Given Quebec's recent treatment of minorities, I'm not sure I'd go there.
It's not a bad way to go frankly. Although, again, you really, really need to excise the racist adjacent language since that's probably the bigger issue. But, yeah, and, not only that, but also actually make it visible in products going forward. Let's have a sort of Reverse Dungeon Adventure Path where you're the inhabitants of a dungeon trying to defend your home from invaders who want to kill you and take your stuff.
So a question--or challenge--for you. How would you re-work orcs to allow for the "brutal-savage-evil" type? Would you make them a sub-race? ("Gruumsh orcs"). And if so, how to portray their nature without the same language that you feel is racist-adjacent? Or if not a sub-race, but just "some orcs are like that," how would you do it? Would you just negate the issue entirely and generalize them to the point that no traits are assigned, essentially making them differently shaped humans that can be whatever the DM wants them to be? And would you apply it across the board, so that all humanoids are essentially just like humans in terms of the range of traits and cultures?
Part of the reason I ask is that one aspect of human vs. non-human in Fantasy Land--at least going back to Tolkien, but I think in the folklore--is the idea that humans are more diverse, they are the great "generalists," while non-humans are more specific, more formed around an archetype. Tolkien's elves, for instance, were essentially better versions of humans--more noble, artistic, intelligent, skilled, beautiful, etc--but also had something crucial lacking, perhaps the human capacity of self-determination. Thus you could talk about "elven nature" in a more specific way than "human nature." Orcs were the archetype of the twisted elf--a reversal of Iluvatar's most perfect creation. Dwarves were even more specific in that they were the creation of the crafter deity (Aule). Halflings were perhaps the most metaphorical race, in that Tolkien was obviously gently making fun of (an homage, really) his fellow English country-folk.
The point being, if we broaden each race in such a way that they become more human, they start losing their distinctness, their specificity. Furthermore, having non-human archetypes gives the freedom to explore various archetypes and What If questions without racializing it--
if it is clearly understood that said non-human race is just that: not human. But if the point is to both de-racialize them (for those who make that connection)
and bring them greater depth and complexity, how to do so without losing their distinctness? And if you use sub-races, wouldn't the same concern still apply or would the fact that "Gruumsh orcs" are one of many types negate the racial connotations?
