No the whole argonian race is not scum, but my character in Skyrim who slaughters any Dunmer he see's in retaliation to the OP could be considered one

No, compared to the Dunmer they're quite noble.

They're just like any other race. Some of them are good, some are evil, many are self-serving but not actively malicious, and most are just trying to get through their lives as well as they can and don't care about any of the previous. Just like the Dunmer, or the Bretons, or the Altmer, etc. ... possibly even the Sload. <_<

This, except I'd articulate much less eloquently

The only good Sload is a dead Sload.

But you can't blame every member of a race for the shortcomings of a few, especially a race that can basically be mind controlled by their gods.

Also, felling any Hist would literally destroy everything around it, because they are THAT vital to everything around them. This is why the argonians would gladly sacrifice 5000 of their own people to protect 1 Hist. Also, think of the argonians as extensions of the Hist, roots that wander the world for the tree.

I'd go farther than that. The Hist were one of the forces that actually physically shaped Nirn. Their roots run DEEP deep, not just "kinda sorta deep". Cutting them all out could be bad. Very bad. Like crossing the streams bad.

Mmmm, to a point, I'd say. The oceans were where the Hist also settled, but were sunk thanks to the war between proto-man and proto-mer. I wonder if it's possible those Hist are still alive.

They aren't scum. THey just are truly alien from the view of the descendants fo the ehlnofey, and to us that ha been shown as the 'normal' perspective. wait till we have a game set in Argonia

I can only really see it as an adventure game, with Cyrus as the protagonist. Only a man that BA could venture into that disease and poison infested marsh.

You can't always judge a group relative to modern entities. Is Argonia vile when compared to, say, modern Iceland? Sure. So is just about every historical civilization, and all of the civilizations in TES.

Argonia is socially, technologically, economically, and morally primitive. It's living in the dark ages, and acting accordingly.

Are Hawaiians scum?

(Translation: an entire group of people can't be defined as "scum." I suppose you could call a voluntary idelogical group (like the KKK) "scum," but we're talking about a race of people, and race is not something that we can decide or that defines who we are.)

This whole topic actually was an experiment and food for thought and I must say it was very successful. So you cannot hold an entire race responsible for the actions of a few correct? Then you cannot say all the Dunmer were slave owners or in anyway deserving of what happened to them. My whole point was to garner a reaction and get people to say how it is wrong to judge an entire race by the actions of the few. That is true. I represented a side of the argument. Unfortunately I was doing stuff while this discussion took place so i could not actively participate. It was interesting.

But my true Statement is that the Hist and the An-Xileel are scum and the Argonians should resist the control the Hist have over them and become the ones controlling the Hist. The Infernal City made some disturbing ideas come up when it came to the Hist-Argonian relationship. If you were Argonian would you want to be controlled or exterminated because you disagree with the Hist?

And I still find it disturbing that the Hist kept knowledge of the Oblivion Crisis from the rest of the world. What if the CoC and Martin had failed? The whole of Nirn would have been reformed or destroyed.

I think the biggest problem is that you underestimate and misunderstand the Hist, along with the argonians. In addition, the mortal races already have nearly wiped all the Hist to begin with, and still do pose a threat to what little there is of them. The ones in Black Marsh are the only ones left, unless there happens to be more on Akavir, or somehow they can survive being underwater. Also, the argonians are Hist

I also think the assumption that slavery was the reason why the Hist tried to kick the dunmer off Morrowind is incorrect. Felling the Hist is a much more likely reason, and there are stories of mer felling a Hist, causing the entire area to become barren and lifeless, and for the Hist to take revenge on the mer.

Without the Hist, all that protects the Argonians is Black Marsh's environment, and for all we know the Hist are the ones that poisoned it.

Without the Hist, there is no Black Marsh and Argonians.

And that. The Hist created the Argonians.

How could anyone understand them though? We have very little information on them. From what we have seen in the Lore, books, and games they are presented in a negative light. They do seem very selfish but I suppose they need to be to survive. I just don't think they really have the Argonians best interest at heart. They are making all the other races pissed off. Chiefly the Imperials and Dunmer.

In lore, they're hardly mentioned, save for having nearly their entire home completely and utterly annihilated. In the book, it was mentioned the one in Lilmoth could have been rogue, which it's parent tree was in a previous time. And the ONLY one in the game was forcibly removed, and looked to have been tortured.

As for being selfish, they made the argonians for the purpose of interacting with the outside world. They needed moveable roots to interact with the outside world, and to believe they don't have the best interest of the argonians at heart is an ignorant view of them. Also, the ones you see in Black Marsh are the only ones left, and they seem to reproduce and grow very slowly.

As to why the Imperials would be piss, why? As for the dunmer, the dunmer practically did the same thing to them, and looked to have no intent of stopping. While they would have stopped the raids into Black Marsh, they still were contesting land, and they did fell Hist.

How are the Hist supposed to communicate with the world except through Argonians? If the fanatical group of An-Xileel were gaining power in Black Marsh, there is reason to suspect that the information regarding the Oblivion Crisis was kept a secret for political reasons.

And the Hist might be amoral observers at this point. It might be completely inaccurate to use the words 'good' or 'evil' or 'scum' to try and describe their nature.

I think you are being too hard on the Hist. Even if they could communicate, would anyone listen? They might have seen the futility and done what they could to prepare with the Argonians.

PeteAtoms does make a good point too, and I suspect the Hist also gain knowledge of the outside world through the collective experience of the argonians. Seeing how the dunmer hardly ever considered to not constantly abuse, enslave, and fell the Hist and the argonians, they probably saw the only way to ensure survival is to remove the dunmer from their location.

I'm kind of glad this was posted, even though I prefer Argonians to Dunmer. I like your unique opinion lol.

I suppose I might be being a bit hard on the Hist but conducting genocide on my favorite race kind of forces that view on me. Was the attempted Genocide really necessary? The Dunmer were weak at that time. They could have simply forced them back or took over and established control. Vengeance on an entire race is never fair. Especially when the two race's relationship was supposedly starting to improve.

As to why the Imperials would be pissed off? Technically the Argonians attacked Morrowind which was still a part of the Empire. Unless I am mistaken? And they broke away from the Empire. I am sure there are some other reasons as well.

Something to keep in mind here is how much more we know about the Dumner than the Argonians. Many of us have spent hundreds of hours among the Dunmer, so we're obviously going to be sympathetic. The Hist are mysterious and super alien, and it's tough to appreciate their side of the story because we don't have it. It's easy to demonize the unfamiliar. Their actions, however, seem motivated primarily by self-preservation, which I would say is morally neutral.

At the risk of sounding unfathomably self-righteous, though, I must point out that things like racial superiority, slavery, and genocide are NOT morally neutral. TES' status as a fantasy universe does not suddenly make these things justifiable. All the races are full of good and bad "people" doing good and bad things, and I very much doubt Greg Keyes or any of the lore creators want this issue to be viewed through the lens of good guys and bad guys or racial superiority/inferiority. No group of people deserves to be wiped out, just as no group of people deserves to be enslaved.

As far as slavery is concerned, I would argue that any action a slave takes against the master to free themselves is justified, and if that includes attacking non-slaveholding elements of the society, so be it. I feel like some people must watch a movie like Spartacus and cry out "Stop hurting the Romans! Many of them are simply complicit with slavery!" Now since the Argonians were set free, their actions are petty and vindictive, but a people are hardly "scum" for taking actions to prevent their enslavement. Stories of slaves wreaking terrible, completely unfair and unjustified vengeance on their masters have inspired and delighted mankind for thousands of years.

The empire broke shortly after the OB Crisis when it split into Colovia and The Niben. Also, the Imperials have no real cares as to what is happening outside of Cyrodiil's borders, unless it puts Cyrodiil in jeopardy, like the Thalamor of Valenwood and Summerset Ilse, and whatever what happening in Skyrim to warrant spies.

Hell, Titus flat out tells Attrebus he doesn't give a rat's ass as to what happened in Black Marsh, because it doesn't concern with Cyrodiil. What happened in Morrowind probably garnered the same response to those in Cyrodiil at the time.