Combine race, history, an upcoming PC game and some angry Reddit users and you've got a recipe for disappointment in your fellow man.
The Daily Dot has a nice summary of what happened when a curious onlooker asked a niche but awesome internet historian - MedievalPOC (People of Colour), who highlights the presence and contributions of non-whites to medieval European society - whether it would be accurate for the upcoming RPG Kingdom Come: Deliverance to feature characters who weren't white.
It's an honest and interesting question! One that probably has you Googling "non-white medieval Europeans" right now. But things got nasty when subreddit TumblrInAction got hold of it. Getting angry like only angry internet men can - and making the leap that this innocent, academic question somehow posed a threat to the racial hegemony of a game that's not even out yet - we get comments like this.
You're right dude. It does.
Where this gets shitty is that instead of festering on their own subreddit, these folks went and got abusive with MedievalPOC.
I call these folks idiots not for their "arguments" - the game takes place in a small area of medieval Bohemia, so there are good odds everyone would have been white anyway - but because of their hair-trigger hostility, and the extent with which they feel entitled to lash out and threaten others.
Nobody told the developers to change the game. Nobody officially complained. All that happened was that somebody, somewhere asked an interesting question, one that happened to involve non-whites in a very white setting.
Video games and race, folks. Video games and race.
If the subject has you interested - and it should, because the pre-industrial era movement of peoples across the planet is a fascinating tale - MedievalPOC's tumblr is a good place to make a cup of tea and settle down in front of.
Is a medieval video game historically accurate without people of color? [The Daily Dot]