Are Orcs Evil?

[Zkribbler]

Huffpost today has an article on racism in high fantasy, esp. Dungeons & Dragons.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/dungeons-and-dragons-diversity-evil-races_n_5ef3b7cac5b643f5b22eb22a

Exerpt:

“‘Races’ in D&D are fundamentally different than our concept of ‘races’ in the real world,” medievalist Paul B. Sturtevant told HuffPost. “In D&D, races are based in deep biological differences, whereas we know that in the real world, race is a social construct based upon arbitrary and superficial differences. Using the word ‘race’ in the game where they really mean something more like ‘species’ promotes racist ideas.”

In a 2017 article, Sturtevant wrote that D&D’s idea of “race” is a holdover from “The Lord of the Rings” and author J.R.R. Tolkien, who “conflat[ed] race, culture and ability.”

In his novel, Tolkien outlined “the ‘racial’ characteristics of men, of dwarves, of elves, of orcs,” Sturtevant wrote, adding that Tolkien “created the blueprint for the troubling relationship between race and fantasy that would govern twentieth-century fantasies.”


This blueprint has been dissected by academics such as Helen Young of Australia’s Deakin University, who writes about fantasy and race. In a 2017 interview with Pacific Standard, Young argued that Tolkien’s idea of race as a hard reality rather than a social construct was inherently racist, and while Tolkien may not have harbored extremist views personally, his work was filled with examples of “good” races with European cultural traits and “bad” races described through “orientalist stereotypes.”

A look at D&D’s “Player’s Handbook” and online resource database offers a glimpse at how modern fantasy has internalized Tolkien’s ideas about race.

Elves, for instance, are described as good and often depicted as white, except for a subset of the species known as “drow,” who are ebony-skinned, “more often evil than not” and occasionally called “dark elves.”

Half-orcs are similarly described as having “a tendency towards chaos” and “the most accomplished half-orcs are those with enough self-control to get by in a civilized land.”

...

“I think this shift is a good start, but they must go further,” Sturtevant said. “It’s a problem that [Wizards of the Coast] don’t seem to be getting rid of their use of the term ‘race’ altogether.”

Young echoed this sentiment. “Racism isn’t just negative stereotypes; it is also an underlying belief that a particular group of people have something inherently in common with each other and also that they are also inherently different from other groups,” she said.

“The change so that orcs and drow aren’t necessarily evil is superficial if that racist logic of inherent difference is still there,” Young said. She stressed that removing gameplay concepts such as orc characters starting with a lower intelligence would be a “much bigger step because it could remove the basic logic of race.” (Wizards of the Coast indicated in its statement that it would be moving towards this in future releases.)

Being brought up in a world of white privilege, I blithely skipped over all of this. I accepted that in fantasies elves are good, and orcs are bad. My first two novels are a bit better, being set in a multi-racial city. Still my craftsmen are gnomes, my elves are musical & beautiful, my orcs are irritable, etc.

It wasn't until I introduced my drows that I realized something was terribly wrong. Drows are black skinned, evil, subterranean elves. In real life, black skins are because of melanin which protects skin against the sun's rays. Subterranean creatures should be white, not black. Making drows black is racist, no doubt about it. Thus my evil elves are albinos.

The Huffpost article and the planned direction of D&D contends that someone's morals and abilities should not be based upon the race into which they are born. If so, how will this change fantasies?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

"Races" in D&D and associated source fantasy fiction would more properly be referred to as species.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

The game is what the DM and players make of it. There is no reason whatsoever why the DM can't tweak the game to fit his/her group's comfort levels. As long as the game remains balanced, as in not too much or too little magic, the players have a fair chance (but not too easy a time) to defeat the villains, the DM rewards good and creative play and discourages bad play, and everyone has fun, I see no need to rant about what color Drizzt's skin is. The DM can change it, and tweak the characteristics of the different "races" (or whatever term they end up using).

Yes, it makes sense in our real world for species living underground or underwater to have little or no pigmentation at all. That's real-world biology.

But these games take place in fictitious locations, with its own rules for How Stuff Works. And if the DM doesn't like that setting's rules, the rules can be changed. The DM's word is law, so poof! and it's done.

Anyone who has read Dragonlance (*casts "Summon @Plotinus"*) knows that not all Elves are good. Some of the very worst are the ones who rule Qualinesti and Sylvanesti. They are bigoted to the core with regard to humans and dwarves. And guess what: Their skin is pale. The Kingpriest of Istar was so obsessed with Goodness that his kingdom became one of the least tolerant places on Krynn, to the point where the gods became offended and chucked an asteroid at Krynn, precipitating the Cataclysm (about 300 years before Dragons of Autumn Twilight).

BTW, the video linked to is geoblocked in Canada.

P.S.: To answer the question posed in the title: It depends on the campaign. I've never worked with a campaign as written in a module or gamebook without tweaking it to some extent (to a huge extent in some cases). And if a campaign is all about orcs? That's an opportunity to do some serious thinking and discussion about the inherent characteristics of orcs, and change them if you want to.

 

[Synobun]

"Races" in D&D and associated source fantasy fiction would more properly be referred to as species.

This.

Race and species are used synonymously in sci-fi and fantasy. In sci-fi some distinction is offered when looking at galactic scale, like how all the species from a certain world may be referred to as races, all in the pursuit of "providing clarity" (when really, it doesn't).

Readers, and the genres themselves, have advanced enough that it's really no longer necessary to use "race." That right away removes a lot of people's knee-jerk reaction. The rest is being a stickler for realism in a setting where it shouldn't be expected. Nuance is certainly great and cool, but I don't think it's necessary for complicated spectrums to always exist in all media. It is nice when it is there, but usually monobehavioural tendencies serve the purpose intended just fine. There's also story to be told in resisting a single foe made multiple. See: just about any Indigenous recounting against "the white man."

Tolkien Fantasy has notes of colonialism, but this kind of thing isn't unique to "white fantasy." I've recently started reading fantasy by people distinctly outside the mainstream, with backgrounds in cultures far away from the white norm, and their fantasy is just as problematic from the lens of nuance. I don't think it's worth complaining about unless it's all that exists in media, which it isn't. If people don't like caricature representation of species, the market is large enough for them to find what they like elsewhere.

Simplification, as much as people wish to ignore it, makes things easier to parse and enjoy. With each aspect of nuance incorporated, the complexity exponentially grows, and someone's ability to craft a compelling narrative weakens. Not everything needs to be a complex allegory or a treatise that resolves itself.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Adding to what's already been said, Dungeons & Dragons also presents the concepts of Good and Evil as literal states of being. (Law and Chaos are a little different; these are more like behavioral traits.) So the presentation of "humanoids" (Orcs, Goblins, et al) as Evil makes the conflict with the Good races inevitable and intractable.

If you want to see a television series that's about the Orcs instead of about the Men and the Elves, I recommend Vikings. If you wanted to do a D&D campaign where the players play Orcs, you would only have to change the names. Instead of Ragnar and Lagertha, you have "Ardek the Butcher" and "Drotho the Hawk", paint their faces green, and you're good to go.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Three words: The Iron Dream.

I don't know enough about the history of Epic Fantasy to give a timeline, but prior to Tolkien et al. fantasy and mythology read more as parables, and quests were more individual adventures against individual monsters. It wasn't until the Brothers Grimm started repackaging folktales for a national project that the Good-versus-Evil clash of civilizations frame became dominant, and like Synsensa says, it's now so ubiquitous that it's an unconscious reflex even by authors to whom it would seem anathema. When fantasy races/species become stand-ins for real-world cultures, this Manichaean^* determinism becomes all the more problematic.

It's one of the things Terry Pratchett's satire got brilliantly right: even when confronting a world-ending faction like the Auditors in Thief of Time, no-one is portrayed as inherently good or bad—individuals of any stripe are corruptible, and members of the tradition's most denigrated races are capable of exemplary character.

* Patine don't @ me.

 

[Synobun]

I love that you know the OT memes despite rarely posting there.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

I ghost enough to get the gist.

 

[Zkribbler]

Adding to what's already been said, Dungeons & Dragons also presents the concepts of Good and Evil as literal states of being. (Law and Chaos are a little different; these are more like behavioral traits.) So the presentation of "humanoids" (Orcs, Goblins, et al) as Evil makes the conflict with the Good races inevitable and intractable.

If you want to see a television series that's about the Orcs instead of about the Men and the Elves, I recommend Vikings. If you wanted to do a D&D campaign where the players play Orcs, you would only have to change the names. Instead of Ragnar and Lagertha, you have "Ardek the Butcher" and "Drotho the Hawk", paint their faces green, and you're good to go.

Or I could read my novella "Orcs & their Ilk," wherein my main character in an orcan jester.

 

[Dragon1965]

Technically Orcs ARE "lawful evil". But Orcs are "lawful evil" not because they are mean/nasty dudes (although a bunch of them are) but because their culture is oppressive and based on conquest. Since conquest/war are "bad" the Orcs are pigeonholed as "evil". Same for the Hobgoblins, also being "lawful evil", mainly due to them being militaristic conquerors. On an individual basis a hobgoblin is quite honorable and will keep his word (same for most Orcs). On the other hand on an INDIVIDUAL level an Orc (or many other "evil" monsters for that matter) might be neutral, or even good. Depends on the needs of the game and how the player wants to use his character. Consider the Hill Giant. Great lumbering dumbasses. They aren't SMART enough to be actively evil, but the effects of their presence are evil, hence they are "chaotic evil". A Hill Giant isn't INHERENTLY evil, but if he's hungry and there's a 5 year old girl running by he's going to pick her up and eat her. He didn't do it because he was evil but because he's a big stupid baby who got hungry. However the killing of the little girl is inherently evil. Hope that makes sense.

Another thing to consider is that just because somebody is lawful good doesn't mean they won't blast you to smithereens despite the fact you are ALSO good. Some uber powered DND characters don't place any value on life on the Prime Material Plane and only think what comes AFTER death matters. So, if a few innocent good mortals happen to get in the way of a massive spell and get croaked: oh well, too bad, see you in Celestia.

 

[Ajidica]

It's one of the things Terry Pratchett's satire got brilliantly right: even when confronting a world-ending faction like the Auditors in Thief of Time, no-one is portrayed as inherently good or bad—individuals of any stripe are corruptible, and members of the tradition's most denigrated races are capable of exemplary character.

Is it thought? Some characters are portrayed as inherently bad - Vorbis in Small Gods, Carcer in Night Watch, and Strappi from Monstrous Regiment. Pratchett certainly understands that the antagonist doesn't need to be inherently evil, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have character that just are "evil" without redeeming qualities.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Is it thought? Some characters are portrayed as inherently bad - Vorbis in Small Gods, Carcer in Night Watch, and Strappi from Monstrous Regiment. Pratchett certainly understands that the antagonist doesn't need to be inherently evil, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have character that just are "evil" without redeeming qualities.

By "everyone" I meant in terms of racial grouping. Certainly there are individuals who are complete scum, but they're not "bad by blood" as it were.

 

[Kyriakos]

Orcs aren't evil. (Homeric) Cyclopae aren't evil either. They just live in a different society, trying to keep their own customs.
Which at times involve eating humans.

 

[Joij21]

Yes. Tolkien invented the concept of the orc. They don't exist in any known historical human culture (with maybe the exception of goblinoid like creatures that exist in all cultures). According to Tolkien orcs were indeed irredeemable. Now he did later regret that statement as maybe being too harsh (he was a Christian after all). However at the time of writing them they were pretty much just generic insert for a race of pure mindless evil, the servants of a dark lord, a literal demon. Some believe he was trying to portray Germans as orcs since he was a WW1 veteran, with Hitler being Sauron (as lived through WW2 only to see those same Germans who killed his comrades back when he was young now serving a real life dark lord of sorts).

 

[Ajidica]

I'm not sure I buy the Hitler - Sauron connections. Almost all of Lord of the Rings was Tolkien working through his experiences in the Great War, so it seems more likely the orcs took the place of the Germans in the Great War.
I know there are some Saruman - Hitler connections, but I don't buy those much either. Saruman came across to me as Tolkien's hatred toward modernism/progress/industrialization; everything that he viewed as threatening bucolic merry olde England.

 

[Imaus]

I'm not sure I buy the Hitler - Sauron connections. Almost all of Lord of the Rings was Tolkien working through his experiences in the Great War, so it seems more likely the orcs took the place of the Germans in the Great War.
I know there are some Saruman - Hitler connections, but I don't buy those much either. Saruman came across to me as Tolkien's hatred toward modernism/progress/industrialization; everything that he viewed as threatening bucolic merry olde England.

Reading into his works his claim that he isnt making direct allegory rings true. Especially with the Simuralionsdnevagenlion. Sauron is Melkor's Protege. Melkor is LOTR Satan, fighting in vain against Eru Illuvatar, LoTR god.

And all of his stuff has roots from 1917-1936-1950ish; and he drew heavily from what he researched than from modern allegory. He was nerding out than being an Orwell.

 

[Evie]

Yes. Tolkien invented the concept of the orc. They don't exist in any known historical human culture (with maybe the exception of goblinoid like creatures that exist in all cultures). According to Tolkien orcs were indeed irredeemable. Now he did later regret that statement as maybe being too harsh (he was a Christian after all). However at the time of writing them they were pretty much just generic insert for a race of pure mindless evil, the servants of a dark lord, a literal demon. Some believe he was trying to portray Germans as orcs since he was a WW1 veteran, with Hitler being Sauron (as lived through WW2 only to see those same Germans who killed his comrades back when he was young now serving a real life dark lord of sorts).

Putting aside the fact that we are not bound to follow Tolkien's definition of the orcs (if we stand on the shoulders of giants, it's so we can reach higher than they did), especially when Tolkien's own definition in life evolved...

...this explanation of Tolkien's orcs is contradicted by Tolkien's own words and actions at just about every level.

"Pretty much just generic insert for a race of pure mindless evil"

Evil, they may be, but mindless is in every way at odds with what's on the page. They are noted in the Hobbit (yes, the Hobbit says goblin, but Tolkien was very explicit that Goblins and orcs are synonymous in his works) to be technologically adept and creators of many devices that have since troubled the world. They also display an aptitude for strategy and cunning in warfare, and a degree of loyalty to other members of their "clan" (eg, Grishnak returning to Ugluk's troops because of the good lads he left behind), plus a desire for independence from Sauron and his army (Gorbag and Shagrat discuss striking out on their own after the war is over also in TTT).

In LOTR, the Isengard-style industrial spoliage of the Shire is explicitly refered to as ORC-works, too. Not Saruman-work.

Some believe he was trying to portray Germans as orcs since he was a WW1 veteran, with Hitler being Sauron (as lived through WW2 only to see those same Germans who killed his comrades back when he was young now serving a real life dark lord of sorts).

Some who aren't bothering to read the foreword, were Tolkien explicitly respond to the notion of the Lord of the Rings as an analogy, and specifically a WW2 allegory with a lengthy answer that boils down to "Oh heck no."

Beyond Tolkien's explicit statement, there's also the fact that he was vehement during the war about how the germans shouldn't be dehumanized (because no one has the right to dehumanize another people; not the germans to other people and not other people to the germans), so the idea that he wrote a dehumanizing take on them, reducing them to footsoliders of evil, would be...strange.

Finally, the *chronology* doesn't work. At all. The Hobbit, introducing the Goblins (again, synonymous with orcs to Tolkien) and the Necromancer (Sauron), was largely finished writing in 1932. Some of the elven stories (featuring Dark Lords, evil orcs and all that jazz) predates even that - some of them were written one whole world war earlier. All of which is...before Adolf Hitler even rose to power, let alone before there were even the first hints of a second world war.

This isn't to say the War didn't have some influence on the writing (although Tolkien's experience in the First one had a lot more influence). But this isn't it.

(Oh, and in answer to the race-species debate: no, elves, hobbits and probably orcs are not species, at least not in Tolkien. Tolkien explicitly acknowledged in his letters that biologically, human and elves are in fact the same (that whole "reproducing and having fertile offspring" thing). And he also explicitly wrote Hobbits are even closer to humans than elves are, so all three, at least, are one biological species. Orcs may or may not be corrupted elves or men, in which case they'd definitely be the same biological species; and even if not, are still apparently capable of some form of interbreeding with humans so either same species or a very close relative)

 

[Lexicus]

Yes. Tolkien invented the concept of the orc.

No, he didn't. Tolkien is responsible for applying the old english word orc to goblins, and goblins are a concept from folklore that dates back centuries before Tolkien. If you want to talk Tolkien's orcs specifically (which certainly are the 'ancestor' of, to my knowledge, every other modern depiction of orcs) then Tolkien himself struggled with the idea that they were inherently evil, as a devout Catholic he had concerns about having 'created' a race of beings that could not be saved. In any case, whether Tolkien's orcs were inherently evil or not is beside the point of whether they are evil in other universes like the Elder Scrolls (where, obviously, they are not evil at all) or D&D.

with Hitler being Sauron

Hitler is absolutely not Sauron. Tolkien explicitly said that if the War of the Ring had been an allegory for WW2, both sides would have used the ring without hesitation, and both sides would only have treated hobbits as slaves.

Thus my evil elves are albinos.

How is this not anti-albino then? In real life, albinism is genetic and albinos do face violent discrimination and bigotry in many places around the world.

(Oh, and in answer to the race-species debate: no, elves, hobbits and probably orcs are not species, at least not in Tolkien. Tolkien explicitly acknowledged in his letters that biologically, human and elves are in fact the same (that whole "reproducing and having fertile offspring" thing). And he also explicitly wrote Hobbits are even closer to humans than elves are, so all three, at least, are one biological species. Orcs may or may not be corrupted elves or men, in which case they'd definitely be the same biological species; and even if not, are still apparently capable of some form of interbreeding with humans so either same species or a very close relative)

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ArtisticLicenseBiology

 

[Evie]

Artistic license biology is a thing, but word of god (the author) is that they ARE biologically one race (yes, he used that word here too). That's not me applying science to Tolkien's work, that's Tolkien applying science to Tolkien's work and concluding science is right.

And since it's canon (so also Tolkien saying it) that hobbits are closer to humans than elves, then per Tolkien himself, Hobbits, Humans, Numenoreans and Elves are all of the same species (H. Sapiens, presumably). Orcs are more dicey (no clear statement here), but if they are tortured elves or humans, then they have to be H. Sapiens too.

 

[Joij21]

Tolkien is responsible for applying the old english word orc to goblins, and goblins are a concept from folklore that dates back centuries before Tolkien.

I would argue goblins to be evil as well. See in most cultures they tend to represent nature spirits of the trickster or malicious kind. Nature spirits that tend to reflect a single emotion (in some cases more than one but usually all negative) like wrath, greed, lust, gluttony, vengeance, pettiness, etc. Those of the positive kind tend to not take the form of a goblinoid but rather have the traits of something more beautiful and are called other names (like dryad). But every nature spirit that manifests in the physical form of a goblinoid type being, usually always is negative or inherently evil regardless of the culture.

Evil, they may be, but mindless is in every way at odds with what's on the page. They are noted in the Hobbit (yes, the Hobbit says goblin, but Tolkien was very explicit that Goblins and orcs are synonymous in his works) to be technologically adept and creators of many devices that have since troubled the world.

I see that as more of an example of a biological robot. A robot pre-programed in their genes by magic, magical torture, spiritual possession, etc. to always make things as prefabs. We see their armor being the same crude wrought iron designs with no sign of creative progression. Plus their battle tactics could just be like lines of code programmed into them by their dark masters (would explain why the heroes of other races are always able to outsmart them). Their tendency to organize into clans could just be clever programming to keep them together as a cohesive unit so they always stay on the march.