Lovecraft's Elephant
Let me address the Chaugnar Faugn in the room: Lovecraft's racism. I've delved deep into the world of Lovecraft and his...issues with Blacks and Jews is appareant. In "The Rats in the Walls," the protagonist has a black cat called N. man. I'm not going to write that word out, you know what it is. During my research I found various views on Lovecraft's views. One blog was by a Jewish man who wrote of Lovecraft: "My favorite antisemite." I laughed out loud when I read it. It seems many are able to overlook or ignore his racism. So what do I think? To give you an answer, yes, Lovecraft is acting in a way we would today call racist, but what about the times he was in? Ford was rolling out the Model T for the public to consume. At the same time he was writing in his newspaper about the follies of the Jews and their plans to corrupt America. That seems to be a theme across Jewish racism at the time. There's this fear that Jews will change our society. A common fear even today as hundreds of immigrants cross the boarder. As Walt Disney was building his empire, he rubbed shoulders with many anti semites and racists. Family Guy can't get enough out of kicking Disney in the ribs for this crime. But what was the world in the roaring 20s? The 1920s, not the current 20s. People drank, smoke, danced as if life would never end. America flourished like it had never had before right off the precipice into the sobbering 30s. Yes, antisemitism was real and the black man was seen as an ignorant savage who was the white man's burden. In fact, all non whites were the white man's burden and it was the white's job to carry them up the mountain to civilization.
I have to step lightly here because racism is an unexploded mine waiting for a foot. To give a second answer, because you can have more that one answer to a question, no, Lovecraft is not racist, he is xenophobic. A trait we can clearly see in Call of Cthulhu in which the protagonist comes across savage, ignorant black men who worship the underwater god. But Lovecraft seems to change in his later years. He marries a woman who is partialy Jewish. His rants on racism tone down in his letters to his friends. Was it the fire of youthful ignorance that flamed his hatred? Perhaps. Perhaps it was the world he inhabited that was full of anger and misunderstandings.
You might look at this and think "how foolish, how ignorant of our ancestors." And you are right, it was wrong to think of another man as lesser due to their birth or skin. But we see the same things happen today. Recently a judge in Mississippis sentenced five former cops to jail for torturing two black men who were sleeping in a white woman's house. Racism still happens today but we look at it differently. My mother recalls watching the funeral of Dr. King when she was four. When she asked my grandfather who Dr. King was, he replied, "A troublemaker." And that was that. Now, my mom knows Dr. King is nothing but a troublemaker. And my grandfather, who has passed, never shared his views with me but I'm sure he softened his stance since then. But that resposnse came from the world he grew up in. Today were taught about the struggles of Dr. King and the heroism behind his crusade. Who is doing that today? Which radical today will be tomorrows hero? To put it another way, how will your views be seen in the future? Ignorant? Racist? Every decade sees the world differently from the 20s to the 30s to the 2020s. It's hard for me to judge someone solely on one aspect or one source. Take today for example, were in the birthing process of AI. Will there come a time when people demand equality for AI machines like in so many scifi stories? Maybe. It's possible that such a thing will never come to pass even with the scifi master's narrative speculations. But without stepping on the mine, I wish to say that I think the question has more than one answer and that there isn't a happy, satisfying answer that will define Lovecraft. Because how do you define a man who you can no longer speak to?
Comments
Post a Comment