LoTR, Racism & Historical Analologies

[open_sketchbook]

I see no problem with editing old works to remove racist content. The is nothing sacred about an artist or his works; I would argue that combating racism is more important than some fanboys worshipping everything some white dude wrote, even when it is disguistingly offensive.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I see no problem with editing old works to remove racist content. The is nothing sacred about an artist or his works; I would argue that combating racism is more important than some fanboys worshipping everything some white dude wrote, even when it is disguistingly offensive.

In other words, rather than preserve our history and everything we can learn from it, good and bad, you would prefer to white wash it. Are we to burn books you find offensive as well?

Oh I know! There are no black characters in Ivanhoe, we ought insert some!

[Darth Wong]

Are you fucking retarded? LOTR is not "history". No one is going to "whitewash history" if he updates an old story to remove its more objectionable elements when he makes a movie adaptation. If you make an update of King Kong and remove the ridiculously racist elements of the original, that is not "whitewashing history". PJ made numerous alterations to LOTR anyway, like removing the entire original fucking denouement.

[Darth Wong]

What about this makes you think it's got anything to do with you being a "minority" and not just being oversensitive yourself?

Because if you could actually point out that these disturbing correlations were not there, you would do so. Instead, all you've got is all of these weasely appeals to "oversensitivity" and objections that it could have been even more racist but wasn't.

[open_sketchbook]

We shouldn't whitewash history, no. But literature is not history, it is art, and there is nothing about art that gives it a right to be racist. Is it acceptable for a southern US state to have a Confederate flag flying, even if it's part of their history, and was acceptable when the flag was chosen? No, of course it isn't! So why the hell is it acceptable for a book to, in a metaphorical sense, do the same? What makes it so special as to be an exempted?

People reading LotRs are not going to be reading it for a historical perspective on racism. They are going to be reading it for fun, and they're going to like it so much that they'll fall into the same trap as other people in this thread, annoucing that racism is a-ko if Tolkien does it. It's part of the culture of racism, and contributes to a racist enviroment in which acceptable views are bred. It is no more acceptable than news networks cherry-picking their crime stories so that black people are always the suspects.

Sure, lets put some black characters in Ivanhoe! Lets cut out the horrid racism of HP Lovecraft! There is no reason to respect the works of artists if those works are objectionable. Lets remove all the racist content from Othello and the Merchant of Venice. There is nothing inheirently special aobut literature, it's just words. You are placing it on a pedistal as though it were a holy book, it smacks of religious behavior.

[Aaron]

Are you fucking retarded? LOTR is not "history". No one is going to "whitewash history" if he updates an old story to remove its more objectionable elements when he makes a movie adaptation. If you make an update of King Kong and remove the ridiculously racist elements of the original, that is not "whitewashing history". PJ made numerous alterations to LOTR anyway, like removing the entire original fucking denouement.

I'll be the first to admit that most racism flies totally over my head but PJ's LOTOR was actually better then the book, even if it didn't remove any racist connotations it ditched shitloads of pointless garbage.

Besides, would it really be so difficult to have an "original" and "edited" version of the book?

[open_sketchbook]

Why bother retaining the originals at all, except maybe for the purposes of historical study? By having two versions avaliable, you are essentially allowing people to choose to be racist, and presenting it as a chance to be authentic. Yes, that'll work out well.

[Aaron]

Does reading LOTOR turn you into a racist, is it going to have any effect on someone who wasn't already racist? Honest question BTW, I'm not trying to be a dick.

[open_sketchbook]

I would not say that LotRs "turns you into" a racist because that is absurd. Racism is not something that magically happens to you, it arises as a result of the environment you live in. It's just like patriarchy; it's death by a thousand cuts, so to speak. What I am arguing is that LotRs should not be made an exception to a removal of racist environment influences. In other words, we wouldn't be whitewashing it in particular. We would simply be whitewashing everything that didn't have academic historical value, because there is no other way to get rid of racism. In modern civilization, racism, sexism and religion can only beget themselves by surrounding people by their messages, so these things must be removed wherever they are found.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Are you fucking retarded? LOTR is not "history". No one is going to "whitewash history" if he updates an old story to remove its more objectionable elements when he makes a movie adaptation. If you make an update of King Kong and remove the ridiculously racist elements of the original, that is not "whitewashing history". PJ made numerous alterations to LOTR anyway, like removing the entire original fucking denouement.

By history, I meant literary history. I care much less about a movie than the original texts (movies rape books on a regular basis. It is unavoidable). We can, as individuals, learn much from an unedited book. We can for example use it as a case study in the systemic racism that even an otherwise progressive person can accidentally place in a work. All the while enjoying the story. There is no need to edit such a work, and doing so I think can definitely be considered to be whitewashing literature.

Why bother retaining the originals at all, except maybe for the purposes of historical study? By having two versions avaliable, you are essentially allowing people to choose to be racist, and presenting it as a chance to be authentic. Yes, that'll work out well.

How does reading a book with incidental racism make one a racist? Hell, how does reading an overtly racist book make one a racist? It is what we do with that knowledge that makes it undesirable for people to read, not that the racism in whatever form exists. Frankly I never would have noticed the racism in LOTR unless someone was looking for it and pointed it out to me.

This can be applied to a lot of prejudices. Misogyny for example. Does reading a copy of the Maleus Maleficarum make me a sexist witch burner? The answer is no.

[Darth Wong]

Are you fucking retarded? LOTR is not "history". No one is going to "whitewash history" if he updates an old story to remove its more objectionable elements when he makes a movie adaptation. If you make an update of King Kong and remove the ridiculously racist elements of the original, that is not "whitewashing history". PJ made numerous alterations to LOTR anyway, like removing the entire original fucking denouement.

By history, I meant literary history.

So ... you figure that if Peter Jackson put a black elf into his movie, then ... the history of literature would be somehow whitewashed, and the books would be somehow retroactively "edited"?

[Bakustra]

Besides, I don't see how the racial makeup of the cast is essential enough to the story that removing it would be a "violence" to the subject material, even in the context of a hypothetical adaptation dedicated to leaving nothing out. Note that I provided a means to do so that works in-story, but that is only a sop for the fanboy and the scholar. Hell, you don't even have to do anything more than de-Aryanifying Gondor to significantly weaken the imagery of "white guys versus the world".

What about this makes you think it's got anything to do with you being a "minority" and not just being oversensitive yourself?

Because if you could actually point out that these disturbing correlations were not there, you would do so. Instead, all you've got is all of these weasely appeals to "oversensitivity" and objections that it could have been even more racist but wasn't.

Um, you misattributed that quote there.

We shouldn't whitewash history, no. But literature is not history, it is art, and there is nothing about art that gives it a right to be racist. Is it acceptable for a southern US state to have a Confederate flag flying, even if it's part of their history, and was acceptable when the flag was chosen? No, of course it isn't! So why the hell is it acceptable for a book to, in a metaphorical sense, do the same? What makes it so special as to be an exempted?

People reading LotRs are not going to be reading it for a historical perspective on racism. They are going to be reading it for fun, and they're going to like it so much that they'll fall into the same trap as other people in this thread, annoucing that racism is a-ko if Tolkien does it. It's part of the culture of racism, and contributes to a racist enviroment in which acceptable views are bred. It is no more acceptable than news networks cherry-picking their crime stories so that black people are always the suspects.

Sure, lets put some black characters in Ivanhoe! Lets cut out the horrid racism of HP Lovecraft! There is no reason to respect the works of artists if those works are objectionable. Lets remove all the racist content from Othello and the Merchant of Venice. There is nothing inheirently special aobut literature, it's just words. You are placing it on a pedistal as though it were a holy book, it smacks of religious behavior.

You're trying too hard. People aren't declaring that "racism is A-OK if Tolkien does it!", they're either denying that there is racism or arguing that people should be conscious of racist aspects in the books they read or films they watch. Meanwhile, I find it amusing that you are actually arguing in favor of censorship. Sure, this is of the most well-intentioned sort (although reading unbowdlerized literature can be beneficial towards understanding the mindset of people throughout history), but people are nevertheless leery of it, and for very good reasons.

I would not say that LotRs "turns you into" a racist because that is absurd. Racism is not something that magically happens to you, it arises as a result of the environment you live in. It's just like patriarchy; it's death by a thousand cuts, so to speak. What I am arguing is that LotRs should not be made an exception to a removal of racist environment influences. In other words, we wouldn't be whitewashing it in particular. We would simply be whitewashing everything that didn't have academic historical value, because there is no other way to get rid of racism. In modern civilization, racism, sexism and religion can only beget themselves by surrounding people by their messages, so these things must be removed wherever they are found.

Literature has no academic historical value? Funny, but people make use of art in the study of history all the time, including literature, since it provides an outlook on the way people thought "back then". Now, for somebody as opposed to the arts as you, this may be a strange and unfamiliar concept, but it is a real one.

[Darth Wong]

What about this makes you think it's got anything to do with you being a "minority" and not just being oversensitive yourself?

Because if you could actually point out that these disturbing correlations were not there, you would do so. Instead, all you've got is all of these weasely appeals to "oversensitivity" and objections that it could have been even more racist but wasn't.

Um, you misattributed that quote there.

Sorry, you're right. That was Rye, not you.

PS. In any case, this idea that improving a book by altering its more objectionable elements for the movie adaptation is somehow "censorship" betrays an all-too-common tendency to overuse the word "censorship". It's not "censorship" to alter an adaptation of an old story. It's "censorship" to forcibly alter the original.

[Bakustra]

Sorry, you're right. That was Rye, not you.

No problem.

[Stark]

Wasn't the movie worse in some ways, like the elves being Aryan instead of primarily dark-haired?

[Alyrium Denryle]

I would not say that LotRs "turns you into" a racist because that is absurd. Racism is not something that magically happens to you, it arises as a result of the environment you live in. It's just like patriarchy; it's death by a thousand cuts, so to speak. What I am arguing is that LotRs should not be made an exception to a removal of racist environment influences. In other words, we wouldn't be whitewashing it in particular. We would simply be whitewashing everything that didn't have academic historical value, because there is no other way to get rid of racism. In modern civilization, racism, sexism and religion can only beget themselves by surrounding people by their messages, so these things must be removed wherever they are found.

You want to remove racism? I am pretty sure the fantasy literature one reads, regardless of quantity, provided the person doing the reading can separate reality from fiction, will not be a controlling factor in making someone a racist. Particularly in the case of LOTR where the racism is buried in things like character composition and subtle overtones that are more grounded in the historical context of the author and the geographic and cultural heritage of the work than in overt prejudice.

If you want to remove racism, you start with education. Not metaphorical book burning.

I have lived in an environment where book burning was considered acceptable. It is something I can never abide.

So ... you figure that if Peter Jackson put a black elf into his movie, then ... the history of literature would be somehow whitewashed, and the books would be somehow retroactively "edited"?

As I said. I care much less about the movies. Movies rape books. It is what they do. But Sketchbook is talking about editing the text itself at this point.

I am not sure how I would feel about a black elf. I suppose aesthetically it would look a tad odd, what with being a black elf wreathed in white light. However I have no larger issue with it. Again, because movies rape books by definition.

It's not "censorship" to alter an adaptation of an old story. It's "censorship" to forcibly alter the original.

Which is more what I am against. An adaptation is an adaptation. Things change. The original needs to be left the fuck alone.

[Aaron]

You're trying too hard. People aren't declaring that "racism is A-OK if Tolkien does it!", they're either denying that there is racism or arguing that people should be conscious of racist aspects in the books they read or films they watch. Meanwhile, I find it amusing that you are actually arguing in favor of censorship. Sure, this is of the most well-intentioned sort (although reading unbowdlerized literature can be beneficial towards understanding the mindset of people throughout history), but people are nevertheless leery of it, and for very good reasons.

Thats the thing isn't it? For this to happen, someone will either have to legislate it into being or for the publisher (or whoever owns it) to do it voluntarily.

[Darth Wong]

Wasn't the movie worse in some ways, like the elves being Aryan instead of primarily dark-haired?

Haldir and Legolas in particular were not just blond and white, but really really blond and white. Nevertheless, I don't know where exactly people get the idea that "aryan" means "blond", since Hitler himself had dark hair.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Sure, lets put some black characters in Ivanhoe! Lets cut out the horrid racism of HP Lovecraft! There is no reason to respect the works of artists if those works are objectionable. Lets remove all the racist content from Othello and the Merchant of Venice. There is nothing inheirently special aobut literature, it's just words. You are placing it on a pedistal as though it were a holy book, it smacks of religious behavior.

And where the fuck would such characters come from in the context of the book? Would Ivanhoe bring a black guy back from the holy land (say he was a Moor fighting in Saladin's army or something) as a prisoner of war (read: slave). Yes. I am sure that makes a whole hell of a lot of sense.

Are we to declare any work of literature in which the cast is racially homogenous as racist regardless of setting?

[DudeGuyMan]

Yeah, people reading old books and picking up the secondhand echoes of the racism that permeated society when they were written is too dangerous a proposition. What we really need is some sort of all-powerful governmental authority that looks at all of the ideas present in every literary work in history and decides which ones are acceptable for public consumption. That can't possibly go wrong.

Don't derail the thread with silly shit like this, Sketchbook.

[Mayabird]

It did annoy me that the movie elves were a bunch of blondes since in the books, blond hair amongst the elves was so rare that the few who had it were named for it, like Glorfindel (who incidentally was cut from the movies - dude slays a balrog in a duel and comes back from the dead and that's just not good enough for them).

Anyway, just a nitpick, and I'm backing off again now.

[Balrog]

Does reading LOTOR turn you into a racist, is it going to have any effect on someone who wasn't already racist? Honest question BTW, I'm not trying to be a dick.

No. Nowhere in the book is it professed how The White Man is superior to everyone else, and those damn uppity blacks need to know their place. Open is just being an idiot.

I am not saying that a work that features a monoracial cast is necessarily racist. I am saying that having a monoracial group of heroes and a multiracial group of villains is racist.

...did you forget that the Good Guys are actually a coalition of different races as well? Or are we only counting skin color in this discussion of racism?

No. He should have avoided making all his heroes monoracial and making his villains multiracial to avoid racist implications in LOTR's background, and he should have altered the orcs, and the depiction of Ghan-buri-ghan, and a few other areas here and there.

Ignoring that his heroes were multiracial, the implication is there only on a skin-deep level. Because it's easy to see "white people fighting non-white people, must be racist" without realizing this is not a conflicted promoted by race. That the Haradrim are not white is incidental to, and not the reason for, them fighting for Sauron. They don't fight for him because, being dark-skinned, they 'naturally' are more prone to evil. In fact, reading the appendices, Tolkien depicts actual racists as being bad guys while people of mixed heritage are the good guys, as when the Kin-Strife of Gondor pops up.

Regarding the orcs, didn't we cover this already? They come in all shapes, sizes, and skin colors, and are an artificial race purposefully created by a Big Bad Evil who, in this setting, actually exists. Tolkien considered people who perpetrated useless bloody wars to be "orcs" in his mind, not minorities.

And the Woses were white IIRC and fought for the good guys. They are more like primitive caveman than anything else. Hell their very name and appearance is based upon old folklore regarding the "wild men of the woods" who had strange powers (as an aside, the character of Merlin is traced in part to these old legends).

[Darth Wong]

Again, we return to the "it could have been more racist, but it wasn't" kind of logic. While it's not entirely groundless, in the sense that it does somewhat exonerate Tolkien of being a terrible human being, it does not legitimately lead to the conclusion that there is no racism at all.

When someone is cooking up completely fictional groups (hence not attempting to depict real history), why shouldn't he take pains to avoid the appearance of racial connections to good and evil? There's a reason the LOTR series was praised by white supremacist groups. It didn't have to be intentionally tailored to make them happy; the fact that it did make them happy would be something I would try to avoid, if I were a filmmaker. Wouldn't you?

[Balrog]

Again, we return to the "it could have been more racist, but it wasn't" kind of logic. While it's not entirely groundless, in the sense that it does somewhat exonerate Tolkien of being a terrible human being, it does not legitimately lead to the conclusion that there is no racism at all.

When someone is cooking up completely fictional groups (hence not attempting to depict real history), why shouldn't he take pains to avoid the appearance of racial connections to good and evil? There's a reason the LOTR series was praised by white supremacist groups. It didn't have to be intentionally tailored to make them happy; the fact that it did make them happy would be something I would try to avoid, if I were a filmmaker. Wouldn't you?

So are we talking about PJ now, or Tolkien still?

Because the books very much have a rather progressive message. Different racial groups, some with a long history of mistrust and aggression with each other, come together to work for the overthrow of evil. The main hero of the story isn't a heroic figure, much less an Aryan superman, but a little person. Actual racist dicks are presented as being racist dicks and, consequently, work for the evil side. The only way it could be more blatant about it is if it made some of the good guys have darker skin tone, which apparently is the only way to appease some people.

That white supremacists found the book enjoyable for the wrong reasons is regrettable, but then these guys are nutters, considering the actual message of the books pretty much promotes exactly what they don't like. These kinds of people will cherry-pick whatever they want to support their mindset. Hell, if someone only saw ANH and ESB, they could easily use it to support a racist message (the only colored guys are either pure evil, or double-crossers). They would be wrong, of course, but they could still twist the movies to have that meaning. The only real way to combat that mindset is with proper education, not literary self-censorship.

As for the movies, PJ went a bit overboard with having most of the Elves be blond hair and blue eyed, though Elrond and Arwen aren't, but the same messages found in the books still apply.

[Bakustra]

I am not saying that a work that features a monoracial cast is necessarily racist. I am saying that having a monoracial group of heroes and a multiracial group of villains is racist.

...did you forget that the Good Guys are actually a coalition of different races as well? Or are we only counting skin color in this discussion of racism?

Elves: Visually white humans with pointy ears.
Dwarves: Visually white humans with long beards.
Hobbits: Visually white humans with hairy feet.
Ents: Walking fucking trees.
Druedain: Grass-skirted, pidgin-spouting stereotypes.

Yeah, I see how this creates the image of a massively diverse group of the Good guys, especially when three only provide token representatives and two don't appear at the climax of the Aragorn/Gandalf storyline (but there are no humans in the Frodo/Sam storyline either!). PS: Yes, skin color is important to this discussion, because this is about implications and impressions.

No. He should have avoided making all his heroes monoracial and making his villains multiracial to avoid racist implications in LOTR's background, and he should have altered the orcs, and the depiction of Ghan-buri-ghan, and a few other areas here and there.

Ignoring that his heroes were multiracial, the implication is there only on a skin-deep level. Because it's easy to see "white people fighting non-white people, must be racist" without realizing this is not a conflicted promoted by race. That the Haradrim are not white is incidental to, and not the reason for, them fighting for Sauron. They don't fight for him because, being dark-skinned, they 'naturally' are more prone to evil. In fact, reading the appendices, Tolkien depicts actual racists as being bad guys while people of mixed heritage are the good guys, as when the Kin-Strife of Gondor pops up.[/quote]

Ah, yes, the appendices, the most essential part of the story, indeed so essential that Tolkien was fine with translators removing all of them but A. Furthermore, this is about impressions and implications, you moron. The racism is not about Gandalf crowing over how they're going to kill some "Haradrim hair-braiders" or other blatant displays, but in the background of the work.

Regarding the orcs, didn't we cover this already? They come in all shapes, sizes, and skin colors, and are an artificial race purposefully created by a Big Bad Evil who, in this setting, actually exists. Tolkien considered people who perpetrated useless bloody wars to be "orcs" in his mind, not minorities.

I'm only proposing the changes Tolkien himself was considering, sir. That is, either remove free will from the orcs, or make it possible and obvious in-story that they are capable of redemption. The actual racist description of the orcs is out-of-universe and never explicitly labeled within the books themselves. If you're going to say "didn't we cover this already", perhaps you should read back over the thread before doing so. It might save your post.

And the Woses were white IIRC and fought for the good guys. They are more like primitive caveman than anything else. Hell their very name and appearance is based upon old folklore regarding the "wild men of the woods" who had strange powers (as an aside, the character of Merlin is traced in part to these old legends).

They're grass-skirted, pidgin-spouting, drum-playing, blowdart-using stereotypes. Do they have to have a neon sign labeled "Bushman/Pacific Islander stereotype" attached to Druedain Wood?