Dungeons and Dragons has a Human Problem

Credit to Vesko81

Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition has an absolute plethora of player options in the form of classes, subclasses and "races". With the recent publication of "Tasha's Cauldron of Everything", that selection grows even more so with optional rules to change the starting stat bonuses, proficiencies, languages and many other things. It is a creative hotbed for new characters! At least, I would like to say that. 

The class and subclass selection are wide and varied, and for the most part have something that distinguishes them and offers a unique place for that class in the world. Their existence says something about the world of the game. The same cannot be said for nearly all of the character "races" provided.

The issue is, there are only three of them.

Humans, Lizardfolk, and the Kenku.

I have seen and heard arguments that Warforged should be added to this list, but I am honestly om the fence regarding that. I'm inclined to agree but haven't collected my thoughts on them enough to decide for sure.

The reason I keep airquoting "race" here is that I think "species" is a better term, so I will be using that from here forward. The term species has a stronger delineation between the choices. Put another way, there is no meaningful distinction between Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Genasi, Triton, Kalashtar and many others in the printed books. Yes, they have their various lore and innate abilities, different lifespans, but Dungeons and Dragons more or less stops there. Elves and dwarves in particular are so far detached from their fae cousins that once their expanded lifespans are accounted for, they boil down to Nature Humans and Mountain Humans. 

Contrast this with the Lizardfolk. They are described in such a way that makes it clear they lack any sort of human way of thinking. Empathy is alien to them, and a Lizardfolk only carry names given to them by members of other species for convinience. Consuming the dead is not an act of barabarity or cruelty, it is pragmatic and acts to ensure their own survival, which is ultimately their biggest goal. They do not adventure out of a sense of friendship towards party members, but the day to day survival of itself. Religious texts hold no importance aside from their utility as portable kindling, but they may decide to not deface a text since doing so means that several armed and armored individuals would try to kill them over it. There would be no hesitation in using the ashes of a disentegrated party member as camouflage should situation demand it. They are adaptive predators, ultimate utilitarians and sociopaths by human standards.

Kenku are a cursed species that had their creativity and flight stolen or removed from them, potentially forever. They possess no ability to form original thoughts or take creative actions, and as such became masters of mimicry. From the moment of their birth they begin memorizing everything around them. Not doing so would result in a certain death. Some people have trouble have issues coming to terms with this outside the game, suggesting that the Kenku removes all agency from the player because a Kenku PC is unable to adapt to situations. Perhaps if the Kenku is a fresh hatchling this would be true, but by the time they are of adventuring age, they have soent years observing others, learning skills, collecting phrases and slowly building a means to communicate. While unable to concieve of novel solutions and poorly reacting to novel sitautions, something they excel at is rote memorization. If situation X is happening, react in Y way. If X and W are happening, act Z way. Kenku are living computers, unable to act in a way they have not programmed themselves to react. 

Dungeons and Dragons has a problem with humans, and it is the fact so many of the character species choices could just be replaced by them.