Getting serious for a bit...
Recently I found
this post on a short story that comments on US race relations by using a racist Hobbit senator in a more 'modern' version of Arda. It reminded me of some Tolkien criticism I've read which says that JRRT's work is subtly or even overtly racist, based on the fact that the opponents and supporters of Sauron are distinguished based on skin colour ---- the heroic Free Peoples are (supposedly) mostly light-skinned while at one point, the men of Far Harad are described as
black...like half trolls with white eyes and red tongues
and there is a strong emphasis on the importance of unmixed lineage in those of Númenorean descent from the High Men.
TBH while this horrifically oversimplified conception of Tolkien does sound iffy in a 21st century context, IMO these basic concepts are most likely carried over from the medieval romances he studied and taught, including the chansons de geste which contain some very dehumanising depictions of Saracens, who are often portrayed as monstrous ---- the Saracen king Marsile in the
Chanson de Roland commands whole armies with inhuman features and pitch-black skin. There's a racist component in many of these stories; in
The King of Tars the title character's skin is black until his conversion to Christianity, at which point it turns white and his deformed child with his Frankish wife is miraculously cured. Medieval Norse literature often emphasises the heroic lineage of its protagonists; the only examples I can think of right now are Sigurd the Volsung and Egill Skallagrimsson. Dark skin is also a sign of difference and unpredictability, linked to nonhuman ancestry. Sigurd's aunt, Signý, commits incest with her twin brother Sigmundr to conceive a child who will be a Volsung from a Volsung, and worthy of avenging their father.
That said, as someone whose heritage is Chinese, I have to admit I used to cringe a bit at JRRT's unfortunate phrasing in Letter 210, when he describes the physical appearance of Orcs as something close to "degraded and repulsive versions of the least lovely (to Europeans) Mongol-types" even though I know he just meant/implied that quite a few Europeans thought that East/Central Asians were ugly (he most likely didn't share this opinion). Probably they were inspired by the Dusky Men from William Morris'
The Roots of the Mountains, demonic versions of Huns who fight the clearly-Germanic Dalemen of Burgdale.
What does everyone else think of "Tolkien is racist" criticism? I think it's an oversimplification and often ignores the inherent racism in the medieval texts he drew on.