Science fiction author Andy Duncan has been talking about his views on Tolkien's world with Wired magazine, and stated that Orcs are written as inferior, dangerous and intrinsically evil. And worse, they are societally and politically harmful.
"It’s hard to miss the repeated notion in Tolkien that some races are just worse than others, or that some peoples are just worse than others—in the long term, if you embrace this too much—it has dire consequences for yourself and for society.”
Has anyone ever thought about why Orcs do what they do, muses Andy?
"I can easily imagine that a lot of these people that were doing the dark lord's bidding were doing so out of simple self preservation and so forth. A lot of these creatures that were raised out of the earth had not a great deal of choice in the matter of what to do"
It's about Trump, again:
Duncan also compared the depiction of the orcs to modern day refugees and appeared to criticise President Donald Trump over the situation at the Mexican border.
'It is easier to demonise one's opponents than to try to understand them and to understand the complex forces that are leading to, for example, refugees trying to cross the southern border [of the US] legally or illegally. It's easier to build walls and demonise them as "scum".
"It’s hard to miss the repeated notion in Tolkien that some races are just worse than others, or that some peoples are just worse than others—in the long term, if you embrace this too much—it has dire consequences for yourself and for society.”
Has anyone ever thought about why Orcs do what they do, muses Andy?
"I can easily imagine that a lot of these people that were doing the dark lord's bidding were doing so out of simple self preservation and so forth. A lot of these creatures that were raised out of the earth had not a great deal of choice in the matter of what to do"
It's about Trump, again:
Duncan also compared the depiction of the orcs to modern day refugees and appeared to criticise President Donald Trump over the situation at the Mexican border.
'It is easier to demonise one's opponents than to try to understand them and to understand the complex forces that are leading to, for example, refugees trying to cross the southern border [of the US] legally or illegally. It's easier to build walls and demonise them as "scum".
