#orc discourse

[txttletale]

i've gotten asks a few times on like 'how to do ''fantasy races'' without. like. just making race science true in the world'. and i think there's three approaches. the first is harkening back to tolkein and making it clear through framing device or format/tonal cues that you are writing in a mythic register--that you are writing about a world where the basic premises of positivism and empiricism simply aren't true. a world where 'biology' is like, not necessarily a salient premise--where there are things that just cannot be understood. (that's not to say that tolkein's orcs werent v. racialised in v. nasty ways--but it wasn't race science in the way a lot of more modern fantasy is.)

the second way i think is to go and actually understand the history of 'race' as a concept. 'race' has not always existed--it was an ideological invention birthed from / alongisde the enlightmenent and imposed onto populations through military force. in real life, it's less helpful to conceive of 'race' as an attribute someone has and and more as a relationship they have to society. so if you want to actually include scientific racism in your story as an element of your worldbuilding and not something decalred epistemologically true you should be thinking about why these people have been racialized and under what hegemonic paradigm--who, in-universe, invented & enforces the racial classification system that distinguishes between 'human' and 'orc' as taxonomic characters?

the third and final way is to simply think of the traits you understand as belonging to ''fantasy races'' (say, pointy ears and exceptional nimbleness and hundred-year lifespans for elves) as instead just being... more variations in the way people can be. like, in the real world, we do not consider 'tall people' or 'blonde people' or 'myopic people' a different species. in a world where sometimes people have wings or pointed ears or green skin, why should that be different? you've just introduced new types of variation within the population of people--you've just expanded the meaning of human. and of course, right, you can still roughly group these features, or note that some of them are more frequent in some ethnic groups--in much the same way as saying 'on average, people in sweden are taller, paler, and more likely to be blonde and blue-eyed', you can say 'people in these forests tend to be shorter and live longer and have pointed ears'--without having a hard taxonomy that classifies all these attributes as metaphysically different Types Of Person

obviously these are all very different approaches--and there are probably other ways to handle this too! i just get this question a lot whenever i do Orc Discourse and finally felt like getting these thoughts out. there are so so so many places we can take fantasy--let's move the horizon beyond 'magical race science' and imagine genuinely new worlds

[rockatanskette]

Semi-related to my post on how human conservation practices, but I have a cold today, and it's got me thinking about biological altruism—the biological imperative to put other creatures ahead of yourself, to benefit the group.

When talking about possible interactions with other species, we talk a lot about humans being crazy and thrill-seeking and impossible to kill. Never use a warning shot as an incentive to keep humans out of a fight; it'll just make them angry. And that's true. But a valid criticism I've seen in the "Earth is a death world" community is that according to our understanding of evolution, every planet must be some form of death world. Competition fosters evolution—the wolf with sharper claws survives when its litter mates die. You can't reach space travel without some casualties along the way.

But the dog survives because it makes friends with the strange ape carrying a sharp stick. And the strange ape survives because it befriends the wolf. Underneath the death world is an inextricable and undeniable layer of the bond world; the love world; the world, together.

I imagine some worlds are not death worlds. They're peaceful and tranquil. I suspect there are worlds far more deadly than Earth, where the skies rain diamonds, harder than any substance we know with the species to match. And I imagine that they are united in their confusion at the duality of humankind.

Today is a great example: I have a cold, and I want someone to take care of me, but the people who would are immunocompromised, also sick, or live 8 hours away, respectfully. I also want no one within the walls of my apartment or I will eat them. I feel gross, I feel tired, and I don't want a single human being anywhere near me, even if they did bring soup.

In my constant scrolling through my phone today, I decided to look up why the hell I feel so bad—why everyone feels so bad when they're ill. And the answer surprised me. I always thought it was because your immune system is active, so it's using a lot of your energy. That is part of it. Another part is that your brain and body are communicating across the blood-brain barrier to fight the infection, which is rare and energetically expensive.

But that doesn't explain everything, and according to more current research, it could also be what's called the Eyam Hypothesis: that we feel so gross, so we instinctively isolate from other people. We're too tired to deal with others, and so we don't infect them. Misanthropy for the good of the species. Of course, it can also backfire: one of the criticisms of the Eyam Hypothesis is that humans also instinctively care for each other. If my brother has a headache, I drive to the store for Advil.

Personally, I think it's a little bit of both: biological altruism. Either way, the majority live on. The first thought I had this morning when I woke up wasn't "I feel gross" it was "there's no way I'm going to work today." And while that might not be everyone's first thought, you don't even have to be a particularly altruistic person to not want to leave your home or your bed when you're sick. It's inborn.

And so when the human named Ismail comes down with a case of the interstellar common cold, his alien friend Dyos grows very concerned. Ismail is usually intensely social, almost off-puttingly so. Some crew members joke about how his quarters are for sleeping and prayer only; if he's home alone? You should be worried. But when Dyos demands an answer to the severity of Ismail's malady, the other humans just nod knowingly.

"Nah, he's okay, the medics already cleared him. It's not a severe infection."

"But there are so many...fluids. And his body has changed color."

There is a moment of confusion there until they remember that Dyos's species can see in the infrared color spectrum.

"Nah, that's just a low-grade fever. It should break in the next couple days."

"But he doesn’t want to play chess today," Dyos insists.

"Ohhhh," says human Claudia, finally understanding. "No, that's normal. Humans don't like being around other people when they're sick, it's supposed to be one of the major evolutionary advantages. Protect your community from your illness and the genes live on."

"So we're just going to leave him alone?" Dyos is troubled by this. He can go for weeks without speaking to another life form, but he has seen Ismail grow despondent when unable to participate in social gathering.

"Oh, no," human Claudia says, laughing. "We're going to employ one of the other most longstanding human evolutionary advantages."

There are many to choose from and Dyos settles on, "middle age?"

"Sort of," human Claudia opens up a small shipping container and holds up a brown paper bag tied with a colorful ribbon. It glows brightly in Dyos's vision, almost as brightly as human Claudia's smile. "His nanni's hot soup, express delivery."

[orcboxer]

I think sometimes the trick to fantasy races is to not think about em too literally. It's not "what if race science was real," it's more like "what if our myths, dreams, and imaginations were reflected in the material world?" or "What if we gave our ideas and social structures physical shape?"

What is a dragon? A symbol of nature, to be tamed or destroyed? A symbol of imperialism, of greed and destruction? A symbol of divinity, of a mysterious higher power? Or just a beast like any other? It depends on the story, and on the way you choose to interpret it. Like all fiction, it's an exercise in subjectivity.

Maybe one writer's orcs are a racist caricature, but another writer's orcs might be an expression of their own self-image, and yet another's might be a reflection of their experiences as an Othered person. Orcs and other fantasy races don't inherently mean anything in particular, each story ascribes its own meaning to them, and it's up to you to try to determine what the story is trying to say.

I just think broad strokes condemnations of things like fantasy races or dragon taxonomy as if there are objective facts about them is kind of missing the point of like, fiction in general.

[tlaquetzqui]

I just saw a thread attributing the cryogenic take that orcs are black people, to Warcraft.

Um.

Some of their dances are hiphop in WoW I guess? Occasionally some of their gag lines are hiphop-fan faux AAVE?

And…that’s it.

Everything else is still Asian steppe, from the Horde (Turkic ordu “HQ camp”) to the shamans (Tungus word for “priest”) to the single-edged cavalry swords and straight black hair.

Now trolls are black, specifically Caribbean, down to worshiping a real vodun loa, Bwonsamdi—phonetic transcription of Baron Samedi, the evil aspect of Papa Gede. (It would have been funny, but a bit politically risky, and confusing to many people, for that one ancient, scholarly troll nation, I wanna say Zandalari, to talk like Nigerians.)

And while Warcraft goblins actually are semi-Jewish, that’s actually for a relatively innocent reason: the sleazeball finance people that American media depicts, are often the same ethnicity as runs a lot of that industry here, good and bad. So their sleazeball accountants are Jews…just like a lot of the idealistic visionary artists whose dreams they crush for the bottom line. (“This Boston gangster is Irish, that’s racist!” That’s a wicked pissah insight, right there, ’cause so are his victims. Not a lot of Lepke Buchalters, in Winter Hill, ya retahd; not a lot of Warren Buffetts—he’s Anglo—running the business side of Hollywood.)

Also though? While most of the humans of Azeroth are English or German (because Warhammer Fantasy) and the dwarves are Scottish, the main Alliance elves? East Asian. Night elf shrines have fucking torii gates. And the draenei are like settled shamanic Asians, like Koreans or someone.

The European-coded (vaguely French-Italian) elves are the blood elves, the ones who joined the Horde…and enslaved a fucking angel to keep powering their white magic after their addiction to arcane spells turned them into amoral tweekers.

[princehendir]

God film twitter would fucking hate the lotr movies if they came out today

[amechyofsorts]

As good as live action op was, I gotta say the scene where Nezumi dropped the n-word to Arlong's face was weird.

[takashi0]

is this a reference to that time when yall were insistent that Samus Aran was trans (because fuck gnc people I guess) and the thing used as citation to justify it was one of her designers making a joke that essentially called her a japanese regional transphobic slur for not being feminine?

Because Vivian was always Trans in the og japanese dialogue, this isnt one of the many cases where your dumb strawman is actually true, you don't get any credit for that.

Happy TTYD remake week!!

[homunculus-argument]

Do you think urban fantasy settings have porn discourse? Like all the races have different ideas of what they find appealing and how it should be presented. Drarves mostly write erotic literature in runes and you would not believe how slow burn that shit can get. You're five volumes in before the two main characters figure out each others' genders and realise that they may be attracted to each other.

Orcs don't really do narrative arts, they figured out advanced chemistry before writing, and they manufacture perfumes specifically meant to mimic the scent of an orc in heat and then jack off to the smell. Having an orc roommate in college is unbearable.

Gnome porn is unspeakable. Do not speak of gnome porn.

Elvish porn, regardless of media type, features more humans than the uninitiated would expect. This is largely because elvish mating customs are just as slow-paced as those of dwarves, so the myth of humans as wildly promiscuous hypersexual turbosluts is somewhat based in reality: the culture shock that elves often encounter in mixed relationships, where the human partner whom they have been appropriately courting in a perfectly respectable way all of a sudden throws all propriety in the wind and goes "hey we've been together for ten years, do you want to see my tits while they're still this good?"

[digital-meat]

Orcs in D&D are colonizers. Everybody is deep-analyzing this shit and they don't ask why orcs have piles of coins and no mints. They travel in wooden wagons, keep slaves, and raid ancient towns and villages. There's stuff D&D doesn't do well but this isn't it.

[whumpster-fire]

Apropos of nothing in particular I just remembered the whole "Inherently Evil Fantasy Races" discourse and thought of a point I didn't before (possibly because my previous posts of the subject were before relevant current events I don't remember):

"Orc" is literally in common use as a slur right now against one of the parties in a war by the other party and by internet users in numerous "not technically in the war but not neutral either" countries. To everyone's credit, as far as I've seen the internet has mostly had the restraint to used "Orc" to only describe the Russian armed forces and not the people of the country as a whole, but still: this is a real, non-hypothetical example of a widely known fictional species of evil subhuman barbarians being used in actual war propaganda to portray real people as evil subhuman barbarians.

However accurate the comparison of Putin's army to Saruman's may be (may Putin die horribly when the floor collapses under the weight of his comically long Insecure Dictator Conference Table), this is a pretty clear counterexample to "fiction doesn't affect reality" here. A culture being saturated with fictional narratives that portray dehumanization of The Enemy as objectively correct/justified conditions people to dehumanize The Enemy in real life more easily, because people's minds do make the connection.

[anghraine]

It's interesting (if often frustrating) to see the renewed Orc Discourse after the last few episodes of ROP. I've seen arguments that orcs have to be personifications of evil rather than people as such or else the ethics of our heroes' approach to them becomes much more fraught. Tolkien's work, as written, seems an odd choice to me for not wrangling with difficult questions, and of course, more diehard fans are going to immediately bring up Shagrat and Gorbag.

If you haven't read LOTR recently, Shagrat and Gorbag are two orcs who briefly have a conversation about how they're being screwed over by Sauron but have no other real options, about their opinions of mistakes that have been made, that they think Sauron himself has made one, but it's not safe to discuss because Sauron has spies in their own ranks. They reminisce about better times when they had more freedom and fantasize about a future when they can go elsewhere and set up a small-scale banditry operation rather than being involved in this huge-scale war. Eventually, however, they end up turning on each other.

Basically any time that someone brings up the "humanity" of this conversation, someone else will point out that they're still bad people. They're not at all guilty about what they're part of. They just resent the dangers to themselves, the pressure from above, failures of competence, the surveillance they're under, and their lack of realistic alternative options. The dream of another life mentioned in the conversation is still one of preying on innocent people, just on a much smaller and more immediate scale, etc.

I think this misses the reason it keeps getting brought up, though. The point is not that Shagrat and Gorbag are good people. The point is that they are people.

There's something very normal and recognizable about their resentment of their superiors, their fears of reprisal and betrayal that ultimately are realized, their dislike of this kind of industrial war machine that erases their individual work and contributions, the tinge of wistfulness in their hope of escape into a different kind of life. Their dialect is deliberately "common"—and there's a lot more to say about that and the fact that it's another commoner, Sam, who outwits them—but one of the main effects is to make them sound familiar and ordinary. And it's interesting that one of the points they specifically raise is that they're not going to get better treatment from "the good guys" so they can't defect, either.

This is self-interested, yes, but it's not the self-interest of some mystical being or spirit or whatnot, but of people.

Tolkien's later remarks tend to back this up. He said that female orcs do exist, but are rarely seen in the story because the characters only interact with the all-male warrior class of orcs. Whatever female orcs "do," it isn't going to war. Maybe they do a lot of the agricultural work that is apparently happening in distant parts of Mordor, maybe they are chiefly responsible for young orcs, maybe both and/or something else, we don't know. But we know they're out there and we know that they reproduce sexually and we know that they're not part of the orcish warrior class.

Regardless of all the problems with this, the idea that orcs have a gender-restricted warrior class at all and we're just not seeing any of their other classes because of where the story is set doesn't sound like automatons of evil. It sounds like an actual culture of people that we only see along the fringes.

And this whole matter of "but if they're people, we have to think about ethics, so they can't be people" is a weird circular argument that cannot account for what's in LOTR or for much of what Tolkien said afterwards. Yes, he struggled with The Problem of Orcs and how to reconcile it with his world building and his ethical system, but "maybe they're not people" is ultimately not a workable solution as far as LOTR goes and can't even account for much of the later evolution of his ideas, including explicit statements in his letters.

And in the end, the real response that comes to mind to that circular argument is "maybe you should think about ethics more."

[alovelyfrenchworld]

Your Neigborly Orc Part 1

Meeting an orc was not something that anyone from your village ever expected. Even with your village being the closest human civilization near the river orc territories, it was still considered strange.

Half-orcs were proof of the interracial relations, but they were rare in your part of the country. A half-orc hadn't been spotted for around 50 years. You never thought you would be one to compete with the discourse of your people.

You met your warlord lover perchance after hunting one day. THe border between the orc territory and the human territory was divided by a small river in the forest. Few ever ventured that close.

There was knowledge that other orc territories had blurred with the humans in other regions, but yours had yet to do so. The overall interactions with orcs had increased across the lands and it was becoming a small shadow in the thoughts of the human civilizations of what these interactions could mean.

Regardless of their opinions, you tried to stay near to your homestead you had established in the blissful wood. You decided a change of pace to create a space for yourself was beneficial. You lived close to the river that divided the territories as it gave you a water source, but when hunting and foraging, you tried to stay as close as possible. If one was not paying attention, it was easy to cross the borders between territories. Even in your land did the borders begin to blur.

You had begun to make a living from selling animals meats and forage herbs in your village. Living in the wood gave you access to many resources and a source for profit. Living solitarily was not as lonely as many thought.

**********

The winter was growing harsher as the weeks went by, making it all the more pertinent to stay stocked on supplies. Primarily, that meant firewood was in constant need.

After enjoying a humble breakfast and attending to your minimal, but helpful, livestock, you set out into the nearby wood to refill your kindling.

Supplied with your rucksack, simple ace, and rope for bundling, you set out for the day. The weather had killed off many of the berry bushes and herbs you often used, so meat and wood had become the primary subjects of your searches.

After finding a decent spot, you chopped away at some smaller trees that would be easier for you to carry. Carrying everything by hand was not your usual method, but your wagon was not properly equipped for travelling in the snow, so you you could only bring home what you could carry. That fateful day, you were not the only one who decided to go out deeper into the woods.

Some distance away, across the river, was a big, burly, orc chopping away at a large log. Methodically and skillfully, he was chopping the wood and bundling it together.

You were mesmerized. You had never seen an orc in person before. He fascinated you.

Having noticed your staring, you went back to chopping wood. The noise must have alerted the orc, who then took his turn to take note of you when you were looking away.

You, unknowingly being watched in return, bundled the bits of ash tree you had chopped and readied yourself to go back home.

"It won't be enough," spoke a gravelly voice.

You turned to see the orc standing closer to the river, his kindling hanging from one arm.

"I'm sorry?" you hadn't expected him to speak to you.

"A few more bits of wood will help you. It's an awfully freezing winter." He was right, but you wouldn't admit that to a stranger.

"I appreciate your input, but I can handle my own. Have a good day, sir." At that, you turned around to head back home.

Regardless of whether or not the orc was right, you wanted to be self-sufficient. You had all you could carry and that was more that what many could do, so either way, you were proud.

[redstonedust]

age gap discourse would go crazy in a d&d style world. is a 30 year old orc girl (will live to 50) with 30 year old elf girlfriend (will live to 800) a cradle snatcher. 800 post debate on fantasy r/relationships.

[dunmeshistash]

Hello!

I'm Cyan (or anything you wanna call me) this blog started as just a stash for Dungeon Meshi extras and worldbuilding details but expanded as people asked questions and I did my best to answer! Hope you find it as useful as I do. I try my best to categorize my posts so they're easy to find but sometimes I forget.

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[mollyjames]

Reputation with Orc faction [IMPROVED]

Orcs will now come to your aid when arguing with discourse blogs

Reputation with Gnome faction [REDUCED]

Percent chance to recieve a swift kick in the shins while on a morning stroll significantly increased

[serene-faerie]

I didn't want to post this kind of discourse, but it's something that I genuinely can't ignore anymore.

It's no secret that the Silm fandom has a lot of problems with its standards for female characters. I've noticed that a lot of heroic female characters like Lúthien, Elwing, and Idril tend to be criticized and bashed on quite a bit.

But I've also noticed that there are three female characters that hardly anyone bashes. In fact, some fans actively like to pit these characters against other female characters by making them the hype-men of the Fëanorians.

(I apologize to any mutuals who happen to be Fëanorian fans. And this isn't to say that these female characters are terrible because they're connected to the Fëanorians, but these are just my observations. I still think they're wonderful characters on their own.)

First is Nerdanel, the wife of Fëanor and the mother of his sons. And with the Fëanorians being so popular in the fandom, of course she would be an automatic favorite. It also helps that she doesn't play a huge role in the events of the First Age, which gives fans the freedom to interpret her character however they wish. And despite the fact that she and Fëanor are separated following the Darkening of Valinor, Nerdanel still remains a favorite among Fëanorian fans.

Next is Aredhel. She's not only besties with Celegorm, but she happens to be the mother of Maeglin, the creep that fandom loves to woobify. People also sympathize with her for her tragic death, understandably so. However, there are people who will claim that she would've wanted Celegorm to rape Lúthien as revenge for her abduction by Eöl, never mind that neither Aredhel nor Lúthien even knew each other. Some fans will also have her sympathize with Maeglin for causing the fall of Gondolin, ignoring the fact that Maeglin betrayed the city because he felt entitled to Idril, Aredhel's own niece, and that he actively tried to rape her during the city's fall.

The third one is Haleth. I've noticed that Fëanorian fans really like to ship her with Caranthir, mostly because he helped the Haladin fight off a bunch of attacking Orcs. This is despite the fact that Haleth wasn't interested in living on Caranthir's lands as a vassal. Instead, she took her people to Brethil and lived freely in the domain of Elu Thingol. Nevertheless, people like to compare her and Caranthir to Aegnor and Andreth, sometimes making fun of them for their tragic separation and claiming that neither Haleth nor Caranthir would be as "foolish" as them.

What do these three women have in common? They have a connection/interaction with the Fëanorians at some point in their lives. So these women are just used to uplift the Fëanorians to the detriment of other female characters- particularly the creeps like Celegorm and Maeglin.

Which, in my opinion, is a huge disservice to their characters.

All of this is to say that Aredhel, Nerdanel, and Haleth deserve better than to be reduced to Fëanorian hype-men. And Lúthien, Elwing, and Idril deserve a lot better than to be pitted against other female characters.