Here's another relevant thread, which includes my considered view (for what it's worth) plus links to additional material provided by Squatter (inclusing, I think, a link back to this thread).
Racism and Tolkien
Quote:
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Originally Posted by davem
But if its 'just a story' then such analyses are unneccessary. We only need to analyses it if we feel there was more going on - in the author's mind at least - than the production of a mere 'entertainment'. Is Tolkien saying anything at all in the book?
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Well I would agree that that Tolkien was not intending to make any statement about race, racism or racial superiority in terms of the real world. So no such analysis is required when one is considering either the story qua story or authorial intention.
However, where the likes of Dr. Shapiro and Jonathan Hari seek to criticise LotR as a racist work or, worse still, where racist groups seek to use it to justify their warped creed (as some do), is it not legitimate to counter those points as Aiwendil has suggested? Particularly since, as Squatter points out, there is material there (Numenorean superiority, for example) which does provide them with some kind of a basis for making the argument (albeit a facile one, in my view).