NP "racist" Tolkien?

[jbor]

on 28/12/02 4:09 PM, Dave Monroe at davidmmonroe at yahoo.com wrote:

>> That's all the argument is, that - knowing when it
>> was written, who it was written by, understanding
>> what racism is etc etc - it's still possible to
>> read/receive the text as not "reproducing racisms",
>> as not having been written by someone who was
>> consciously or unconsciously "reproducing racisms".
> 
> Of course it is.  If one doesn't recognize what might
> well be racist encodings therein and read them as
> such.

So, the reading which sees hobbits and orcs as mythical, invented creatures,
is "inferior" to the one which sees them as analagous to human "races", in
your view. I see. 

> But my
> argument is, said elements exist as such regardless
> of, despite, in direct contradiction of, whatever,
> authorial intention, readerly reception, critical
> reaction, whatever ...

In other words, whatever you say goes. I see.

Point is, _TLOTR_ isn't "racist", doesn't "represent racisms" (use "racial
coding", whatever - all that euphemism and semantic subtefuge
notwithstanding), no matter how much you want to keep carrying on like a
pork chop about it.

>> As I said before, for whatever reason/s it's done,
>> labelling something like _TLOTR_ "racist" when it
>> isn't actually distracts attention from, and makes
>> people sceptical of the identification of, those
>> aspects of our various world cultures which are
>> racist, and which are potentially and actually
>> destructive.
> 
> Rhetoric.  Demagoguery.  Attempted, at any rate.
> Whatever ...

Rubbish. This "racist encoding" is yours, not the text's. You really don't
seem to have much of a concept of what "racism" actually is, or does, or how
it should be countered.

best