I hadn't realized that War of the Spider Queen involved Eilistraee lightening the skin of the drow. That's a problem and possibly the UR source of this problem. Might have to read that. (and if so WotC might do well to apologize for that)
It's actually the Lady Penitent series where that occurs, which is a sequel trilogy to the WoTSQ series. Though you might want to read WoTSQ first for context since WoTSQ sorta 'sets the stage' for the LP. From there, Empyrean Odyssey is sequel trilogy to *that* where the infamous Spellplague gets kicked off. Basically a congo line of escalating-ly questionable metaplot decisions. Shame, because there were parts of WoTSQ that I genuinely enjoyed, with an interesting premise whose potential was just never met for a variety of reasons.
When I look at Tasha's I see artists using colors that make it clear that the skin tones are not like human ones. Drow go from charcoal to coal and, were I a WotC artist, I would avoid coal as color because that could easily be confused for a human skin tone. I'd go for charcoal and I would emphasize the blues in the black colors. Which why I selected it as unproblematic. My favorite 5e drawing so far is the Matron Mother in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes -- ethereal, unworldy, timeless.
Staying away from hues that could be taken as human is for the best. IMO. WoTC seemingly deciding to whiten the drow to avoid the controversies to my cynical mind-very typical WoTC always taking the easy way out. If they wanted to counteract the racial controversies, addressing the Curse of Ham stuff D&D fans have had problems with for ages might have bee a good place to start, but hey...what do I know.
more to subject, IMO the seldarine/lolthsworn is a clunky and weird distinction mechanically, but I wouldn't mind it nearly as much if they weren't treated as in-universe distinction-iirc you can find the terms being used in game somewhere which is jarring, because they really weren't forgotten realms terms before this game. 'Spider-kisser' was a term, but 'loltsworn'? no. Certainly not 'seldarine drow'. The eye thing though is much worse than some new invented terms.
Somewhat off topic but doesn't Vhaerun want to institute a patriarchy no less oppressive than the matriarchy of Lolth?
That's a question that does not have a simple answer. He actually promises cooperation and equality of the sexes, and some of his clergy make good on this dogma and form societies where Drow men and Women are more or less equal. The thing about Vhaeraun though is that he's also a bit of a sociopath who will tell people whatever they want to hear if it gets them on his side. Priestesses of Lolth will be told he'll grant them wealth, power, that they'll be installed as the new matrons after the revolution is over, or that they'll be his chosen or even his consort. He tends not to make good on those promises though-they (and everyone else) are all just tools to him. The statistics laid out in the demihuman deities give has 1% of his clergy represented by these undercover clerics, now keeping in mind that these would be mostly female....
less than 1% of his
entire clergy is female. Clearly traitor priestesses making the transition and new female clergy being joining the ranks is basically not happening in practice.
By contrast, Lolth's clergy is 4% male. So yeah, the Drow god who espouses gender equality has worse gender equality in his clergy than
Lolth. It gets worse. One of the big dictates Vhaeraun has is growing and spreading. Vhaeraun's worshippers are really active in the slave trade. I'd really rather not spell it out how those are connected. Suffice to say he's a really evil and insidious deity.
