Potrayal of Evil Humans in the Lord of the Rings

I am a big fan of Lord of the Rings, and I dont consider Peter Jackson or the people involved to be racist. Im just pointing out the similarities of the good and bad humans in the movies to the real life cultures today. And the messages (correct or incorrect) that can be derived from their portrayal in the movies.
( this was done as a School project for a Cultural/Media class)

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Lord
• of
• the
• Rings
• Haradhrim
• Easterlings
• Good
• bad
• guys
• racism

[Xerxes2005]

Was Tolkien a racist? Maybe not, but he was certainly paternalistic. That was the way of thought of almost every british man in the beginning of the XXth century. Britain was very proud of its Empire, and for them colonization was a good thing for those "poor, uncivilized peoples who needs Britain/France/Spain/Germany/N­etherlands help to govern themselves and progress. You see that way of thinking in Silmarillion and LOTR. We can't accuse someone to live with its time.

[TheSputan]

Besides, seems many people thought the easternlings were badass and loved their marching etc.

[twilightzoneseinfeld]

@twilightzoneseinfeld And remember, the books are inspired by the events of WWII, where everyone is conquered except for a European-based culture.

[twilightzoneseinfeld]

@CarterKhoury And both cultures where swayed by Sauron because of their hate of Gondor and Rohan.

[pakheng]

@CarterKhoury yea their eyes look like the Indian or middle-eastern of asia

[CarterKhoury]

And its not racist that they have thaos kinds of clothing. First of all Haradrim are from a desert area, so they have to cover their faces. they have darker skin because of the sun. the easterlings are not evil. gondor tried to take their lands multiple times, so their kinda pissed off. Many european culture attempted to take Japan and India from the locals, so they West was veiwed as a threat to their way of life.

[CarterKhoury]

Also easterlings are described to, whater the darkness or palness of skin, to have a sallow (yellowish so asian like) complexion and slanted eyes.

[CarterKhoury]

Well i wuld imagone that the african peoples wuld be from far harad, and the more bedoiun like ones from near harad. easterlings and rhun wuld correspond with the asian continent and east asian cultures. i think variags (though not shown) wuld be like mongols or huns.

[thebrigadier27]

@Xerxes2005 im with you on that one cos at the time most of the empire was still together like australia, india new zealand ect, that was general appinion at the time, also it could just be creative lisence of the studia who made and tolkiens idea of what they looked like may have been different

[thebrigadier27]

@idioticozzy i think who ever reads your coment and goes " oohhh....." wil have one hell of a face palm moment! very shortly

[TheSleeper33]

There are no Evil humans in Tolkien's Middle Earth. Only people who have been deceived by Sauron. Numenoreans weren't evil either. Yet Sauron managed to deceive most of them and turned them again the Valar.

[dannydong3000]

and as for ppl that were in the movie well tolkien story was written from his own perspective so ofc northern european cultures would be favored here. it has nothing to do with black white. and there are no blacks in rohan gondor cuz theyre not native to tolkiens homeland rly :)