black! I'M SUCH A RACIST!
Well, to be fair, the word has gained a negative connotation outside of, like you said, Spanish people talking about colours. Walking through a busy street shouting "Negro!" would be interpreted as racism, not a love for the colour black.
 

SsilverR

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Feb 26, 2009
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i seriously think people are thinking too much when it comes to racism

remember resi 5?? that game was in no way racist but some prick somewhere (either some overzelous black person or some overzelous white person who wished they were black) tried to pass it off as racist because apparently there shouldn't be so many black people in africa
 

Bored Tomatoe

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Aug 15, 2008
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Oh come on, you're just looking for it if you go around spelling words backwards and saying "It sounds kind of like a mild racial slur!"
 

Octorok

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May 28, 2009
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Hey, if you assign each letter a random number then divide that by the square root of pi, then you take all the ones and zeros as binary, then you spell out "grumpnf". In other words, this is a very tenuous link. OMG - if it's pronounced backwards it's racist??

And anyway, negro isn't that racist. It was the polite term for them.
 

JediMB

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Oct 25, 2008
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CuddlyCombine said:
I'm pretty sure I have that right. Either that, or Blizzard has been scheming to create racism in the name ever since the Vikings were around.
*gasps*

And Blizzard created The Lost Vikings!
 

shadow_pirate22

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Aug 25, 2008
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electric discordian said:
Worgen has been used in the past to refer to werewolves, before Black people existed infact.

Im sure it the term appeared in several stories from the middle ages.
This. I've seen the word "worg" used to refer to wolf in several stories and video games. and adding the "en" suffix just makes them seem like the population, not the creature. So no, its not racist.
 

Gaderael

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Apr 14, 2009
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It's just coincidence and people with too much time on their hands looking for something to be offended about.
 

gbemery

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Jun 27, 2009
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Diablini said:
gbemery said:
Oh my god then that means spanish speaking people must be racist too, I mean their word for 'black' is 'negro'. Contact the NAACP, the ACLU and Al Sharpton!/sarcasm
And Al Gore! ManBearPig is real! I'm super cereal.
Pssh, ManBearPig is only real in the northern hemisphere. But thank you oh great Al Gore for bringing us The Internet, for this we give thanks.