Why Tolkien Hated Democracy

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In this video we explore Tolkien's ideology and beliefs, his dislike of democracy and modern democratic systems, as well as examine his alternative!

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He held these views almost one hundred years ago. Imagine if he saw the state of democracy today.

sergiopablo
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"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter."
- Sir Winston Churchill

swehumorofficial
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the great philosopher socrates also hated democracy. because democracy is about popular opinion and not about hiring the correct man for the job.
he asked the people in the past, who would you want to be our ship captain in charged of our travel and lives? just anyone? or someone who has years of experience?

in the modern world, we have world leaders that are comedians and actors.

claireglory
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Tolkien understood the fundamental paradox of democracy. Anyone who is narcissistic and arrogant enough to seek the position of President is unfit for the position. It takes a special combination of the dignified and the petty.

chuckhoyle
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To be fair to Tolkien his most idealized social order wasn't monarchy at all but was communalism (not to be confused with communism) as represented by the Hobbits.
The Hobbits have no king, no aristocratic class.
The Hobbits are a shared community, which is why wealth is redistribute at a constant rate through their birthday giving system or
"byrding."

"In the Shire it was expected that close relatives (second cousins or closer), as well as neighbors living within a 12-mile radius of the byrding would give a gift. These gifts would be received in private, so as to avoid embarrassing the giver.

The byrding also gave presents of his or her own. After their third year byrdings traditionally gave gifts to their parents that were made, grown, or collected by the byrdings themselves (usually the youngest byrdings gave bunches of wildflowers.) Beyond this, the giving of gifts depended on a byrding’s age and status. If they owned a house, they would be expected to give gifts to all those living in the house, as well as any employees or close neighbors. Younger byrdings without houes of their own weren’t required to give gifts to anyone in particular (other than their parents) and could give depending on their resources. These gifts wouldn’t be expensive, so as not to burden the byrding (one of the ways Bilbo was unusual - his birthday presents were extremely generous.)

Holding a party on the eve of the birthday was a tradition, and all those invited to the party would receive a gift from the byrding (but guests never brought their present for the byrding to the party - it had to be delivered in person before the date!)

Tolkien wrote extensively on this alternative system of living, so he does actually have an alternative idealized veiw to Monarchy.

But it is one that requires peace, sacrifice, as well as shared community values.
Values based on the place he grew up in before the horrors of rapid industrialization prior to ww1.

His veiws on Monarchy need to be veiwed under the context of Martial soceities.

Now I personally do not share his veiws on Monarchy, I think executive powers in anyform lend themselves to cults of personality, in any system of government. But I very much do respect his veiws of communal organization and the values they inspire.

libraryofpangea
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The statements you quoted suggest that Tolkien did not show that he "hated" democracy but that he entertained doubts about the political process. His depiction of monarchy is simply a reflection of the historical fact that monarchy has been the most frequent form of government.

dakinayantv
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As a conservative catholic british is hardly suprising tolkien wasnt a fan of democracy. Nevertheless IN PRACTICE the Shire is hardly a monarchy (is part of Arnor but the king is vacant for hundreds of years) so its sort of a republican local selfgovernment and quite a bit democratic (certainly compared to Gondor, Rohan or Mordor) in its functioning.

vatsetis
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4:21 Professor Tolkien was terminally based.

viniciusvyller
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A lucid presentation, thank you!
It sounds like Tolkien was close to Catholic integralism, a late 19th-early 20th century philosophy that rejected the “economic man” attributed to Adam Smith and Marx as a being defined by his economic interests. Instead integralists wanted to see humans as embedded in their religions, cultures, communities and nations. Some followed this rejection of so-called materialism into fascism, finding meaning in the heroic myths championed by fascist movements. Tolkien’s desire to create an English mythos fits with this framework, but thankfully not all integralists made that leap into authoritarianism. As you point out, Tolkien rejected the Ring, like Gandalf and Galadriel rejected it.

dansiegel
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Shout out to Hans-Herman Hoppe's Democracy: The God that Failed

padraicburns
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As far as I know he called himself eventually an anachist of the peaceful kind.
The Shire would be every anarchists dream. Everyone is equal, there are no relevant governmental structures and there is an enormous solidarity between the people.
Edit: Found the quote:
"My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs)"

anachronistxs
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For those people wondering here in the comments why someone might prefer aristocratic, hereditary monarchies to democracies:

A monarch owns the government as private property, property his children will inherit. He is thus, more than anyone, incentivized to ensure the whole of his property prospers. Rich peasants pay more taxes over the course of their lives, and will continue to do so into the future for his successors.

A politician in a democracy, elected not through merit but through popularity and demagoguery, is a renter of the government. They have a limited amount of time to enrich themselves and their backers/bank rollers/supporters. The long term prosperity of the citizen is irrelevant, as their term in office is not long term. They are incentivized to make hay while the sun shines, using taxes on short term personal projects and to pay back their lobbyists and supporters. Not to mention Their friends. While a king might need to do the same, he has his entire life to do so, not 4 years of outrageously high taxes. He is not incentivized to loot his own treasury any more than I am mine. I might need to, but I don’t want to. A politician does not own the treasury, so looting it (printing money) is of no Nevermind, so long as it doesn’t have immediate consequences.

Additionally, kings are chosen by the accident of birth. You get some good ones, some bad ones, but mostly benign and unremarkable ones who simply own their government as you or I might own our home. Take good care of it, making mistakes along the way as well as making some improvements.

Politicians, by contrast, are universally ambitious. They want to rule. They want to wield power over you, for good or ill.

Finally, for this short medium, kings are far more accountable than the primary political unit of democracies (the political party). While you might vote out particular politicians, you cannot get rid of the party nearly so easily. If I, in Pennsylvania, do not like my representative I might remove them. But my representative takes orders from people I cannot remove, and they will simply replace Party Slave X with Party Slave Y. This applies to all parties and factions in democracies. And worse, nearly all of these important political decisions are not visible to the public. Who runs, why the policies are decided, deals between the parties all take place behind closed doors. This applies to nearly all republics and democracies. Some have found partial solutions. One is to operate democracy ONLY on the small scale, at the community level where you know your neighbors and who will be affected by your vote. All for this. But this does not help nation level democracies, where people living in cities dictate the policies rural folk will live under, or where the numerous poor will demand taxation from the middle. The only republic I quite like is that of Venice, but this is mainly because the Doge was so monarchical in his power, it was almost entirely aristocratic, and the election process for the Doge was so complicated it basically strangled factionalism in the crib.

A king, by contrast, is one man. Tyranny tends to result in him becoming much shorter. Typically a head shorter.

xenophon
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good analysis of Tolkien's views. In America, democracy was called "the grand experiment". It is still just an "experiment"

johnbulger
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this is your most interesting video by far. before i watched it i was convinced this would finally be the one where i fully disagreed with tolkien, but even though i disagree with his solutions, i think his insight into the problems our "democracy" has were shockingly accurate. i do believe a corrupt democracy is better than a corrupt monarchy, and i personally think with some significant changes to the world we could fix our democracy, but he really was spot on with his take on how things are

aldrichunfaithful
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His observations turned out to be true. Modern democracy feels like a thinly veiled oligarchy.

But how do we get enlightened, benevolent people at the top of the state, and these people don't get corrupted by power?

xelldincht
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Lord of the Rings in a democracy:
"...and then Wormtongue convinced Prime Minister Théoden to grant 1 million orc refugees from Mordor citizenship in Rohan, who ended up voting Sauron into office. THE END."

Pik
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Tolkien was an anarchist, more than an a monarchist.
He saw authority as something consensual, albeit as something that people should respond to when it's legitimate.
His basis for the monarchist half was his form of Catholicism, very much a Burkean sort of Conservatism...ironic given that Burke was protestant, but still the belief in the ability of institutions to organize society around old tropes that guys like Burke and Tolkien felt dependent upon.
But, ultimately, he wanted the spontaneous order of a free society.
The Shire is mostly run anarchically, with the "government" mostly amusing itself, and settling disputes when asked to, while mostly people govern their own lives.
And that's how his successful "kings" run things, as well.

The bad "kings" are the ones who actually wield their authority where it's not welcome.
It's like Lao Tzu's admonition, that the more the rulers meddle, the worse things get.

KAZVorpal
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Sounds like Tolkien wanted a king bound not by constitution, but by "old customs, rights, usages and laws" as C S Lewis puts it.

Yde
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"My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs) . . . the most improper job of any man, 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." ~ J. R. R. Tolkien from a letter to Christopher Tolkien

jobdroid
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"We see the politician and not his backer; still less the backer of the backer; or what is most important of all, the banker of the backer"

Love this quote by Tolkien. I too dislike democracy and have the same views as Tolkien on localism and monarchies. When did the world decide that "democracy" was the ideal system of governance.

beanzor