Birth of a Nation came out to huge commercial success and was the first American film to be screened in the White House. Lovecraft was 25 years old at the time. .
Last edited:
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Challenging the bigotry of an icon: How Bloodborne slyly calls out HP Lovecraft
- Thread starter Alo0oy
- Start date
yeah, i'm thinking this's an example of 'seeing what i wanna see' more than anything else. i love miyazaki as much as anyone, but i'm having a seriously difficult time thinking he was intentionally coming from this angle...
but, hey - we all see what we wanna see, i guess :) ...
Great read and several good points made. This is nothing exclusive to Bloodborne/the video game medium though. Anyone interested in reading Lovecraft-inspired literature forming an antithesis to those very points of Lovecraft's views commonly criticised should give Ruthanna Emrys (Winter Tide) a try.
Lovecraft hated anyone who wasn't a White American. He was even xenophobic towards other whites. Dude was freaking crazy. (I'm just stating the white thing to show how incredibly racist/xenophobic he was)
Yeah well they all sound the same, innit? Love how an article on racism is founded on generalisations about a particular race. And Yharnam is not based on London at all.
There's probably a case to be made that Lovecraft's brand of cosmic horror was shaped by his visceral, deep-seated discomfort toward anything that appeared different from himself... from jellyfish in the sea to (unfortunately) people of color. It's like he was hardwired with a natural gag reflex that was triggered by anything that seemed outwardly different from himself.
On the one hand, his perpetual sense of alienation as someone deeply xenophobic might be why his horror stories — based on fear of "the other" — are so effective and authentic. But on the other hand, of course, he was hurting his fellow man and slowing society's progress toward inclusion.
I still appreciate his works, and deeply admire his imagination and ability to articulate it. But yeah, it's unfortunate he harbored such views.
On the one hand, his perpetual sense of alienation as someone deeply xenophobic might be why his horror stories — based on fear of "the other" — are so effective and authentic. But on the other hand, of course, he was hurting his fellow man and slowing society's progress toward inclusion.
I still appreciate his works, and deeply admire his imagination and ability to articulate it. But yeah, it's unfortunate he harbored such views.
Free pass? No, the dude had a cat named 'Niggerman' and described a black person as a 'disgusting gorilla-like creature' in one of his stories, he was pretty damn racist.
However, it's important to see a piece of work in the context of the era it was created in, because some of his racist thoughts were probably very much shaped by the way society was those days.
The is a difference between taking historical context into account and "a free pass", you know.
Sometimes I can separate the artist from the art, and appreciate the art on its own terms. Lovecraft is one such case. It's probably easier because he's dead and no longer actively promoting racism. Instead we're left with his canon of works, which contain racism, yes, but which will grow no further.
Where it becomes more difficult for me is with artists who are still very much among the living. For example: Jontron.
I used to adore Jontron's show — it embodied the sort of warm, friendly, all-inclusive humor at no one's expense that I love. His persona was the guy who feels like everyone's friend. And to be fair, his show — up until I stopped watching it — always maintained that tone.
But then we learned that Jontron harbored some horribly racist views. And at that point, I couldn't watch his show anymore, even reruns, because the illusion of him being "the guy who loves everyone" was broken.
I'm still bummed by that. Jontron could've been such a positive presence on the Internet. Someone whose humor brightens people's day and makes their lives easier. Instead he got suckered into the toxic cesspool of GamerGate and adopted their casual cruelty towards those who are different.
Even if he wasn't acting outwardly hostile, he was still propagating views that hurt people around the world. And knowing this, I just can't bring myself to consume the content he (presumably) continues to create. (I say "presumably" because I don't follow him or hear about him anymore.)
Yeah, same thing.
To be honest , i'm not able to separate artist from the art anymore. If the artist is racist, i would not be able to enjoy his work anymore. Lovecraft is an exception somehow. His racism is undeniable, but i still adore his work and shaped by life tastes when i was growing up. Glad that i'm not the only one who is able to make that sort of separation , i was feeling bad :p.
Thanks for all your takes to my question, with the exception of:
Last edited:
You took a lot of weird post to come to this but thanks now I see your point and see where you are coming from, It really puts a lot of insight of how the normalization of the racism of the era well, seem like normal acts of the everyday.
Thanks for keep pressing your point in this thread now I have a new point of view of this whole affair.
That is that and now the first one to start with Lovecraft problems with sexuality in his work gets the eyeroll.
There was nothing weird about my posts leading up to that post. However I'm glad you were willing to give my posts a chance and view things from a different and broader context
Lovecraft: Exceptional horror author. Unexceptional racist.
Hitler: Exceptional racist. Unexceptional painter.
Yes, and? A movie I have never heard before and isn't still talked about, nor does anybody I know have anything to do with it.
Lovecraft is still talked about. He's a figurehead of an entire genre.
What are you even arguing for????? there is no problem here????? Nobody is saying anything in actual disagreement with you.
I was so bummed out when I read Lovecraft Country and they talk about how he was a racist and his writings were racist. I love writing, and I've always wanted to write stories in his vein of horror.
Lovecraft's racism wasn't exceptional.
Oh yeah and Birth of a Nation is stll talked about and taught in film school.
I think this is just a coincidence, to be honest. I mean, the general public and most if not all of the authors that have been inspired by Lovecraft's works have already separated his works from his worldviews and opinions from the works themselves with most of the people not even knowing about his racist views.
The Fishing Hamlet is practically ripped out from one of his works and there's even the Milkweed Rune, which many look as a direct reference to Lovecraft's name, so this "challenge" thing really sounds like someone looking too much into things.
The Fishing Hamlet is practically ripped out from one of his works and there's even the Milkweed Rune, which many look as a direct reference to Lovecraft's name, so this "challenge" thing really sounds like someone looking too much into things.
A movie being shown in a dedicated class/school to a specific profession isn't equivalent to a full genre literally created by the dude.
Lovecraft's racism is exceptional when looking at him as a still talked about individual person, where even his biggest works have hard racism in it. Yes, obviously, the nameless murderers and assholes on the streets were bigger racists, but as a historical figure/celebrity whose name is still fairly well known today, Lovecraft being such a gigantic racist that even his closest friends/loved ones called him out on it consistently, is petty exceptionally racist.
Like.... why is this even a debate. Who cares about petty crap like "who was more racist??? This dude or HITLER????" When you can't even quantify that. I'm talking in terms of single inspirational/famous individuals from the era, not comparing to the societal amorphous mass of bigotry that lived back then.
Ignoring all that, even if he isnt exceptionally racist to you, people seeing him as that in no way invalidates victims of other forms of racism in the same era. This is making an argument out of nothing because it still boils down in the simplest terms to "Racism was real bad, and Lovecraft was also real racist, in ways most racists were commonly not"
Why is it so hard to separate the man from his work? Just because he was a rasist doesn't devalue his work.
Actually Birth of a Nation its credited as a pioneer in a lot of "modern" filming techniques that are still used today. In that regard it may be on par with Lovecraft in importance to the medium.
Nevertheless Birth is credited and one of the causes for the re ignition of the KKK. This is a very negative impact in the society that Lovecraft's racism didn't have.
Why would that matter? We had a thread a while back calling out old movies for sexism, and bigotry from the decades past regardless that that was more acceptable at that time.
Gonna take a guess that you've never read a Lovecraft story, you can't separate the man from his work because his racism was directly included in his work.
How did Lovecraft's racism compare with Agatha Cristie's? They were born in the same year and I recently learned of the original title of And Then There Were None.
The vast majority of White Americans of that era were exceptionally racist or moreso relative to Lovecraft in a White supremacist society hence me putting it in context of other media, events, and laws at that time. Lovecraft being an exception to this, shows a gross mis or uneducated view of the time and the racist misery inflicted upon Black Americans by the White majority.
Why are you so upset or bothered at me challenging this notion and forcing people to rethink it in a greater context?
Last edited:
When I say famous, I mean casual famous. Nowadays, Lovecraft is a casual name(not household, just common) and theres a large probability both readers, gamers, and horror fans in general atleast know his name offhand.
And I'm not downplaying Birth, because it's way tf in there too. Lovecraft can be more racist than usual while other things can also be more racist than usual/more racist than Lovecraft. Nobody is saying Lovecraft is the biggest, baddest, and only standout racist of the 20s-30s. Just that for what he is, hes way more racist than usual.
User Banned (1 Week): Downplaying racism.
I read all of his work multiple times and that is bs. If you are ofended by a cat named niggerman and dismiss the whole story just because of the one cat than I'm sorry for you.
I'm like......completely lost....we agree or disagree? i need to sleep LMAO.
I've already made my points and so have you, and neither of us are budging an inch.
I'm not upset that you want to challenge notions, I'm more annoyed that its over such a bygone and unnecessary issue. Lovecraft is dead, that era isn't this era. Somebody thinking a guy from 80 years ago may or may not be slightly more racist than the average person fro that era is such a pedantic topic to debate that it's just not worth it. There's no greater understanding gleaned from that.
I'm in the same position as you at this point lmao
I'm like......completely lost....we agree or disagree? i need to sleep LMAO.
Latest South Park game introduced me to one of Lovecraft's more edgy named racist creatures, whose name isn't just unrelated as it apparently actually did feed on darker skinned people according to my friends. They may have been fucking with me though, I never researched thoroughly.
There's nothing for me to budge in being truthful in properly framing the past and Lovecraft's context in it. I apologize this annoys you despite this constant parroting of Lovecraft's racism being exceptional for the time.
And there is more to him than people try to label him as a racist.
Which is a different thing entirely, you can't separate the man from his work when his work absolutely reflects his views.
That's why the fishing hamlet was subversive though, it portrayed the fishing hamlet villagers as victims of Byrgenwerth's conquest, and what they did didn't go unpunished.
Your perception of the past and how Lovecraft compares to it isn't objectively fact.
Tell that to the millions of Black Americans who suffered after Reconstruction and pre Civil Rights.
Yeah, it's explicit in the DLC. I honestly thought The Old Hunters was a pretty obvious commentary on colonization in that it plays out exactly the opposite of Shadow over Innsmouth where it draws its inspiration. Innmsouth is all about how these people went to parts unknown -- meeting savages -- and came back with dark magics they could not possibly understand. There's lots of gross stuff about how people speculate they must have procreated with non-white people because they look "sub-human" but actually it turns out they're part fish god. This leads to their eventual destruction. That's the Lovecraft version.
In Bloodborne, the people seem to be living just fine until the scholars decide to send people in to study and dissect them, destroying the entire town. That's why the first NPC you encounter in the fishing village says: "Byrgenwerth...Byrgenwerth...Blasphemous murderers...Blood-crazed fiends...Atonement for the wretches..." He prays to the "wrath of Mother Kos." Their interactions with the old ones, though not understood by the people from Byrgenwerth, don't seem to be their undoing at all; the church that invaded them and tried to take over and corrupt their religion is the reason they were destroyed.
I'm pretty sure the implication is that London was not chosen because of a Lovecraft connection -- since there isn't one -- but because England can be seen to represent Imperialism, which they believe this game has a commentary on.
Excellent read OP, thanks for sharing! There's a lot more going on in Bloodborne than I first gave the game credit for
Again with the same spoilers. It seems like you're deternined to spoil the movie experience for others on unrelated threads. It definitely would have been a better experience for me, if I hadn't known that beforehand. Didn't you appreciate experiencing it fresh yourself, without having a second hand knowledge of what's to come? The very same can be said about Bloodborne's events, as they're much more effective when they come as a surprise.
I'm sorry, dude, I will never be convinced that something's literary genre is a spoiler.
If mods disagree, I'll comply with their decision, but as long as it's up to us, I won't tag a title, come on.
Answering your question, no, I didn't appreciate experiencing it fresh myself, because I would never have checked out a random movie on Netflix if people didn't recommend it in that Lovecraft thread. So I didn't experience it frresh, and I would never experience it fresh anyway. Bloodborne's twist is also not as much of a twist as people pretend it is. It was when the game came out, because we had almost a year of marketing telling us it was just "Dark Souls with guns", but as soon as you get your first Madman's Knowledge, still in Central Yharnam, it brings eldritch knowledge driving people mad into the picture right away.
This article was really good! I like articles like this that make me look at games I've already played differently.