You could point out that by semantics, dark doesn't mean black. The palest albino could be a dark priest, a fallen high elf could become a dark elf. The most noble paladin can be turned to a death knight and become a dark lord.
In the Star Wars Prequels, the palest, most inoffensive politician was secretly a dark lord of the Sith. One who used guile and flowery words to create a clone army, start an intergalactic war, and turn jedi to sith.
In my novels, the people trusted the most have fallen to the "Dark side" and abandoned their posts. The Mayor who left town before appointing a new sheriff and hid the job advert. The chaos god who brought his dark pets to the world and set them loose.
What's destroying fantasy in traditional publishing is the fact that the SJW idiots dodn't understand English. They associate dark with black, and they are mostly white women with a college degree.
Agreed and I’ve noted the same across all those tales such as SW, and yeah I’ve similar semantics in my world as yours just as I have an actual race of corrupted Elves who have sold their souls for power.
They are by the time of the story of Gemstone and Darkspire almost entirely extinct because of their own ceaseless wars.
Any exposure I've had to Dark Elves has been pale, probably anaemic, evil shut ins who needed more sunlight as kids. The darkest Dark Elves I've seen in art are the Drow, and they are hardly paragons of healthy, African people. Grey is not a very healthy colour, as far as I'm aware.
I’ve observed the same, very strange to say they are African when they are grey, pitch-dark or ghost-pale or something. I don’t think I’d associate them with any living people but oh well.
As to the Norse, yeah we need to make axes cool, which is why I made one of the main magic arms of Gemstone a great double-headed axe.
I've experimented with elves of other races, using other cultural mythos as a starting point. The Mrenh Konveal of Cambodian myth are more like gnomes or fairies due to their diminutive size, but hold some elflike characteristics.
Philipino mythology even has equivalents to light and dark elves in the form of the daleketnon (benevolent elflike entities) and engkanto (malevolent ones). Both are said to live inside trees.
Finally, Malaysian, Bruneian, and Indonesian folklore has the Orang Bunian, while the Maori people have traditional beliefs regarding the Patupaiarahe. The former are more like sea elves that are said to have inhabited the archipelagos since long before humans reached the region. Likewise, the Maori entities are believed to have predated humans in New Zealand by thousands of years (the Maori themselves didn't get there until the Middle Ages).
Dwarves, gnomes and the like have even more parallels. Stories about "little people" are far more prevalent in world mythology than elflike beings, though I've seen hints of "blue people" in Cherokee mythology which are strangely similar to Icelandic folklore about a type of blue elf which is otherwise unique to that island. Iceland alone allegedly has thirteen varieties, if you weren't aware. The variety may stem from the fact that a sizeable portion of Icelandic people seem to unironically believe they exist, but that's a whole different topic.
I'm not against expanding the concept of elves into other ethnicities by any means. It's a process of comparative religion and mythology that goes beyond the vapid social taboos of critical race theory. What's more, it's considered a bit of a taboo by believers in that ideology. The use of spiritual concepts from those cultures in fiction is all but forbidden, especially when comparisons are drawn to familiar European mythical beings like dwarves and elves. It's absurd, and I don't intend to let it stop me. My elves have almost as much ethnic diversity as humans.
Needless to say, "light" and "dark" are terms of spiritual alignment and have nothing to do with ethnicity.
Agreed, and hey I’ve expanded on their ethnicity with my Merialeth story, so no problem. I don’t mind that, though in my mythos the Earth Elves died out in the wars against evil.
I wanted to use them as part of a greater tragedy.
What you’re doing is making them your own and using different myths and folklore as inspiration that’s really cool Old Wolf!
Then you have the dark elves from Warhammer, Hellboy/DC, and Thor/Marvel, ALL of which look more like the Engineer aliens of the Alien franchise in terms of skin tone than African people.
Critical race theory has introduced all new forms of primitive superstition.
The kakamora playfully depicted in Moana are Polynesian dwarves wearing coconut armor in their mythology, even if the movie makes em look like coconut monsters.
My exposure to Dark Elves is Warhammer and there they're very pale and live in the cold frozen lands of fantasy North America/Canada. So how they see something like that and say that it's racist against melanated people is beyond me.
I confess that I do love Dark Elves as a villainous force in my fantasy stories. They make an excellent mirror.
All elves should have a connection or be more in tune with the divine or magical in whatever story they are in. The traditional High Elves use that connection to be stewards and guardians of the world, often mentoring or advising our heroes. By contrast, Dark Elves have forsaken that role completely in favour of a will to power, using their knowledge and insight in a pursuit to dominate others.
If Dark Elves are not directly serving evil gods or other malign beings, they most likely are perfectly eager to make bargains with them or perhaps even try to enslave them to further their own ends.
And whereas the High Elves are often led by a wise and noble high king, Dark Elves will be led by a cruel and scheming matriach or high priestess. That Dark Elves societies are often portrayed as matriarchal is another clue that they are meant to represent a world with an inverted order.
Great comment, I do agree and I think there’s something to be said about your vision regarding the inversion of the natural order with these things. What is more is that they are indeed an excellent mirror and terrifying force that serves as a counter to High/Light Elves.
It is strange to me that so many like their ‘Drizzt’ stand ins and try to debate me about the value of truly evil Dark Elves, and your one of the first to actually argue for tradition (thank you for that!).
I think people have gotten so enamoured with the "Drizzt" type of character that they have forgotten that they only work when they are the rare exception to their people. A problem further exaggerated by the trend away from evil races. That we are not allowed to suggest that matriarchies are a rebellion against the natural order has not helped either.
Now I admit, I have toyed with the idea of "good" Dark Elves myself. But in that case, there are no "High Elves" as they all fled into the subterranean world to escape a cataclysm brought on by their kingdoms falling into decadence and kinslaying. With the result that the elves that escaped gradually turned into what can be called Dark Elves.
But even in that case, the good Dark Elves are effectively a break-away religious sect rebelling against what they see as the same behaviour that brought on the original cataclysm. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the Dark Elves are still the cruel and merciless villains we all know and love.
I like the take from Elder Scrolls on their races. Morrowind is all about the collapse of the Triune for their betrayal, and the break up of their society. Skyrim is about the war between the Empire and the conniving High Elves who has an insurgent noble as a sleeper agent in a civil war. The “High” & “Dark” game is silly.
I even heard of a person getting heat for saying “Dark Lord” like REALLY? Barnes & Noble still sells Tolkien with all its “Dark Lord’s” like, what, 100 years after it being written?
I see, still I like to apply them as monikers/races. In my stories there’s some good and bad High Elves, and the High Elves can be divided between the Iron Elves and the ‘Light’ Elves.
But yes the Dark Lord idea still sells and must be revived I think.
I think it’s worth noting that dark elves and dwarves are also seen by some scholars of Norse Mythology as being the same—they just have different names. While I don’t have a problem with dark elves being used as villains, and I certainly don’t think it’s a cry of white supremacy, I don’t think one should use the whole “dark elf is bad, light elf is good” concept as gospel. An elf, whatever their flavor, can be good or bad. So a dark elf can be a hero, a light elf a villain, and vice versa. Fantasy worlds and their races can be malleable according to the creator’s whims—that’s their right as a creator. If you read some of my stories you can see I try to employ these ideas.
Never said it was ‘gospel’ only that they serve as contrasts to one another, and yeah Dwarves are often synonymous with dark elves I know.
I think that before one sets up a Dark Elf hero one should first set up villainous Dark Elves and heroic Elves. Why? Because you are setting the pattern for your race to the reader. First impressions matter and if their first impression is Drizzt this means the general view is that you’ve a race of Drizzts.
Also I’m bored of Light Elves being evil, it’s so overdone since the 80s that it really does need to stop. I must confess I don’t read those stories anymore, and just generally ignore them. I’ve no use for them unless there’s already been 3-4 decent good Elves of good character and complex character.
Wait, dark elves aren't chocolate-skinned southern beach elves?
Afraid not lol
You could point out that by semantics, dark doesn't mean black. The palest albino could be a dark priest, a fallen high elf could become a dark elf. The most noble paladin can be turned to a death knight and become a dark lord.
In the Star Wars Prequels, the palest, most inoffensive politician was secretly a dark lord of the Sith. One who used guile and flowery words to create a clone army, start an intergalactic war, and turn jedi to sith.
In my novels, the people trusted the most have fallen to the "Dark side" and abandoned their posts. The Mayor who left town before appointing a new sheriff and hid the job advert. The chaos god who brought his dark pets to the world and set them loose.
What's destroying fantasy in traditional publishing is the fact that the SJW idiots dodn't understand English. They associate dark with black, and they are mostly white women with a college degree.
Agreed and I’ve noted the same across all those tales such as SW, and yeah I’ve similar semantics in my world as yours just as I have an actual race of corrupted Elves who have sold their souls for power.
They are by the time of the story of Gemstone and Darkspire almost entirely extinct because of their own ceaseless wars.
Hmmm.
Typical racist leftist insanity.
You said it well.
Thanks, I hope people take from the bottom section. I really want to get back to ‘how to write fantasy races’ and stuff that was fun to write about.
Any exposure I've had to Dark Elves has been pale, probably anaemic, evil shut ins who needed more sunlight as kids. The darkest Dark Elves I've seen in art are the Drow, and they are hardly paragons of healthy, African people. Grey is not a very healthy colour, as far as I'm aware.
The Norse loved axes. Maybe we need more axes.
I’ve observed the same, very strange to say they are African when they are grey, pitch-dark or ghost-pale or something. I don’t think I’d associate them with any living people but oh well.
As to the Norse, yeah we need to make axes cool, which is why I made one of the main magic arms of Gemstone a great double-headed axe.
I've experimented with elves of other races, using other cultural mythos as a starting point. The Mrenh Konveal of Cambodian myth are more like gnomes or fairies due to their diminutive size, but hold some elflike characteristics.
Philipino mythology even has equivalents to light and dark elves in the form of the daleketnon (benevolent elflike entities) and engkanto (malevolent ones). Both are said to live inside trees.
Finally, Malaysian, Bruneian, and Indonesian folklore has the Orang Bunian, while the Maori people have traditional beliefs regarding the Patupaiarahe. The former are more like sea elves that are said to have inhabited the archipelagos since long before humans reached the region. Likewise, the Maori entities are believed to have predated humans in New Zealand by thousands of years (the Maori themselves didn't get there until the Middle Ages).
Dwarves, gnomes and the like have even more parallels. Stories about "little people" are far more prevalent in world mythology than elflike beings, though I've seen hints of "blue people" in Cherokee mythology which are strangely similar to Icelandic folklore about a type of blue elf which is otherwise unique to that island. Iceland alone allegedly has thirteen varieties, if you weren't aware. The variety may stem from the fact that a sizeable portion of Icelandic people seem to unironically believe they exist, but that's a whole different topic.
I'm not against expanding the concept of elves into other ethnicities by any means. It's a process of comparative religion and mythology that goes beyond the vapid social taboos of critical race theory. What's more, it's considered a bit of a taboo by believers in that ideology. The use of spiritual concepts from those cultures in fiction is all but forbidden, especially when comparisons are drawn to familiar European mythical beings like dwarves and elves. It's absurd, and I don't intend to let it stop me. My elves have almost as much ethnic diversity as humans.
Needless to say, "light" and "dark" are terms of spiritual alignment and have nothing to do with ethnicity.
Agreed, and hey I’ve expanded on their ethnicity with my Merialeth story, so no problem. I don’t mind that, though in my mythos the Earth Elves died out in the wars against evil.
I wanted to use them as part of a greater tragedy.
What you’re doing is making them your own and using different myths and folklore as inspiration that’s really cool Old Wolf!
Then you have the dark elves from Warhammer, Hellboy/DC, and Thor/Marvel, ALL of which look more like the Engineer aliens of the Alien franchise in terms of skin tone than African people.
Critical race theory has introduced all new forms of primitive superstition.
Agreed, and now that I think about it they do look similar…. hmmmm, might have to finally watch the Alien franchise to get a better grasp of them.
Ancient Aliens hypothesis meets ancient Sumerian religion. They created us and want to destroy us, according to those movies.
Crazy bastards.
Lmao
The kakamora playfully depicted in Moana are Polynesian dwarves wearing coconut armor in their mythology, even if the movie makes em look like coconut monsters.
Another group of crazy bastards!
https://www.nerdveda.com/moana-cultural-significance-kakamora/
My exposure to Dark Elves is Warhammer and there they're very pale and live in the cold frozen lands of fantasy North America/Canada. So how they see something like that and say that it's racist against melanated people is beyond me.
Not sure either
Just make the dark elves virtuous victims. Problem solved. Sort of.
Lmao! Nice!
I confess that I do love Dark Elves as a villainous force in my fantasy stories. They make an excellent mirror.
All elves should have a connection or be more in tune with the divine or magical in whatever story they are in. The traditional High Elves use that connection to be stewards and guardians of the world, often mentoring or advising our heroes. By contrast, Dark Elves have forsaken that role completely in favour of a will to power, using their knowledge and insight in a pursuit to dominate others.
If Dark Elves are not directly serving evil gods or other malign beings, they most likely are perfectly eager to make bargains with them or perhaps even try to enslave them to further their own ends.
And whereas the High Elves are often led by a wise and noble high king, Dark Elves will be led by a cruel and scheming matriach or high priestess. That Dark Elves societies are often portrayed as matriarchal is another clue that they are meant to represent a world with an inverted order.
Great comment, I do agree and I think there’s something to be said about your vision regarding the inversion of the natural order with these things. What is more is that they are indeed an excellent mirror and terrifying force that serves as a counter to High/Light Elves.
It is strange to me that so many like their ‘Drizzt’ stand ins and try to debate me about the value of truly evil Dark Elves, and your one of the first to actually argue for tradition (thank you for that!).
I think people have gotten so enamoured with the "Drizzt" type of character that they have forgotten that they only work when they are the rare exception to their people. A problem further exaggerated by the trend away from evil races. That we are not allowed to suggest that matriarchies are a rebellion against the natural order has not helped either.
Now I admit, I have toyed with the idea of "good" Dark Elves myself. But in that case, there are no "High Elves" as they all fled into the subterranean world to escape a cataclysm brought on by their kingdoms falling into decadence and kinslaying. With the result that the elves that escaped gradually turned into what can be called Dark Elves.
But even in that case, the good Dark Elves are effectively a break-away religious sect rebelling against what they see as the same behaviour that brought on the original cataclysm. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the Dark Elves are still the cruel and merciless villains we all know and love.
Interesting ideas there!
I like the take from Elder Scrolls on their races. Morrowind is all about the collapse of the Triune for their betrayal, and the break up of their society. Skyrim is about the war between the Empire and the conniving High Elves who has an insurgent noble as a sleeper agent in a civil war. The “High” & “Dark” game is silly.
I even heard of a person getting heat for saying “Dark Lord” like REALLY? Barnes & Noble still sells Tolkien with all its “Dark Lord’s” like, what, 100 years after it being written?
I see, still I like to apply them as monikers/races. In my stories there’s some good and bad High Elves, and the High Elves can be divided between the Iron Elves and the ‘Light’ Elves.
But yes the Dark Lord idea still sells and must be revived I think.
For sure, I probably still will as well. Getting offended by an adjective in a fake story is simply Orwellian imo.
Agreed
I think it’s worth noting that dark elves and dwarves are also seen by some scholars of Norse Mythology as being the same—they just have different names. While I don’t have a problem with dark elves being used as villains, and I certainly don’t think it’s a cry of white supremacy, I don’t think one should use the whole “dark elf is bad, light elf is good” concept as gospel. An elf, whatever their flavor, can be good or bad. So a dark elf can be a hero, a light elf a villain, and vice versa. Fantasy worlds and their races can be malleable according to the creator’s whims—that’s their right as a creator. If you read some of my stories you can see I try to employ these ideas.
Never said it was ‘gospel’ only that they serve as contrasts to one another, and yeah Dwarves are often synonymous with dark elves I know.
I think that before one sets up a Dark Elf hero one should first set up villainous Dark Elves and heroic Elves. Why? Because you are setting the pattern for your race to the reader. First impressions matter and if their first impression is Drizzt this means the general view is that you’ve a race of Drizzts.
Also I’m bored of Light Elves being evil, it’s so overdone since the 80s that it really does need to stop. I must confess I don’t read those stories anymore, and just generally ignore them. I’ve no use for them unless there’s already been 3-4 decent good Elves of good character and complex character.