He tolerates non-Nords. This attitude would continue as High King. What really matters is how the other Jarls feel about elves.

And the Stormcloaks do not want to drive out all elves. As I said, they seem to use "the elves" for when they're talking about the Dominion. Drive out the Dominion. Give me a quote where a important member of the Stormcloaks says they want to drive out all elves.

He's an "asset" because they can manipulate him into doing what they want, without him even knowing. They did it when he was originally captured, planting the ideas that lead to the civil war before letting him out (in such a way to let him think he stole the information and escaped on his own), and further weaken the Empire. He's uncooperative because he won't knowingly aid the Thalmor, and he's "dormant" because there's nothing more they need to do with him right now. And with tensions the way they are, any direct or indirect contact may backfire.

No, it's because the Nords won't let them in. The Nords only allow them to work the docks while living in the Assemblage (and they apparently steal the occasional shipment in retaliation). The invasion happened over a century and a half ago. I don't doubt there's some bad blood, but I don't think it's to the level that they're completely incapable of living in the same city.

Well there's no reason you can't go back. Volcanic ash should make for good farming soil, and with the government gone, it wouldn't be hard to reestablish yourself on a new piece of property. It's a literal blank slate, an entrepreneur's dream. If I was a Nord living close to the Morrowind border, I'd go over and see if I could salvage an ebony mine or something.

"tolerates"? He doesn't let argonians live in the city. That doesn't sound like tolerance. And surely we should expect more than "tolerance" from a figure like him anyhow.

On the subject of his relationship to the Thalmor, he's being used. It seemed clear to me that he was *not* a willing or even necessarily knowing asset to them, but he's enough of a fool that they can make his opposition to them useful in furthering their goals.
Which is precisely what he's doing with his war against the Empire and Thalmor.

Eh. Yeah, that was the wrong word to use.

The dumner do not exactly seem like the forgive and forget types.

"So you guys took advantage of a huge disaster and kicked us when we were down.Let's hug out."

add to that

A dumner wrote a book in game claiming that they were going to take Skyrim from the Nords and make it their new home.

I believe it prudent to keep dumner separated from everybody.

The Dunmer are generally dikes, that's for sure, but "I believe it prudent to keep dumner separated from everybody"?
Wow, seriously?

seriously.

A bunch of ticked off refugees with an undeserved sense of superiorty and entitlement.

but maybe you are right letting em run wild could'nt possibly end badly for anyone

UESP doesn't have diologue, but I recall both Galmar and Ysarald saying something along the lines of 'first we defeat the Empire, then we drive out the elves'. I shouldn't have said 'all' elves, but my point is that the ambiguity is unsettling in light of everything else we know.

As for tolerance: let me put it this way. You move to a new town. You get beaten up on the street; when you go to a guard he says 'svck it up'. You get robbed; the guards say the same thing. The one of your family members is killed; you know who did it, but the guards won't do anything. You've had enough. Next time you see one of your tormentors, you knife him in the street. The guards cut you to pieces. This is why 'tolerance' means nothing without legal equality.

I would like to note that there are several succesful elves in Windhelm whom nobody seems particularly bothered about. Some of them (or all of them? I forget) are Altmer for crying out loud.
It seems that when it comes to discrimination against elves the people of Windhelm have singled out the Dunmer. And that's where the culture clash lies.

The Altmer in the city came there voluntarily for their own reasons. The Dunmer are involuntary refugees who are trying to hold on to their own identity in the wake of great hardship. This creates friction and this lies at the root of the problem. The Thalmor, Dunmer being elves or non-Nords in general, it's all incidental. It's just that two rather rigid and proud cultures have been forced by circumstances to live together, breeding mutual resentment. The Nords happen to be on top, but it probably would've been no different had the situation been reversed, and it probably would've been no different had the Dunmer 'kept going' and settled in one of the other cities as one of them suggests. Atlhough it certainly doesn't help that Windhelm is one of the more 'traditional' Nord cities.

That's not to be taken as a justification for what's going on or a defense of Ulfric, but it is to stress that the attitude towards the Dunmer is a problem born of deeper issues in Windhelm society and one seperate of the general dislike towards elves that pervades Skyrim (and the Stormcloaks), imho. Likewise, the Imperials taking over won't magicly solve the issue either.

Good post, though I think you understate the implied discrimination against Altmer. My concern is the way in which the different types of resentment might fuel each other with someone like Ulfric in charge, especially if he were to take the cynical route of blaming mer for his own future failures or the suffering of Nords.

I'm not saying it's a good thing.

Let's put it this way: You want to actively worship your god. The Empire tries to arrest you (the priest in Whiterun claims to have been arrested by Imperials, having bribed his way out). You eventually, through bribes, escape. Thalmor come. You are tortured, and eventually give out random names so they stop torturing you. How do you prevent this? Kick them out. But you can't, because the Empire allows it. Worshiping underground isn't freedom. Might as well say the Dunmer should move somewhere else.

This is not equal to one racist city.

Not sure about Yrsarald, but Galmar gives a very ambiguous answer if you ask him if he opposes non-Nords. He says he opposes tyranny. If you say Skyrim is your home, he likes the answer (even if your an elf). Ralof, a high ranking member, says you don't have to be a Nord to fight for Skyrim.

Yes it is, in the forums, at least.

I tend to get more worked up about things on here than I do in game, yes, I had to restrain myself from slitting the throat of that one Nord who told me that he'd punch me back to Morrowind; I kicked his ass, and he claimed I didn't fight fair. Being ex Morag Tong, repenting and trying to take control of one's own blood lust, I found it difficult not to remove his head from his body. But other than that, the Nords really don't bug me. Some of them I like, actually. Specifically the Ravencores and that Bruunulf Free-Winter fellow (that's not how his name is spelled.)

But I do want to say that the Orc argument is invalid, mainly because Orcs want no part of Nordic society. They either stay with the clan, become sellswords, or join the Imperial Legion. They have no interest in setting up permanent residence in any of Skyrim's cities, nor do they have much interest in the political landscape, so they have no problem with not being equally represented.

As for Beth's choice to make everybody hate one another rather than developing interesting hybrid cultures, that just seems like Skyrim's direction as a game. Every guild is in decline, nothing is in its glory days, everything is going to complete [censored]. Honestly, I feel like the game tries too hard to get these points across, and thus sacrifices lots of interesting possibilities in the lore. Not to say that Nord's should welcome the Mer with open arms, but the extent that they reject them seems a bit drastic. Specially sense their enemies are yellow and brownish, not gray.

Edit: Never mind. I really hope they release DLC continuing the story after the Civil War.

Well [censored], looks like Ulfric needs to get his eyes checked, as he just sold my Saxhleel a home in Windhelm, and keeps promoting him in his army.

The difference is, that if it were reverse, people would love the dunmer even more for being "different."

Because said Saxhleel is useful to him and his cause. The fact that Ulfric is a hypocrite is not news to me: just look at what he did in the Reach. Self-determination for the Reachmen is not the same as self-determination for the Nords, apparently.

[edit] to add: I don't see this as an issue of Nords versus mer. I quite like the Nords, actually, including some of the Stormcloaks- I just loathe Ulfric, and I'm yet to see anyone convincingly defend him.

The Reachmen were always a giant zit on everyone's ass, even before the nords. They've been hostile, and very unfriendly with EVERYONE since forever. The book "The Bear of Markhath" is nothing but Imperial propaganda to discredit Ulfric, only less obvious like, say, http://www.imperial-library.info/content/pig-children-1 (which was then later discredited by the book "The True Nature of Orcs")

I won't say that the Forsworn aren't as nasty as the come, but the accounts given by the Forsworn imprisoned in Cidna Mine (and the fact that they're being used as unwitting puppets to enforce the will of some powerful Stormcloak sympathizers doesn't help) seem to suggest that Ulfric and his men were as brutal as the book suggests.

He probably was very brutal, but a key missing info was really how brutal the Reachman also are. The author likely glossed over that, just to make Ulfric look like an unjustified ass. The Foresworm were never nice people, and for all we know, Ulfric may have had to go to such brutal methods because they were highly brutal themselves.

Also, Ulfric was probably very pissed off about everything and how the empire abandoned them.

My point isn't to say 'oh noes poor Reachmen mean Ulfric'. It's that the Reachmen want the Nords out and to be free to practice their own religion, just as the Stormcloaks want the Thalmor and legions out and to be free to practice their religion.

That's hardly an all or nothing affair, is it?
It's easy to list only the similarities and claim they're oh so much alike, but I see plenty of differences between the Forsworn and the Stormcloaks, not the least of which is that the Forsworn are pretty eager to use terror and wanton murder of civilians as tools to achieve their goals. No matter what you think of Ulfric, that's not his way.

But...that's never really been the case with the Reachmen, they've been constant asses to everyone since ever.

Well in real life, people hate each other. The Nords and the Elves have been fighting since the Merethic. Now that the Thalmor have spit on their god, they're likely to harbor utmost contempt toward anything with pointy ears. Not to mention the bad blood the Nords have had with the Dunmer while they were still the Chimer. Two failed invasions and the banishing of Shor is bound to stay in the Nordic collective memory.

Not to mention the Dunmer nationalism that's bound to follow the Dunmer wherever they go. That's just the Velothi way. The Nords already view the Dunmer as haughty elves, then the Dunmer live up to the stereotype. As expected though, it's the Hlaalu who withstand the test of time.

I'd like to add that the Reachmen use some highly esoteric magic, which combined with their hostility isn't going to make them fans with either the Empire or native Nords.

If the Reachmen are such a pain, why doesn't everyone leave them the hell alone? The issue isn't who is naughty and who is nice, but why there is a war in the first place.

Anyway, my point was that Ulfric claims rights for Nords which he denies others and is thus a hypocrite, not that the Forsworn are peace-loving hippies who only want to be left alone.