True, simplification is sometimes better. But slavers and cultists into human sacrifice are usually pretty non-complex (he says, thinking about his group who have done work for Great House Dres, the biggest slavers in Tamriel, before now). Or people who were given a chance to back down and refused, like the raiding orcs ate the last envoy sent to speak with them. Boom, problem solved.
The issue, I think, comes from the way that certain monsters are coded as people. Especially because the things people say about Drow (for example) sometimes land pretty close to home for real-life people of color. In the Larp community, we're really struggling to undo generations of fantasy where "dark skin" is a signifier of a dark soul... Drow are not analogous to black people, but I've heard PoC say that they feel uncomfortable in spaces where the plot is focused on we white skinned heroes destroying those evil black-skinned elves. Especially when larpers get SUPER defensive about wearing black face makeup, and whitesplain"it's not racist, you are offended for no reason." I dunno, how many fantasy movies have black protagonists? (please don't mention Marlon Wayans in the D&D movie) Are we SURE that this has nothing to do with our Othering of marginalized people?
One of the things I like the most about the Malazan series, other than when all the ridiculous subplots come crashing into each other, is that it rails
hard against this trope. The Malazans, as a multi-nation empire, have people of every possible race serving under their banner and, due to being situated in what could generously be called the tropics (don't talk to Erikson about maps, or timelines) is a lot of the characters are of Dal Honese extraction. Dal Hon would be roughly equivalent to the Zulu, in terms of environment and skin tone. A large subset of characters also come from the unnamed subcontinent called Seven Cities, which has so many Arabic overtones as to be ridiculous at times. Kalam and Quick Ben, two of the more noted characters from that region, are also described as very dark-skinned, but there are others, like Lostara Yil, who tend to be lighter but still quite tanned in comparison to non Dal Honese.
Metaphysically, Darkness is the first Hold, in elemental opposition to Chaos. The original inhabitants of the Hold of Darkness, the Tiste Andii, are among the more noble characters in the setting, perhaps personified by their leader, Anomander Rake. And though their intentions are often vague and saying too much would be spoilery, the rulers of the Warren of Shadow, Ammanas and Cotillion, are far from evil in a metaphysical sense, despite all the "shadow" associations that rulership of that plane grants them. If anything, light is evil in this setting, because the notions of purity that are associated with it breed zealousness, arrogance and distaste for outsiders.
