For starters, they still appear to worship Auri-El. Compare this http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m43/danburite/ScreenShot7-3.jpg, to the http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-item-Falmer_Hardened_Armor_Male.jpg. Anyone else see the resemblance?

Maybe it's because since they can't actually go into the sun anymore, that they revere it more than ever. Maybe they even see Vyrthur as an avatar of their god?

Thoughts?

That's not necessarily worship, that's more likely artisans maintaining traditional form.

So because they worship the Altmer God-King of hates humanity their not barbaric? That doesn't change their practices really to make them any less what they are.

Maybe not worship, but it's certainly impressive for blind smiths to make it resemble Auri-El that well.

Well, it goes to show that they're not just mindless savages.

OP never said they weren't barbaric. Just not as barbaric as we think. And Gelebor himself says he thinks the Falmer are getting more intelligent, organized, etc.

EDIT: ninja'd by OP

Note, I said any less barbaric.

I see the resemblance, but that certainly doesn't make them any less barbaric.

I dont think the therm "barbaric" will fir with them. I think that with the things they′ve done to them their minds are just lost, and only hate and resentment are in their twisted blind minds.

Being blindly resentful and being barbaric aren't mutually exclusive.

What changed my mind about the Falmer was the way their villages in the lost vale were laid out. It was clear from their contents that different huts housed different members of society, and their baskets of gems and ores and ingredients spoke to me of a legitimate society with commerce and value appreciation. It made me wonder if the Falmer really are as monstrous as we choose to see them. They hate us, true, us being those people who live on the surface and see with the light of Magnus, but I don't think we can call them monsters simply because they know envy.

Would I call them barbaric? Certainly. But the Orcs were called barbaric once, as well. I see them now as a twisted people, disfigured by a curse they didn't earn and hated by all. I'm inclined to agree with Gelebor. Perhaps there's hope for them yet, though probably not as long as there are people who see only the savagery with which they butcher their foes.

They're Morlocks.

Of course not, but in the case of the barbaric tribes, we can define them as rustic people with old traditions. Traditions that may be uncivilized to the "civilized" ones.
What I try to say (this is a campus for big debate) is that, in the case of the Falmer, they are just not rational, while in the case of the barbarians (lets take the Forsworm) they fight for an ideal (may be resentment) but they use their reason even in the nonesense of their actions.
The falmer just lost they reason capacity, they are more like angry animals in a permanent state of hate.
Is just my view, of course.

It's important to remember that the traditional use of the term 'barbarians' refers to 'everyone who isn't me.'

Anyone who isn't Greek you mean.

Or in China, those who aren't Chinese, or in Ancient India those who aren't Aryan, in Rome those who aren't Roman, etc.

We use the Greek, but the meaning is cross-cultural.

Yes, I was just trying (unsucsessfully) to apply the therm in the elder scrolls universe