I don't know, you're the one who decided to play devil's advocate! I'll summarize basic comments I've made previously: I don't think Tolkien is racist, I CAN see why people call racism/sexism, but I DON'T agree that it's entirely fair. I maintain (and will, even if we argue this for a year) that if the author doesn't intend racism, and even tries to point out that people can be corrupted no matter their color, he does deserve some benefit of the doubt. There are bad people in the books that are white, including some of the most powerful. Is it fair to assume that he believes alllll people of color are bad, just because we only see those who have come to war? Possibly, if Sam had never made his statement re: the Southron.
Yes, I've never been very good at concisely making a point and then letting it go. Having Joel around has the unfortunate side-effect of letting everyone else think "at least I'm not as bad as Joel", I guess...
So, here's me trying to be concise: no, but a less offensive but still racist interpretation of Tolkien considering people of color to be ignorant and in need of guidance from white westerners *is* fair, I'm afraid.
You may have me there. I'm not that geeky. 
Yeah, unfortunately I did make an error in there, as John pointed out... so I guess it's three white westerners and one brown easterling on the ones we know of.
And I said I can see how they can think that, and I agree that there isn't much I can do to fix it. I simply don't think it's intended as racism/sexism, and I don't think it's fair to hate him/his books on that basis. That's it.
We'll agree to marginally hair-splittingly disagree, then.
Sooo... he can't couch it in mythology and religious "history?" I don't understand why it has to be "real world" anything when he was writing from myths and fairy tales. I admit that it gets harder when he talks about dwarves/jews, but why do we believe him there and NOT where he says that orcs are based on demons/devils (something beautiful and good, corrupted by evil into something else)? Isn't that, in fact, where the word came from?
Many myths have the same problem, of course, but aren't generally subjected to the same scrutiny as 20th-century novels, what with being so old. As for the other question, you can of course look at the overarching Catholic messages, but I don't think it makes much sense to just consider all of the non-human races as purely abstract concepts given flesh, and like I said, the orcs are merely the worst case so you can't limit the abstraction to them - in essence the Elves have the same problem.
I doubt Tom is reading this. 
I don't know, he might be.
Yet again, I can see the point in your last sentence. I can't argue against that. I don't agree, again, because I'm looking at it from the angle that he's a historian using medieval concepts to frame a race for a novel. My main objection is that nobody seems to want to look into WHY he said the dwarves remind him of Jews. They seem to simply assume it's re: money. This is part of what I read on wiki:
The representation of Dwarves as evil changed dramatically with The Hobbit. Here the Dwarves became occasionally comedic and bumbling, but largely seen as honourable, serious-minded, but still portraying some negative characteristics such as being gold-hungry, overly proud and occasionally officious. According to the 2007 book The History of the Hobbit, Tolkien was now influenced by his own selective reading of medieval texts regarding the Jewish people and their history.[5] The dwarves' characteristics of being dispossessed of their homeland (the Lonely Mountain, their ancestral home, is the goal the exiled Dwarves seek to reclaim), and living among other groups whilst retaining their own culture are all derived from the medieval image of Jews,[5][6] whilst their warlike nature stems from accounts in the Hebrew Bible.[5] Medieval views of Jews also saw them as having a propensity for making well-crafted and beautiful things,[5] a trait shared with Norse dwarves.[4] For The Hobbit almost all dwarf-names are taken from the Dvergatal or "Catalogue of the Dwarves", found in the Poetic Edda.[ 7 ][ 8 ] However, more than just supplying names, the "Catalogue of the Dwarves" appears to have inspired Tolkien to supply meaning and context to the list of names—that they travelled together, and this in turn became the quest told of in The Hobbit.[9] The Dwarves' written language is represented on maps and in illustrations by Anglo-Saxon Runes. The Dwarven calendar invented for The Hobbit reflects the Jewish calendar in beginning in late autumn.[5] The dwarves taking Bilbo out of his complacent existence has been seen as an eloquent metaphor for the "impoverishment of Western society without Jews."[6]
Interesting.
When writing The Lord of the Rings Tolkien continued many of the themes he had set up in The Hobbit. When giving Dwarves their own language (Khuzdûl) Tolkien decided to create an analogue of a Semitic language influenced by Hebrew phonology. Like medieval Jewish groups, the Dwarves use their own language only amongst themselves, and adopted the languages of those they live amongst for the most part, for example taking public names from the cultures they lived within, whilst keeping their "true-names" and true language a secret.[10] Along with a few words in Khuzdûl, Tolkien also developed runes of his own invention (the Cirth), said to have been invented by Elves and later adopted by the Dwarves. Tolkien further underlines the diaspora of the Dwarves with the lost stronghold of the Mines of Moria. In The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien uses the main dwarf character Gimli to finally reconcile the conflict between Elves and Dwarves through showing great courtesy to Galadriel and forming a deep friendship with Legolas. The Gimli-Legolas relationship has been seen as Tolkien's reply toward "Gentile anti-Semitism and Jewish exclusiveness".[6]
Tolkien also elaborated on Jewish influence on his Dwarves in a letter: "I do think of the 'Dwarves' like Jews: at once native and alien in their habitations, speaking the languages of the country, but with an accent due to their own private tongue..."[11]
In letters 29 & 30, it appears that a German translation of The Hobbit was being negotiated in 1938. The German firm enquired whether Tolkien was of Arisch (Aryan) origin. Tolkien was infuriated by this, and wrote two drafts of possible replies for his publisher to choose.[1] The first one is not present - in it Tolkien is assumed to have refused to give any declaration whatsoever of his racial origins. The second, surviving, draft included:
Thank you for your letter ... I regret that I am not clear as to what you intend by arisch. I am not of Aryan extraction: that is Indo-Iranian; as far as I am aware none of my ancestors spoke Hindustani, Persian, Gypsy, or any related dialects. But if I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people.
—Tolkien, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, #30 (Emphasis in original)
Okay. Consider that theory well and truly debunked, then... I'd suggest informing acrackedmoon of all this, but she seems rather too stubborn to concede a point so easily, based on what I've seen.
I rarely think you're being silly, but I really do not agree with you here, or below. I don't think there is much point in continuing.
Well, there we have a real disagreement, then.
Yeahhh, and she changes the whole function of the fellowship by allowing Frodo to see what he had started to suspect. What good is Elrond's advice and aid if it isn't going to work? I just disagree that she is in a traditional or lame-ish female role. Period.
I never said lame-ish. She certainly is less pompous and arguably more relevant than Elrond in her comments and advice. And as for traditional, the point is that if she's the best one can do in terms of women breaking traditional gender roles, which she is in LotR, by a mile, she's still not that much of a cliché-breaker. A feminist writer might not necessarily have written her so differently, I agree, but a feminist writer would have sufficient other female characters of note that there was no need to subject her to such scrutiny.
The racist elements in Tolkien's writing
- 29/01/2012 01:31:02 PM
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She has some points, of course.
- 29/01/2012 02:25:32 PM
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Quite a few points
- 29/01/2012 02:40:45 PM
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I don't find the tone blunt; I find it leading, patronizing and often wrong or inferring too much.
- 30/01/2012 01:43:27 AM
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Agreed - reading it, I struggled to find any redeeming qualities
- 30/01/2012 07:32:58 PM
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Agreed, in general. The tremendous bad faith and sophistry turn me off, though.
- 29/01/2012 09:31:04 PM
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Mostly agreed with the article, but thought she undermined herself with her own racism.
- 29/01/2012 02:50:11 PM
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Just read your Twitter convo... nice try, but looks like wasted effort. *NM*
- 29/01/2012 10:37:08 PM
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Well, I'll be honest.
- 29/01/2012 10:34:46 PM
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Let me try to summarize some of her points with the invective filtered out, then.
- 29/01/2012 10:48:24 PM
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Thank you.
- 29/01/2012 11:10:13 PM
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What the hell, might as well go and play devil's advocate, right?
- 30/01/2012 04:50:30 PM
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- 30/01/2012 04:50:30 PM
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I expected that.
- 30/01/2012 05:39:59 PM
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- 30/01/2012 05:39:59 PM
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Of course you did. I'm predictable that way.
- 30/01/2012 10:28:10 PM
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Re: Of course you did. I'm predictable that way.
- 31/01/2012 12:39:46 AM
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Re: Of course you did. I'm predictable that way.
- 31/01/2012 08:38:46 PM
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I <3 you, but there are several very key things we are not going to agree on.
- 31/01/2012 10:02:22 PM
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- 31/01/2012 10:02:22 PM
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Oh.
- 31/01/2012 11:07:52 PM
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- 01/02/2012 12:17:59 AM
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- 31/01/2012 11:07:52 PM
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- 01/02/2012 12:17:59 AM
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Hmm?
- 31/01/2012 10:10:22 PM
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Yeah. I got to reading Encyclopedia of Arda just now, and it told me the same thing.
- 31/01/2012 10:35:54 PM
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As a sort of group answer (I've been mostly absent from forums the past two days)
- 31/01/2012 10:45:55 PM
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I don't mind if you tell me I'm out of line here, but
- 31/01/2012 11:55:04 PM
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I'm rarely ever offended
- 01/02/2012 01:54:58 AM
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She was referring specifically to the Twitter "conversation" I had with the blogger.
- 01/02/2012 09:05:28 AM
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Yes.
- 01/02/2012 10:47:22 AM
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It makes me wonder what she thinks is happening in Zimbabwe, for example.
- 01/02/2012 11:13:11 AM
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I've been thinking about that.
- 01/02/2012 11:29:18 AM
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That blog post was mostly good, but the exception is a rather large one.
- 01/02/2012 08:35:57 PM
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What's a neckbeard? And why am I supposed to care? *NM*
- 30/01/2012 01:29:07 AM
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neckbeards are when the person (either intentionally or through misfortunate genetics)...
- 30/01/2012 03:21:09 AM
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acrackedmoon is a racist, sexist bore. And I don't even like Tolkien. *NM*
- 30/01/2012 01:14:17 PM
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