this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2024
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grimdank
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I get and agree with your overall point, but as a matter of petty pedantry (sorry) I have to point out that racism in that sense was pretty absent in the Medieval period, at least amongst Europeans, who saw Subsaharan Africans as more fascinating than inferior. "Black = Inferior" started developing with the slave trade in the 16th century, and didn't really hit full speed until the start of the 18th century.
History is funny like that. Not ha-ha funny, unfortunately.
Oh I am cognizant of the fact that not necessarily skin-color is the fulcrum of real, existing medieval racism (it's rather a different kind of racism/culturalism and it does declare for example jews and muslims to be subhumans (source)) but I'm talking completely RPG-worlds here, with all their baggage and misunderstandings.
That source poses a, uh, very curious look at race in the Medieval period.
Then look at Sir Moriaen, a knight in Arthurian canon.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moriaen
That the social constructs around race change over time and that our modern understanding is different is not the same thing as our ancestors not being something we couldn't call racist.
Sir Moriaen's story is particularly interesting historically because it demonstrates both a clear racist fear response and a clear moral that it is wrong, and Sir Moriaen should instead be judged by his having better, noble blood and being a good Christian, not the color of his skin.
Okay, one might note a whole other topic of discussion there, but the point remains, tribalism and heirarchy are the root of all prejudice, and they weren't invented by Portuguese slave traders.
That's kind of what I'm getting at, man. Tribalism and hierarchy are related to racism, but calling all prejudices racism makes the term so broad as to be borderline useless. Racism, as we would recognize it, dates to the early modern period.