[quote=Dervish]
Yeah, but we're not living in the 1300s anymore. Any fears that were the source of our mythology and fables isn't relative to our society any longer. Notice how people love werewolves and vampires today? Back when they were created, they killed people for allegedly being one of those creatures. The stories that survive today that were written dozens, if not hundreds or thousands of years ago, survive because of historical value or because they are good stories, not because we're terrified of what they represent.Nobody alive today knows of what it was like around the time where Europe was on it's slaughter happy Crusade binge, and nobody knows what it's like to have an equally powerful and enlightened Middle East in our modern world. It's not that people are scared of darked skinned people in fantasy, as you allege, it's just nobody really knows or appreciates the setting. Sure, there's always going to be the odd racist asshat, but on the whole we live in a pretty tolerant and understanding culture. We're more than capable of separating old myths and legends with reality, because otherwise we'd hear about ships disappearing and immediately blame it on sea monsters. Hell, most people don't read The Lord of the Rings and realize Tolkein wrote it as a "fundamentally Catholic story", as he described it. The messages and themes we take from it are decidedly different from the author's on the whole.Tl:dr Whatever the reasons a fantasy story or myth was written does not mean it applies to contemporary society. We tend to enjoy folklore and myths for entertainment value more-so than any perceived lesson or fear it's trying to instill upon us.
[/quote]

I'll definitely say you're right, thankfully, that a lot of the old meanings are changed. But they're not lost. A lot of those symbols still ring true to us, even if their meaning is merely in the general direction of the original intention. I mean, just look at the Apple of Adam and Eve. It doesn't actually exist, Jewish/Christian literature only calls it a fruit and I figure apple's probably aren't the first you'd expect in Africa/Western Asia, yet despite all that, an Apple today has this power as an image that harkens back. The meaning isn't quite the same today as it was before, nor is the symbol, but we still feel the gist of it. In the same way those old fairy tales still guide our stories now. And the old ways of painting those archetypes definitely show through. You don't have to be a progressive liberal to note the deep racism even Bruce Lee experienced in Hollywood, where colour is all too often exotified and demonized. The odd ball racist doesn't quite account for the incarceration ratios in America either. Overall, if the stories we use repeat from generation to generation, built from old biases, even if the cancer is dead, do you still want to raise your children around it? In all seriousness, I do agree that things have changed. We hide our judgements in small gestures, all too often unaware that what we are doing and saying is actually very hurtful. I really dig the idea of bringing some other mythologies and forms of entertainment like Dinh's suggesting for its freshness and willingness to explore something that defies some basic rules in Western society.

@Dinh: Never been to Ferguson, and while I'm aware of what's going on over there, I don't have to go 20 miles to see what our country thinks of other cultures. 

[quote=Kaga]
I'm sorry. I just can't take this statement seriously.

I'll let Dervish take this one. I have nothing else to say.
[/quote]

Uh... okay. I'm pretty certain Dervish responded already, not that he needed permission, so, why post that you have nothing to post?