So, a player in my games community created a beautiful hawaiian outfit inspired by hula dancers. I have been wondering, does adding items like this (As well as hijabs & kimonos) create a problem of white people/people not of that culture using the items in a way that is not intended. I don’t wont to create a game that isn’t inclusive but also dont want a game where players wear these items unknowing of the history and significance.
I don’t think it does. To be honest, if it is people that are misusing the outfit, that is a problem on their end, and they are going to be the ones taken down. Definitely be wary about how you allow people to use this, but if they are say abusing chat, you can’t do much about that.
By design it is not your intention to allow for misuse of cultural items but there may be some outliers in your community who unfortunately do wear these items intentionally in an inappropriate manner.
What you’re balancing here is giving more representation to other cultures by allowing them to equip items that may have cultural significance for them with a chance of item misuse, versus the inverse which is only providing a “standard, white, western” set of items with no cultural representation. It is also important to remember Roblox protects expression of cultures and religions and does hold developers accountable if their community mass misuses content within their games.
I cannot provide you an authoritative answer here but much like the Roblox catalog, moderation will probably be more inclined to moderate users based on their individual behaviour rather than your system allowing users to wear more items that may be personal to them. If push comes to shove and you’re in a corner, it’s probably better not to include cultural items and avoid inappropriate use or discussion of them than to include them at the expense of bad actors.
You may want to forward this question to Developer Engagement to see if they can get an answer from the moderation team from you about how you can proceed with this and to what extent you or your game may be affected if your community is wearing items inappropriately.
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I see no problem with foreigners wearing items of different cultures as long as they aren’t doing it in a way that is racist or xenophobic. This shouldn’t be a problem (as long as you remind people to report discriminatory players).
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So this isn’t for every religious piece of clothing or item, but a general rule of thumb is if the character is mocking the religion/culture then it’s wrong no matter what.
Also hijabs aren’t a religious item, they’re head coverings but they’re widely used in certain religions. But typically anyone can wear one.
An item I’d stay far far away from adding into a game is the Native American headdresses and such. These items (which can be purchased off the Roblox catalog, go figure.) are sacred to them and it’s almost always offensive.
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