Why libertarians/anarchists need to lie

[Tear-Down-the-Wall]

I've been watching Star Trek: The Next Generation again.  I have to wonder if Roddenberry wasn't a closet anarcho-communist.   It is very interesting watching the show now being an anarchist.

I would like to read some anarcho-space fiction.  Anarchists leave earth and are mercilessly hunted by the one world earth government.  How would the fledgling anarchist space colonies fight off their attackers? Tune in next week...

Well technically Roddenberry didn't have a hand in Next Generation. However in the 60s there were rumors going around that he was a communist and Star Trek was a commie plot to brainwash us capitalist.

Anyway, let's think of anarchist/libertarian themed movies and books by anarchist/libertarians.

J.R.R. Tolkien
-The Hobbit
-Lord of the Rings

Philip K. Dick
-Blade Runner
-Minority Report
-Total Recall

V for Vendetta

Demolition Man

The Matrix (heard the Wachowskis are socialist but I see anti-authoritarian themes in their work)

[Syock]

Anyway, let's think of anarchist/libertarian themed movies and books by anarchist/libertarians.

J.R.R. Tolkien
-The Hobbit
-Lord of the Rings

Where do you see it in this?  A big part of the story was a guy being born a prince and eventually reclaiming his rule on the world.  A bunch of statists were heros.  Other than the hobbits, who were being used, they were all essentially the politically elite.

[State-God]

@Syock Not sure about LOTR itself, but I know that Tolkien increasingly moved towards anarchism as he aged, and said so quite openly.

[Tear-Down-the-Wall]

Anyway, let's think of anarchist/libertarian themed movies and books by anarchist/libertarians.

J.R.R. Tolkien
-The Hobbit
-Lord of the Rings

Where do you see it in this?  A big part of the story was a guy being born a prince and eventually reclaiming his rule on the world.  A bunch of statists were heros.  Other than the hobbits, who were being used, they were all essentially the politically elite.

True but if you read about the Shire it was pretty much an anarchist community. I highly doubt Tolkien's Shire and the Shire Society is a coincidence in terms of the name. That and as State-God said he admitted to being an anarchist, kinda.


“My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning the abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs) — or to ‘unconstitutional’ Monarchy. I would arrest anybody who uses the word State (in any sense other than the inaminate real of England and its inhabitants, a thing that has neither power, rights nor mind); and after a chance of recantation, execute them if they remained obstinate! If we could go back to personal names, it would do a lot of good. Government is an abstract noun meaning the art and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so to refer to people. […] Anyway the proper study of Man is anything but Man; and the most improper job of any many, even saints (who at any rate were at least unwilling to take it on), is bossing other men. Not one in a million is fit for it, and least of all those who seek the opportunity. At least it is done only to a small group of men who know who their master is. The mediaevals were only too right in taking nolo episcopari as the best reason a man could give to others for making him a bishop. Grant me a king whose chief interest in life is stamps, railways, or race-horses; and who has the power to sack his Vizier (or whatever you dare call him) if he does not like the cut of his trousers. And so on down the line. But, of course, the fatal weakness of all that — after all only the fatal weakness of all good natural things in a bad corrupt unnatural world — is that it works and has only worked when all the world is messing along in the same good old inefficient human way. […] There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamating factories and power-stations; I hope that, encouraged now as ‘patriotism’, may remain a habit! But it won’t do any good, if it is not universal”

From J. R. R. Tolkien. The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien. ed. Humphrey Carpenter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1981), 63 -4.

[Syock]

True but if you read about the Shire it was pretty much an anarchist community. I highly doubt Tolkien's Shire and the Shire Society is a coincidence in terms of the name. That and as State-God said he admitted to being an anarchist, kinda.

It is one thing to be an anarchist, another to write an anarchist story.  You can't really claim the story to be anarchist themed just because the guy that wrote it became an anarchist later in life.  

Did you even read that quote?  It didn't sound very anarchist to me.  It sounded confused.  

[Tear-Down-the-Wall]

True but if you read about the Shire it was pretty much an anarchist community. I highly doubt Tolkien's Shire and the Shire Society is a coincidence in terms of the name. That and as State-God said he admitted to being an anarchist, kinda.

It is one thing to be an anarchist, another to write an anarchist story.  You can't really claim the story to be anarchist themed just because the guy that wrote it became an anarchist later in life.  

Did you even read that quote?  It didn't sound very anarchist to me.  It sounded confused.  

Until another anarchist author hits mainstream I'll take it. The only other semi-anarchist (and it's a large stretch) authors I can think of are George Orwell and Robert Heinlein.

[macsnafu]

There's plenty of fiction about liberty and revolution, with anti-war, and anti-tyranny themes.  The trouble is making it specifically anarchist/libertarian enough to stand out from the rest. And, of course, to keep it entertaining.

Anybody can write about fighting authority, but can you show how government is truly unnecessary?

[Syock]

There's plenty of fiction about liberty and revolution, with anti-war, and anti-tyranny themes.  The trouble is making it specifically anarchist/libertarian enough to stand out from the rest.

Most of it is wanting to replace one government with another.  They may be libertarian, but not anarchist unfortunately.  Truly anarchist stories are nearly unheard of.

[macsnafu]

Here is a book called "Freedom Incorporated", by Peter Tylee.

http://manybooks.net/titles/tyleepother09Freedom_Incorporated.html

First published in 2005, it's an anti-corporate, dsytopian sf novel.  Based on the descriptions and reviews, it seems to be a bit on the absurd and over-the-top side.

Obviously, it's not quite what we're looking for, but maybe it would give an anarchist writer something to respond to.