People really need to stop dragging real world problems/world views into fantasy.
I think that's what we are trying to do here. I don't think there's a problems with talking about subraces of elves but because racists believe that humans are divided into subraces it's a problem to have a template that adheres so closely to that model. I think @mrfuji nailed this.
Here's a good example where this can go:
https://www.thegamer.com/tsr-dave-johnson-star-frontiers-playtest-racist/"Racism" is a word with layers of meaning -- my inner prescriptivist wishes people hadn't started using "racist" when they mean discriminatory but they did. That the original theory of race is: " humans are divided into sub species just like dogs are divided into breeds and these breeds have different mental capacities"
Again if you are talking about entirely fictional species that live to 1000 years old I don't see that as problematic. If you are talking about humans you run right into the trap that NuTSR did.
