Tuesday, 27 July 2021

Thoughts on the release of the Tolkien Society Summer Seminar videos and push-back against the online small-minded backlash around the event


“Eärendil the Mariner” by Adrian Bara


With much anticipation and jubilation, the
Tolkien Society have uploaded the videos from their Summer Seminar to their YouTube channel.

You can view them here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1BYu4NOIv8&list=PLoyx2jXs6Le_MelDj_rJsmiYSYQBeVYxQ

The Seminar details can be still found here: https://www.tolkiensociety.org/events/tolkien-society-summer-seminar/

Since the Seminar there has been many important thoughts and posts by the Tolkien Community – about the ongoing dialogue around diversity and inclusivity.

Most recently was University of Glasgow PHD researcher Mariana Rios Maldonado about her experiences of racism in academia –
https://sgsahblog.com/2021/07/21/learning-to-not-unsee-racism-in-academia/

Following the Seminar, there has been an outpouring of writing focused on the reception of Tolkien’s work and finding representation to identify with in Tolkien’s words. There have been numerous blog posts about LGBT+ and Tolkien. A few include:

Molly Ostertag’s “Queer readings of The Lord of the Rings are not accidents” -
https://www.polygon.com/lord-of-the-rings/22550950/sam-frodo-queer-romance-lord-of-the-rings-tolkien-quotes

Molly is known for her brilliant illustration of an unpublished epilogue between Sam and his daughter here - https://twitter.com/MollyOstertag/status/1361492489228623872

Lauren Coates’s “Why queer readings of the Lord of the Rings are so popular — and important” – https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/lord-rings-sam-frodo-ship-lgbt-queer-reading-history

And then there are the informed reviews that came out of the Summer Seminar. All of these put into words feelings I hold and they say it so much better than I can get down. Below are just a few (alphabetical) –

Troels Forchhammer
Tolkien Society Seminar 2021 – “Tolkien and Diversity”
https://www.parmakenta.com/2021/06/tolkien-society-seminar-2021-tolkien.html
The Tolkien Society Seminar 2021 – part 2
https://www.parmakenta.com/2021/07/the-tolkien-society-seminar-2021-part-2.html
Tolkien and Diversity – and Tolkienian Inclusion
https://www.parmakenta.com/2021/07/tolkien-and-diversity-and-tolkienian.html

Christian S. Trenk
Tolkien and Diversity: A Seminar Report
https://thetolkienist.com/2021/07/10/tolkien-and-diversity-a-seminar-report/

John D. Rateliff
Diversity and Counter-Diversity in Tolkien Scholarship
https://sacnoths.blogspot.com/2021/06/diversity-and-counter-diversity-in.html

Robin Anne Reid
Saturday, June 3, Tolkien and Diversity Presentations (report)
https://tolkien-on-the-web.dreamwidth.org/4726.html
Sunday, June 4, Tolkien and Diversity Presentations (report)
https://tolkien-on-the-web.dreamwidth.org/5021.html


Closing thoughts

A couple of weeks ago, as we headed towards what would be a fantastic and thoughtful Tolkien Society Summer Seminar, it came apparent that a part of the Tolkien fandom were quite vocally angry that diversity should be a topic associated with Tolkien. We saw a rival conference set up (as if other conferences have ever been a bad thing), we saw podcasts and YouTube rants. Social media saw the same people posting angrily about the affront that the Tolkien Society were holding a seminar – not sure where these lot have been, the Tolkien Society have hosted seminars every year for longer than some of them were born.    

What became apparent very early in my discovery was a few common points from this “angry” side. I’ll keep it in simple terms:

a) They claimed to represent a Christian moral upper ground. More often than not they displayed extremely non-Christian ethics and behaviour, unless you want to bring in the Crusades, Witch burnings and more.

I even got called degenerate by one bile-spewing numpty on a rival “conference” that turned out to be four blokes on YouTube getting their facts wrong and their knickers in a twist.

b) A lack of empathy for other human beings – lack of consideration for diversity and inclusion, of making fandom a place where everyone is welcome.

The argument thrown back at people (like myself) who point this out is that we allegedly ignore the Christian side of Tolkien, so excluding these people. I think we need to make it clear – there are many people in attendance who are Christian and we all get on. It’s just the vile frothy hate-spewing gutless fools who claim the Christianity card and thus drag the religion into their own fetid mire that no one wants to stand next to.  

c) Shocking homophobia, misogynistic rants and other vile stuff.

d) Simple knowledge is hard to pick up apparently – for example the continual mixing up of just what the Tolkien Society and what the Tolkien Estate are. No, the Tolkien Society is not taking money from Amazon (the TS is a charity) and no the Tolkien Society can’t cancel Tolkien’s books – that would be the publisher and the Estate. The Tolkien Society is set up as an educational and scholarly outreach to help promote Tolkien, not take him down. Facts, simple things really. When you can’t get a simple fact like this right, what hope is there you’ll understand complex thought behind Tolkien?

e) Tolkien is theirs! Of course he is… of course.

To say I was appalled and disgusted by the rhetoric of this small group of “fans” is an understatement. It felt like a rent-a-mob (with torches) getting themselves and others riled up and filling social media and other places on the internet with their intolerant views.

This isn’t the only fandom sadly seeing a rise In “rage-boi” tantrums on the internet – Star Wars has famously seen it and others too.

Here’s the thing. No matter how far back these cave trolls want to try and drag us, we (as a fandom and a society) are going to move forward. We are diverse, we are inclusive. Will we make mistakes? Of course, we are human. But I will stand by groups that at their core hold values such empathy, kindness and being welcoming to all.

And at the centre of it all – our love of Tolkien’s works.

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Afterthought: I can’t wait to see the publication of the papers from Luna Press Publishing, hopefully at the end of 2021 but more likely 2022.

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