Racist Overtones in Lord of the Rings?
12.29.2003
According to Lloyd Hart in his opinion article The Racist Tapestry of Lord of the Rings, in the Lord of the Rings trilogy...
- "the only people of skin color in the entire three part series of films are all associated with the Dark Lord Sauron, the destruction of the earth and all of its occupants. Not to mention the elephant riding mercenaries that resemble the cultures of the Arab world as well as Africa, Persia and East Asia and the fact that the Monarch of the land of Rohan, King Théoden a white guy yelled out "You great warriors of the West" in the final part of his speech to rouse the troops into battle in the third film..."
He then asks...
- "Can you imagine how people of skin color, of Persian, Arab and East Asian ethnic background feel when they come out of these films where all the heroes are white and all the "evil doers" are of dark skin. Being married to an Asian American I watch people disregard my wife everyday while regarding me, simply because of her skin color. Being part of a European family that has lived on the North American continent for 400 years I've been lucky enough to gain perspective that when you create an evil character (Uruk-hai) that resembles native Americans as they have done in the Lord of the Rings films a great deal of cultural and racial alienation will occur. "
Read the entire article here.
Now, let's explore the issues brought up above.
First, let's look at his language. He speaks of "people of skin color". What does that mean, exactly? I did not realize that there were people whose skin lacked color! I realize, of course, he's talking about non "white" people - however, even in that case the term is silly and incorrect - technically, dark colors are dark because of the lack of color, light colors are light because of more color. 100% white is caused by the existance of all colors in an object; 100% black is caused by the absense of all colors in an object. Thus, the phrase "people of color", or in this case, "people of skin color", is incorrectly used. (This whole issue, of course, ignores the fact that there is no such thing as race.)
Second, "people of skin color" aren't the only villains, by a long shot. Indeed, many of the most wicked, treacherous, deceptive, backstabbing or insane characters in the film are "white". First and foremost there is Saruman "The White" - hardly a "person of skin color". Smeagol, the hobbit-like creature that became Gollum through the influence of the One Ring, was "white". Grima "Worm Tongue" was white. Etc.
Third, King Théoden says "You great warriors of the West" because, well... the people he is talking to are from the western lands of Middle Earth. And who says that his "west" is capitalized? He could just as easily be saying "You great warriors of the west", without the "Western Civilization" connotations.
Fourth, it seemed strange to me in the extreme that Lloyd found the Orcs/Half-Orcs (Uruk-hai) to resemble native Americans. I, for one, was reminded of Scottish warriors from films like Braveheart, where the warriors cover themselves in face paint, hair braids, etc. If Lloyd sees native Americans, maybe he ought to consider his own racial stereotypes.
Lastly, he says that people disregard his "wife everyday while regarding me, simply because of her skin color." How does he know why they disregard her? When she is disregarded, does he ask them, "why are you disregarding my wife?" Perhaps it's because she's a woman (which would be just as reprehensible, of course), or because she doesn't speak English (or very good English), or because she is too short or too tall, or because she is too ugly or too beautiful, or because Lloyd is more personable or friendly than she is... or maybe Lloyd just finds racism in everything because he looks for it too hard.
Agree? Disagree? Think I'm full of it?
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