Is LOTR racist?

Question

Do you think LOTR is racist? I Know its kinda of an old film. Its one of my favourite movies, Tolkien is a genuis , But you gotta admit that there is some racist undertones throughout the movie. Elves - blonde + blue eyes = Good
Orcs - Black skinned + dreadlocks = Bad
Some would say the elves are white people, the orcs black or asian and the dwarves are jews. What are your views on it?

P.s if just gonna moan and question the importance of the question, don't reply,

Answer 1

I think the real racism is in the interpreters, after all, if you look hard enough, and use enough imagination, you can see what you want, wherever you want to see it...

Sexual Overtones of Peter Pan.
A Group of boys living together, their only "adult" is a fairy. And when a girl shows up, they try to kill her...

Anti-Woman sentiment of Cinderella:
Here, the woman who works, is abused by her employers, obviously a symbol for the pampered rich, meanwhile, when Cinderella adopts the "proper female" attributes of behavior and dress (giving up her work) she is taken by the prince, and never allowed to work again.

Board game "Go For Broke" a communist attack on America.
In this game, the object isn't to make money, or to become wealthy, but to, in effect, redistribute the wealth, by giving all of your money away. Instead of teaching the values of work, or capitalism, this game teaches that wealth is bad, and the only goal is to eliminate it..

To quote Tom Lehrer, the singing professor:

"Everything is Lewd, when correctly viewed..."

Answer 2

I do not believe the story is racist. But it is exclusionary.

Lord of the Rings represents the ultimate metaphor of European and western cultural ideals. The concept of different races coming together to battle a dark threat, how a humble small man can become the salvation for the world and the ideals of sacrifice, redemption, friendship and chivalraic honour are all central to a Euro-centric idealism. Even environmental causes are paramount, written far before modern sensibilities.

The book and movies attack the idea of moral or military suppression and espouse freedom and simplicity and feminine power.

This may seem to put it at odds with certain other cultures' values, and certainly it can appear to resemble an idealization of the Crusades, but it is not racist.

At no point does the theme suggest that differences in appearances make one evil.

The primary villains are not foreigners so much as "fallen" from grace. Men fall to temptation, orcs are derived from unfortuante or twisted elves, and powerful wizards can become blinded and corrupted by the powers they wield.


Evil comes from within, not without. The ring almost brings about the moral decay of the hero Froddo.

The story is very Christian in its metaphors, so in that way may seem exclusionary.

Answer 3

No. and the thing you are missing is the concept of soot. The Orcs work in the mechanized furnaces and are covered in soot. And some people would be wrong as the Elves look Gaelic, the Dwarves look Scottish and the Orcs look Pagan.

Answer 4

Tolkien was a professor of Old English literature and based his novel on medieval sagas written in both Old English and Old Norse. The elves, dwarves, orcs, and other critters were based on the medieval descriptions, so I don't think racism had anything to do with it.

Answer 5

Just because a time period is set in a certain way, even a fantasy time period, doesn't mean OUR interpretation of its' -isms isn't relevant.

Look at all the Star Wars movies for OBVIOUS critiques on the Middle East.

Look at King Kong's racism

It's not hard to see this, the subplot is where ALL the meaning is taking place in these otherwise vapid productions, you mind-controlled automatons.

Another thing in LOTR is the role of women. They're either witches or houswives, with the exception of one warrior-- but if you remember the scene she only defeats the war god with the help of a hobbit, a half-man that makes up for her female 'deficiency.' And then she cries like hell on the battlefield.

Answer 6

I think you are right that there is a definite hint of racism there. As you pointed out with the elves and orcs differences but also in the Return of the King the guys on the big elephants with rings in there noses etc definately suggest african origin whilst all the 'good' guys are very European.

There was a very interesting article in The Guardian about this.. You can read it here http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/classics/story/0,,852235,00.html

However, despite these problems I still think they are awesome films.

Answer 7

no longer between the characters have been written to be gay. no longer a one. Merry and Pippin are proper so the belief of them having a gay relationship is slightly gross. (no longer the homosexuality, the reality that they are cousins) The movie depicted a number of of the biggest characters as having gay dispositions and that i characteristic that to a director who had no theory what this tale replaced into approximately (as is obvious throughout the time of the action pictures) and he replaced into merely form of transforming into issues up as he went alongside. the tale that Jackson instructed replaced into no longer Tolkien's Lord of the jewellery.

Answer 8

In my opinion I don't see the racism in it. It's just a fantasy movie based on a book, but the book was written in the 60s so perhaps it was lightly based on the events back then, but J.R.R. Tolken had written many fantasy books long before all the racism started.

Answer 9

I did notice that, especially the east versus west undertones as well. Kind of an ironic parallel to what is happening today.

Answer 10

I dont think that it is at all. but remember LOTR was written in the 1960's when society had much different views.