When I grew up, orcs were evil, plain and simple. As a teen in the early 80's, I did not know enough of the world to think an orc could have any real-world equivalent or that someone could construe such a creature to be an analog for any real entity. Same with drow, elves, dwarves, etc.
Now, that's not our social awareness. Real and damaging analogies have been tied to these fantasy races.
This is well said. Real world awareness grows with age. But it also makes connections that were never there: song associations that never existed*, nudity in paintings that were never sexual, AI coding being evil as opposed to doing a function, etc.
Neurologically, we build connections, whether they exist or not. That is how our brain works. Most of the time, false associations are completely benign. Even in science, they often just lead to a new path. ie. biological classification; some dinosaurs are reptiles - no they are birds, elephants and rhinos must be related since they are both big and grey - no they are not related). Point is, writing is imperfect. The person that sees an association from one author to something else might be the only one to see it. Hell, even a large number of people can see it, and it never existed. And this leads to...
In today's world, information spreads at a strange and ungainly pace. By authors who know nothing or by experts (Reddit), at a pace that varies in speed from minutes to years to centuries. This creates A LOT of false connections. Tie this to sensitive topics such as race, religion, ethnicity, culture, or family pride, and you get a knot that is in one's mind and in one's gut.
I do not mean this to sound as though we should be insensitive. We
should be sensitive. We
should seek acceptance. We
should listen. And part of that stems from language and art. But we should be aware enough to ask: Did I tie this connection by looking at the rope and figuring it out or was it tied to me and I never looked at the rope?
* For the longest time, directly after reading Masque of the Red Death, I thought that was what Pete Townshend from The Who was singing about in Eminence Front.

Ahh... young me. I found connections in a host of Rush songs too... fortunately, many of those were correct.