It's a matter of personal preference, I just happen to like my fantasy black and white and not in shades of grey.
Exactly, it's personal preference. So, if they were to add more "exotic races" to the CC, you could just choose to not pick it.
Seems like a win-win to me.
You get to pick more conservative/common races, and those who want the other ones can pick them.
Is that a problem though? That we need "evil" things to fight? Can't our opponents simply have another perspective than ourselves without being tagged evil for the race or culture they come from?
I still agree with you that a main character Yuan-ti pureblood would face prejudice and fear from many populations based on history etc but I don't agree with you that the fear and hate based on prejudice or general conception of a race is a crucial element. I don't know the general age demographic for dnd players but surely the majority should be old enough to understand moral and philosophical concepts that goes deeper than "me-good you-bad because someone says so". What is an evil-inclined society? From who's perspective and do members of that society share that?
+1!
I actually like, for instance, what they did with Drows (controversial I know).
Some NPCs would attack on sight or be extra agressive (Damays, Nymessa, Jeorna, an ox...), other would be more open minded (like Tieflings who might know better since they are often seen as just fiend/evil), some are cautious but might welcome good deeds (Zevlor, Arabella's parents, Barcus Wroot 💜...) and some even appreciate them just for being a Drow (Kagha, Goblins, Duegars and fellow Drows...more or less).
I prefer that instead of everyone attacking you on sight or not talking to you...just cause. That would be seeing NPCs as a boring monolith.
Seems like this is a debate of nature vs nurture. The thing is, this isn't real life. RPG can have defined rules, so the moral compass can be defined as well. Some systems stick very closely to the alignment chart : morality isn't societal there, it is divine and transcend the life of the characters in it. DnD is part of those manichean role play games.
DnD used to be like that, not as much anymore.
