The Nords' early experience with elves was being the victims of genocide so it's not like it comes from nowhere.

problem with these arguments is, that they are made from our world understanding and extracted out of an extremely condensed world.

yes, the racism that the different races in tamriel display is objectively bad. but tamriel is an extremely racist continent with an astonishing amount of actual races (not the crap, that is called races in our world). every race in tamriel is strongly racist, many support slavery and warmongering is just daily life. TESV just plays in the home of the nords and therefore we are more exposed to their flavour.

TESV is extremely condensed. how many citicens does windhelm have? maybe 15? the drunk asshole in the gray quarter is probably the most cited source for nord racism. but bethesda had to put one open asshole there, that is even too much for most other inhabitants - if they want to keep racism as a story telling instrument... actually i wish there was more to him. for example you could side with him and harass locals or beat some sense into him. both should have lasting consequences in the world. but that is just not the level of detail we got from TESV...

Yeah I remember considering both sides and then just saying fuck it and stopping the quest entirely when it came time to choose.

still waiting to hear about the non racist natives in tamriel

feel bad for the dark elves in the gray quarter? go look at how the argonians are treated by them. go see that the only reason argonians arent allowed in windhelm is because the dark elves are racist as fuck and would start a riot if they had to live with argonians

Its not racist to resist change from outsiders who happen to be another race.