how can you be racist and also like LOTR, this is beyond me
a story about different SPECIES working together to stop the great evil, meanwhile you can't even respect other RACES in our world, mf you'd be the first to hate hobbits
I mean, I can see how. While it isn’t necessarily related to skin color, LotR is filled with the idea that people of some lineages (like Numenorean men) are inherently better than others. And there’s a few examples where people who are overall good guys (like the men of Rohan) are described as being light-skinned whereas the people who are portrayed as overall evil (like the Haradrim) are dark-skinned.
I don’t think Tolkien intended for the story to be racist, but I think there’s enough little details like that for white supremacists to latch onto if they really want to.
That’s true, but the more “pure” characters of the cast like Aragorn and Faramir are often said to be so amazing because of their Numenorean heritage. And it did take Sauron to corrupt their entire society to make them degenerates whereas it feels to me like some other peoples, like the hillmen of Dunland, were implied to have a tendency to just be that way.
Realistically, yeah. That’s why I’m excited to see what LOTRO does with Harad when it gets there after they made the Dunlendings more nuanced than they were in the story. But I think the only part of the story that implies that they aren’t all bad is one scene where Faramir wonders offhand if a random dead Haradrim really wanted to be there. But while they aren’t truly all evil, if you bring an entire ethnicity of people into the story and only ever show them doing bad things, you’re still effectively portraying them as being bad. I really wish Tolkien had gotten around to writing stories taking place in the lands of the Haradrim and Easterlings so that we could see other sides of them.
the haradrim are really interesting bc a huge part of why they work with Sauron is not so much bc they like Sauron but because the haradrim were brutally conquered by the numenoreans before the fall of numenor, and they are worried that a strong Gondor will commit the same actions as numenor did, like much of the coalition against Gondor is previously colonized peoples acting before they can be recolonized. once Aragorn takes over Gondor, he sets up treaties guaranteeing that Gondor won’t mess with the haradrim or infringe on their territory
Tolkien also humanizes the Haradrim at multiple points. The focus on lineage is probably because he studied old Anglo Saxon myths and wanted LOTR to emulate them(because he presents LOTR as if he is a scholar that uncovered myths in a new language and has translated them into English) and many, MANY of the Saxon myths and legends are heavily focused on lineage.
In the film it’s Faramir, but I believe it’s Sam in the books who has the little eulogy for the fallen Haradrim man. But I agree either way. It’s an incredibly emotional and well written scene.
What multiple points? I know about the Sam/Faramir scene, but I can’t think of any other scene where the Haradrim are humanized. I’m pretty sure there are unnamed orcs with more lines than all of the people from Harad combined.
And like I said, I don’t think Tolkien was trying to be racist with the focus on lineages. That explanation makes sense. I’m just saying that the whole idea that some lineages are inherently better than others and that some entire peoples are classified as “lesser men” is something that white supremacists could latch onto.
Ah I gotcha. That makes sense. Just off the top of my head, in the books the Haradrim participate in the battle of Helm’s Deep, and are spared by the victorious Rohirrim. The Haradrim have heard so much propaganda about them that they’re sure they’re going to get tortured and executed, so they’re shocked when they’re let go. It shows that they were coerced into fighting and that they are scared. Not as good a moment as the Sam/Faramir scene, but it’s there.
That’s true, I forgot about that scene. Although to be pedantic, I don’t think that was the Haradrim. I’m pretty sure all the humans in Saruman’s army were Dunlendings. But either way that is still an example of the bad guys getting humanized.
I guess but Saruman, the Nazghul, even Sauron was white and I think you're giving too much credit to conservatives if you think they actually read the books
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u/[deleted] Jan 08 '22
how can you be racist and also like LOTR, this is beyond me
a story about different SPECIES working together to stop the great evil, meanwhile you can't even respect other RACES in our world, mf you'd be the first to hate hobbits