Don't be silly. Khajiit are not allowed into imperial cities, either. Meanwhile Dunmer are living in Windhelm, and the most you can accuse Ulfric of is neglecting them- he's not persecuting them. The jarl who takes over in Morthal after a Stormcloak victory has an Argonian housecarl.

There is reason to not let Argonians into Windhelm- namely, that Dunmer are already living there.

Talk to Niranye, the Altmer (!!!) vendor in Windhelm about why the Dunmer have such problems in that city.

And OMG, please do not talk about the imperials and their blessed tolerance. They are the ones who let the other provinces go to the Dominion without a whimper. It's the Thalmor that Stormcloaks hate, not all elves.

Bottom line- ALL of Tamriel's races are racist toward the others. Imperials think they're the divines' gift to humanity, so they're no different.

Yes. I'll admit that's one of the most tragic stories in all of Skyrim. First invaded and driven off their homeland by the Nords. If that wasn't bad enough, the Dewmer picked up where the Nords left of and betrayed them in continued genocide. You don't understand the full extent of their horror story until you do the TG questline. Then you finally encounter the fabled statue of their fallen King, and realize all the Falmer lore you read about in The Snow Prince was the truth.

dunmer likes everybody.

The problem is, nobody likes the dunmer >_>.

They didn't seem to be quite so open and friendly in Morrowind.

My Dunmer joined the Stormcloaks for the sole purpose of exacting revenge on the Imperials. They tried to execute him without a trial for crying out loud!

Sure sure. Jenassa really likes Khajiit, she'll even tell them to come closer so she can make them into a rug. XD

Dunmer are living in Windhelm like Jews were living Warsaw ghettos , they were accepted by the High King (not by Ulfric ) and the last thing Ulfric can afford in the midst of a civil war is to alienate the Dunmers and get a rebellion in Windhelm , it's also likely that he needs them because they do the dirty jobs that Nords don't want to do . Besides the point you make about a single Argonian , well that one must have been Very lucky or did something Truly exceptional to earn this place .


She's one of those "collaborators" who got a special place under the occupation in France/Poland/Norway , thrived from the situation , and consequently , didn't want to open their eyes to what happened . What Niranye says basically is " Look , i'm useful to them and behave well , i shut up and contribute to their economy , i'm well off and couldnt care less about the sufferings of the others as long as it doesn't affect her " , she's basically egotistical and dismissive about the Dark Elves . Like many Thalmor/Altmers , she thinks hersef superior to Dunmers and do not like them as well , it's pretty clear when you hear what she says


First of all , it's not even for debate that the Imperials are more tolerant than Stormcloaks , of course they are not the paragon of tolerance (think like Romans compared to Germanic tribes , Romans may have burned entire cities and often been ruthless , but they were still much more open to other cultures in the end ) , but the laws of the Empire and culture/values of Imperials are more cosmopolitan . Secondly , the Empire has not let other provinces go to the Dominion as far as i'm aware of , they actually lost a war and had to make concessions after a treaty (think treaty of Versailles ) . What the Empire is trying in Skyrim is to consolidate because they expect a war in the near future , the Empire counts on all races of Tamriel , the Stormcloack actually want only one race to rule Skyrim and oppose the Dominion alone ( as if they had a chance alone against the Thalmor , it's like Hitler who wanted to oppose nearly the whole world in the end )

"Except Nords?" Have you not played a Nord character? My Nord got called a milk drinker all the time.

You act as though the Nords have always been against the Empire and everything the Empire stands for. That's simply not true. The Nords were a HUGE part of the Empire. Talos/Tiber Septim was a Nord. Their problem is that the Empire is falling apart and giving way to the Thalmor to do whatever they want. The Thalmor are trying to remove Talos from the Nordic pantheon. Such an act has a very, very significant effect on the entire world, if Talos should fall from worship. It's one step in unmaking Mundus.

How funny it is when Dunmer get a taste of their own medicine. The Dunmer are second only to Altmer as the most racist race in all of Tamriel. Maybe we notice it as more pinpointed by the Nords, but the Nords are in the middle of a war where it seems like everyone is against them. The Dunmer in TES3 were just chilling and they still managed to be more racist.

Oh right, so people who work hard and mind their own business are collaborators. I see. *facepalm*

And the fact that every race in Tamriel looks down on the other is precisely the point.
They let Valenwood, Black Marsh and Elsweyr go, were going to hand over Hammerfell- they've all but handed Skyrim over to the Thalmor, too. They did nothing when the Argonians invaded what's left of Morrowind. The imperials only care about imperials and whoever else can benefit them and their capital.

After his victory, Ulfric says "Skyrim will lead Tamriel against the Thalmor." It is not true that he and the Stormcloaks expect to go it alone. They simply want Skyrim to be ruled by Nords and Nords to not be simpering patsies and let the empire drag them down into an ever growing list of concessions to the Dominion.

For comparsion you're holding up the Romans... who enslaved anybody who wasn't Roman and often brutally enforced whatever the emperor's religion happened to be? That is your idea of "tolerance"?

Thank you Celan. What goes around comes around. Oddly enough, I don't see any of the pro-Imperial faction complaining about the expansionist attitudes of the Imperials in trying to keep what is clearly a deteriorating union. If this TES had been set in Cyrodil instead of Skyrim, and had a Nord/Stormcloak occupying force in Cyrodil, wonder what the pro-Imperiaist faction would be saying then??? Now why do I get the feeling the name calling would be exactly the same from the same Imperialist faction? Except this time around, the Imperialists would have A VALID CAUSE TO CRUSADE AGAINST. So having to forcibly impose one's culture and ideology on another set of people is another form of racism IMO. The Nords only want the right of self determination as a people. They want freedom of Skyrim from an ongoing Imperialist occupation.

This is anologus to the way the American colonists became disillusioned with inept British rule and finally rebelled. Or the failed modern day US occupation of Iraq---the Iraqi people simply want ALL foreigers out of their country. That includes the US, England and Taliban insurrectionists who are predominantly foreign muslims. The similarity between these two groups? Both desire the right of self determination. Both groups initially tried diplomacy, but were ignored as their requests fell on deaf ears. Which leaves the only remaining possibility---rebellion to free their homeland from the occupiers and preserve their heritage.

So I can't understand why all the mud slinging and name calling (f@cking nazis??? are you kidding me???) where the Stormcloaks and Nords are concerned. Nords have the right to self determination as a sovreign people. A fundamental concept which the Imperials have yet to get through their thick skulls. As for the other races--the Argonians, Kadjit, and all Elves in particular---Ulfric isn't holding a crossbow to their heads holding them hostage in Skyrim now, is he? He isn't doing what the Dwarves did to the Falmer now is he? So nothing is stopping these folk from returning back to their respective homelands. You'd think with all that bad treatment they'd just pack up and leave. Some folks are gluttonous masochists I guess

This is exactly what Ulfric wants them to do btw. Hell, Cyrodil and Morrowind are but a stone's throw away to the south.....
And let's not forget what happened back in Oblivion some 200 years earlier. It seems everyone has forgotten the extent of racism that existed in Bravil as well.....

You've obviously never played Morrowind. < _ <.

You speak as If all Nords support the Stormcloaks. The True Sons and Daughters of Skyrim are fighting with the Empire, side by side with Imperials, Redguards, Bretons and even Altmer. Can Ulfric claim he speaks for all Nords? Do all Nords want Independance?
Its called a "Civil war" for a reason.

what i'm saying is that she knows perfectly that most of Windhem inhabitants hate Elves (specially of her kind ,Altmer ... ) , and that Ulfric would never lift a finger for non Nords , yet she finds life great because she is not personally segregated and profits for her position of "priviledged sub-citizen " . that's why the anology with collaborators sprung to my mind , but i respect your opinion .
Yes Every race in Tamriel shows some form of xenophobia like all countries on earth in real life , but some shows it far more than others , and Stormcloaks are some of the most "hardliners" from my point of view


Ok i think i understand your point

What you mean is the Empire has become Weak (not that they willingly let these countries rebel ) , and thus has lost some regions.

Hum , Bosmers of Valenwood allied with the Dominions , they chose to , the Empire just did not have the military might to prevent it . Argonians of Blackmarsh took advantage of the eruption of the Red Mountain and big cataclysm that the Dunmer suffered to invade them .
Yes the Empire has become weak and the Dominions/Thalmors profit from it , but do you think it's better to further Weaken it by getting Skyrim to be a mess too (not everyone is Stormcloack supporter in Skyrim or like Ulfric ) ? Why do you think the Thalmor encouraged the Ulfric rebellion ? Don't you think it's because they thought Skyrim would be further weakened under Ulfric and a cakewalk to invade afterwards ?



I precised in my post that Romans burned cities and committed slaughters , but in the end , Rome had Celtic , Germanic etc people , it had non-Roman born generals , absorbed a lot from other cultures and had a climate of relative tolerance at some point , if you compare to their neighbours , their culture and society was more cosmopolitan , like the Empire in Tamriel .


It's the Nords that made the Empire happen in the beggining , Skyrim was pro Empire loooooong before the Stormcloak , they are not occupied , they are an important part of it , it's just happen that the Empire has been severely weakened (think 1929 crisis and WW1) so Ulfric (sort of Hitler ) wants to take advantage of it and killed the high king to make a coup and seize power to apply his "Nords only " project ...

All nations are sovereign within the Empire , it's like the USA , Texas and California are free , but part of a larger structure to defend their interests ... In Tamriel terms , that means if they start going it alone agains the much larger Thalmor , they will be obliterated and claims of "sovereignity" will look stupid once they are crushed , because under Thalmor rule , they will be what Dunmer would be under the Stormcloacks : sub citizens , slaves , pariah ...

But its fair enough , it's actually great that we disagree , it proves the lore and story is complex and good , it means anyone can make his own interpretation of the politics within Tamriel

Where did you get that from? Ysgramor, an ancient Nordic king started a war with the snow elves and drove them underground. Then you know pretty much the rest.

Not to mention the Battle of Red mountin.

If Stormcloaks are such hardline racists, how is it even possible for an Altmer to set herself up and (by her own words) do alright in a relatively short time?

It sounds like you're using special pleading. Any prosperous non-Nord in Skyrim is an exception and contributing to the problem, while any non-imperial who prospers in the empire does so because of the system.

Divines forfend that someone should have to work hard and prove themselves- like my Nord PC also had to do, who was called an "outsider" and a "milk drinker."

The point is that the imperials only bestir themselves when Cyrodiil and the Imperial City is in threat.

They want chaos, neither a Stormcloak nor imperial victory. And this really has nothing to do with whether Stormcloaks are more racist or not.


This is ridiculous. The Romans had lots of neighbors, and many of them were "cosmopolitan." Persia, Egypt, Greece... you name it. And the Germanic tribes you mentioned disparagingly, they mixed with the Celts and allied with neighbors when they needed to, as well. In places where Germanic peoples invaded, they assimilated quite well with local cultures- England, Ireland, Rus, etc. These sweeping generalizations add nothing to the discussion.

That's old news. The current empire is a long way from Tiber Septim's. Comparing Ulfric to Hitler.... that one is a non-starter.

Is that why the imperials think they should be able to hand pick the high king and execute Ulfric without a trial? They are not even respecting their own laws, let alone Nord sovereignty.

This thread is missing a simple fact about ES games, every race is racist, some more obviously then others, but all of them ultimatly act towards theire race interests over any sort of "greater good".

Nords: natural enemies of the elfs, theire "moral code", or pride masqueraded by a false sense of honor leads them into acts of extreme violence.
Althmer: consider themselves the most advanced and civilised of existing races, they invaded the empire with intention of wiping out the human race.
Imperials: Consider themselves the most civilised and fit to rule over other humans, they completly neglect or consider other provinces a bore compared to theire superior culture.
Dunmer: in skyrim, they are basically war refugees, that want to preserve theire culture has much has possible, and that leads to a neutrality that infuriates some nords, that happen to be in the midle of a civil war.

Every group of races is racist if you want to go with a black and white perspective of the world, reality is racism is a personal trait, and can't and shouldn't be atributed to a whole group, but because this is a game members of this races will be "in character".

Germanic tribes didn't live in cities at this period and sparsely mixed with the Celts , mainly in modern eastern France and Belgium , but actually they spent most of their time fighting them or fighting among themselves . I agree Celts were more civilized (cities , trade , contacts with other cultures ) but still lagging compared to the Roman Empire who absorbed much more people and culture (quote me a Celt philospher , Celt corpus of law , German tribes monuments at this period ... tolerance exist when culture flourishes ) . Only Hellenic civilization compares in term of "mixity and tolerance " , but then it was still not as cosmopolitan than the Roman Empire .

In Britain , the Germanic tribes (Saxons and Vikings) actually slaughtered and installed themselves by routing the locals towards the south west and taking over their lands/crops , they were nothing like tolerant or civilized or cosmopolitan by Roman standards .

Using the term ridiculous is not cool cause the person who answers it sometimes can overreact , fortunately , i'm sure you are a kind person who happened to disagree with me

It would be boring if we would all agree , it would be pointless to discuss , i liked reading the opposite arguments you made in your posts as it makes the whole Skyrim politics fun to think and talk about even though i still disagree with you as i think you exagerates the Empire's flaws and ignore the Stormcloak xenophobia and delusion about fighting the Thalmor alone , i also think you conveniently omit to talk about Ulfric's real motives , which in my opinion are just power/ego based , and not based on the general interest , but again i respect your opinion

Now you're mixing criteria. The fact that Romans codified everything and had philosophers has nothing to do with how culturally tolerant they were.

Germanic monuments- runestones and standing stones- but again, irrelevant to the discussion. The Romans were good at exploiting people or eliminating them if they didn't accept the Roman way. If that is what you call tolerance, well I guess...

The Saxons and Vikings mixed with the local population. Genetic studies show that the modern British population is still majority Celt. The Vikings assimilated into all the British Isles, intermarried, and both adopted local culture as well as passing on their own influences. The same when the Normans (also originally Vikings) came in.

This is what people do- and though the Romans were good at using colonies, they were also prigs and thought themselves a superior brand of human, and would dispense of or oppress those colonies if it suited them. So they compare to the empire pretty well all in all!

Well, you're free to have your own interpretation and there are those in the game who say that. Maybe some of those same people have mixed motives of their own.

Dunmer don't like anyone, not even other Dunmer.

I think if they had to choose, however, they would probably go with the Empire, just due to the fact that in the past it provided centuries of peace and a stable government, whereas Ulfric has shown himself to be a turncoat (read the dossier on him in the Thalmor embassy) and a butcher (read the book on the sacking of Markarth).

i just wish people would say STORMCLOAKS instead of NORDS. Not all Nords want the Empire gone - in fact, I would wager most of them do not. If the Nords wanted the Empire gone, the Empire wouldn't stand a chance, not as weak as it is.

The Empire abandoned Hammerfell. This is fact. I would not be surprised to see Hammerfell as TES VI.

The Empire ALWAYS treated Elsweyr and The Black Marsh as second-class provinces. They abandoned the Empire after the Empire proved itself too weak to lead them.

Should Skyrim be any different?

Ulfric Stormcloak's motives are irrelevant. If Nords feel like the Empire is still speaking for them, they are loyal to the Empire. If Nords feel like the Empire has abandoned them by abandoning their greatest hero, then they join the Stormcloaks. No one follows a power-mad murderer. They follow an ideal.

Edit: I'm neither for or against the Stormcloaks. But bear in mind that the Empire has to both 'apologize' for its Tiber Septim worship, and also discredit any supporters of Tiber Septim. So be careful of what propoganda you swallow.

The Dunmer in the game tend to stay neutral. They are no longer part of the Empire, the Nords do not really want them there. They believe that it is not their fight. The Empire probably makes slightly more sense than the stormcloaks, but in the end if you're a Dunmer, you'll have to come up with your own reasons. To me, "The Stormcloaks are racist" isn't a good motivation to up and join the Empire.

I thought Morrowind was part of the Empire.. Since it was overrun by Argonians, I'd be pretty pissed at the Empire if I were a Dunmer. They're off playing cat and mouse with the Stormcloaks, and they tried to execute me to no reason, instead of sending all available troops to fight off the Argonians (the Dunmer themselves wouldn't care about the Thalmor -- all they'd want is their own province back).

I haven't gotten that far in the main quest, but I've yet to see anything that suggests Ulfric is a murderer. Even supporters of the Empire will tell you that he challenged Torygg to a duel, which he accepted -- Ulfric didn't outright assassinate him, as the Empire would have you believe.

It still is, although slowly decaying away like the rest of the empire.

@ the OP: It doesn't sound as though you've played Morrowind. So I strongly recommend taking some time to acquaint yourself with the BIG picture in TES lore before making your choice on the MQ. There's much, much, more to the civil strife, racial and class warfare being currently waged across Skyrim. The central plot line of TES has always revolved around the power struggle between 2 racial groups. The first group is the race of Man (Nords, Redguards, Imperials and the biracial Bretons, the mixed racial progeny of the Altmer & humans in High Rock). The second group is the race of Mer (the Aldmeri Eleven folk) These are the Altmer, Dunmer/Chimer, Ayleids, Falmer, Dwemer, Bosmer, Orsimer). Also, note that in the current TES time of present day Skyrim, the MQ contains not one but THREE simultaneous plots:

1. Alduin vs all of Tamriel and the TES universe (the high selling point of the MQ in Skyrim)
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Alduin

2. The Thalmor Aldermeri Dominion aka The Mer vs. everbody else--led by the Altmer, this unholy union consists of the Altmer (Summerset Isle), Maormer (Pyandonea), Bosmer(Valenwood), and Khajiit(Elyswer).
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Great_War#The_Great_War
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Thalmor
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Altmer

3. The Civil War aka Nord Stormcloaks vs everybody else----this appears to be the plot that everyone seems real fixiated with on the forums The Civil War is a direct result of the Great War after the Oblivion crisis in 4E. All thanks to failed---and completely inept---Imperial rule that led to an even bigger failure in the Great War. Due to poor Imperial leadership in the Great War, there's a good chance that Hammerfell and The Black Marsh will be lost to the Empire for good in TES VI. And most likely Morrowind as well.

Especially since the end of the Oblivion crisis where the Argonians finally overthrew their Dunmer masters (who enslaved them for a millennium while the Imperials/Empire stood idly by). The Skyrim Dunmer are descendants of refugees who fled Morrowind due to a combination of the environmental blight at Red Mountain and The Hist assault of invading Argonians after the Oblivion crisis. There's also a side quest you get from the Dunmer merchant in Riften which provides insight on this.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Black_Marsh
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Morrowind

Never mind.