“Remember,
remember the fifth of November.”
Ah,
yes, a quote from the beloved movie, V
For Vendetta. This is a movie that
all gun-toting libertarians love (even though the protagonist, V, uses
virtually every weapon excluding guns).
That’s
where we get the rhyme. Isn’t it?
Oh,
wait, no, it’s not. It’s from a
children’s rhyme, celebrating the legacy of Guys Fawkes, a hero and visionary
man that opposed large, evil, tyrannies of government. All libertarians who oppose big governments
should admire and idolize Fawkes by wearing creepy, pale masks that resemble
his face.
That,
mates, is where we get this rhyme. Isn’t
it?
Hold on
a sec, that doesn’t seem to ring true either.
The children’s rhyme doesn’t celebrate Fawkes. It warns of the consequences that come when
one attempts to do the things that Fawkes did.
And Fawkes, my Ron Paul-loving friends, did not have good intentions in
the slightest. In fact, even by today’s
standard (no matter your political affiliation), Guy Fawkes was a terrorist.
I’m not
opposed to conservative folks. Living in
Utah, I rub shoulders with quite a few of them.
Growing up in South Carolina, I have many friends and family that also
have conservative views. In fact, in a lot of
ways, I have conservative views. There
are a few things that I lean a bit to the left on (i.e. gun control) that make
me view myself as quite the liberal. But
I digress.
My
point is, I love libertarians. There are
quite a few of you I consider to be close friends and family. But last week, you contradicted yourself more
than ever, mostly without even realizing it.
I do not attack you. I attack the
hypocritical way that you sometimes attack the left. I attack the way you call “the dirty, Obama
loving” liberals misinformed, while not having the slightest clue what really
happened on November 5, 1605. I attack
the way you use one of the most liberal movies ever made as your inspiration
for a revolution against a liberal president.
I don’t attack you. I attack your
attacks, especially when they are foolish and hypocritical.
Let’s
begin with Guy Fawkes, your historical revolutionary hero. And in order to understand the man, you must
understand his time and country.
The 16th
Century was a long religious war. During King Henry VIII’s reign, the official religion of England was Protestantism. After years of receiving the death penalty
for any form of heresy towards the Catholic Church, it was now okay, and in
many ways encouraged, to rebel against Catholicism. Unfortunately, it wasn’t fair to many
Catholics.
There were some very harsh laws put
against the Catholics, and, since many residents of England had ties to
Catholicism, many people were treated unjustly.
However, when Queen Mary I took the throne in 1553, things changed. Mary was a devout Catholic. So devout, one would venture to call her a
religious fanatic. She didn’t just
restore all of the laws that called for capital punishment against the
heretics; she loved those laws. She loved them so much that she earned the
nickname “Bloody Mary.” Basically, if
you even smiled because your Priest farted in Mass, you were dead.
Queen Elizabeth I, Mary’s
half-sister and successor, was a more tolerant woman. She was not a Catholic and hated the way Mary
ran things, but she also recognized the unjust way Catholics were treated
before Mary’s reign. She made England a
Protestant nation again, and tried to treat Catholics fairly. However, constant assassination plots against
her because of her Protestant affiliation led the Queen to become somewhat
paranoid. I mean, who wouldn’t be a
little jittery if there were murder plots against them? I know I would be, and I know I’m not alone in
that regard.
When Queen Elizabeth passed on,
King James I became King. Though not a
Catholic himself, it was hoped that he would restore the country to Catholicism
and bring back the old laws that are essentially what kept Great Britain in the
Dark Ages for a thousand years. But James
just wanted everyone to be happy. He
didn’t want a religious war. He was much
more indifferent to Catholicism than Elizabeth was, and made things fair as laws in regards to Catholicism vs. Protestantism were concerned.
But this friendly attitude didn’t
last for long.
As Parliament Members informed
James of the assassination plots against him from religious zealots, he decided to
keep things the Elizabethean way. This
school of thought did not sit well with Catholics.
Which brings us to Guy
Fawkes. Well, actually it brings us to
Robert Catesby.
Wait, Guy
Fawkes was not the leader of the group that plotted to blow up Parliament?
You can bet your libertarian butt he wasn't. Guy Fawkes was the Scottie Pippen to Robert
Catesby’s Michael Jordan. Catesby was the leader. He gathered a bunch of
his fellow radical Catholics and told them of his plot to blow up Parliament,
killing Parliament members and the King.
They would then place a new, Catholic ruler on the throne and restore England to a
Catholic nation—the same nation that would burn you at the stake if you laughed
at a Priest’s fart.
A couple of Catesby’s followers
were skeptical and afraid of being caught.
They wrote an anonymous letter to Parliament warning of the attack to
take place on November 5.
On November 4, 1605, Guy Fawkes was
caught under Parliament, checking on the explosives. When asked the first time what he was doing,
he answered that his name was John Johnson (clever one there, Guy), and he
wanted to “blow a Scotsmen (King James I) back to Scotland.” After several days of interrogation, he
admitted his name was Guy Fawkes and told of the plot to kill the members of
parliament and the King to bring Catholicism as the official religion of
England. As for punishment, it was a
different, less merciful time. He was
sentenced to death.
Why all of this history? Well, to show that this was not a 15th
Century Libertarian story, in spite of what you may think. Guy Fawkes wanted only one religion, not
freedom. This was about religion more than it was about government. It was about terror. By celebrating Guy Fawkes, you are in essence
saying you celebrate terrorism. It makes
me wonder if popular masks 300 years from now will resemble the faces of Osama
Bin Laden or the 9/11 plane hijackers.
Guy Fawkes was no hero or
revolutionary. He was a terrorist. Think about that next time you post all over
your Facebook walls about how he died for a good cause and the world needs more
people like him today.
Now, let’s discuss V, your
fictional revolutionary hero.
When Alan Moore began the comic
book series in 1982, the themes were anarchism vs. fascism. Moore imagined a 1990’s England that had
taken the fascist route after a nuclear holocaust. Moore to this day has not seen the movie in
fear of what the filmmakers have done to his work. The reason for the rebellion in the movie has
changed. Rather than it being an
anarchist vs. fascist war, the conflict has turned into a struggle between
liberals vs. radical conservatives. I
won’t go into great detail about the differences between the graphic novel and
the film. For the purposes of this
article, and because most people haven’t read the comics, I’ll just discuss why
it is ironic that libertarians choose the movie as a representation for their
political beliefs.
The 2006 film takes place in the
late 2020’s England. England remains the
only stable country after a virus sweeps the European continent. They are under rule of a fascist Norsefire
political party. Their leader ran on a
political platform based on radical Christianity. All homosexuals, political opponents, and
others the government deems as “undesirable” were imprisoned and often died in
concentration camps.
V, our vigilante hero, begins to
fight against this despicable government.
He strives for equality, not only in the moral sense of the word, but
also in the economic sense. He is
strongly opposed to Norsefire’s regime, and makes the ultimate sacrifice in the
name of revolution against it.
And guess what? He doesn’t use guns. He uses explosives, of course, to destroy
certain buildings in England, like Parliament.
But when it comes to the combat, he fights with knives, swords, and his
bare hands. Please correct me if I’m
wrong, but I recall those he fought-the bad guys-using all kinds of guns. I recall V being shot repeatedly. However, I do not remember him using a gun
once.
If the protagonist didn’t use guns
at all, and the wicked government did, then doesn’t that make this movie
anti-gun? Hollywood isn’t full of a
bunch of dummies. I think it was in
their every intention to make V For
Vendetta an anti-gun movie. Sorry,
libertarians, but the facts point to the conclusion that the filmmakers are
advocates for gun-control. Your right to
bear arms was not necessarily represented in this movie the way that you wish
it to be. Your hero, V, is not as much
like you as you think he is.
V, after all, is a liberal. He fights for equality among all classes,
rather than the class system created by the fascist political party that rules
the country. He wants homosexuals to
have all of the same rights that heterosexuals have. And, as stated above, I think he believes in
gun-control. And he, the liberal, V, is
our hero. To say that he was a
libertarian is a joke.
I find this extremely ironic as most
supporters of Ron and Rand Paul wear the Guy Fawkes mask as homage to V. In case you have been living under a rock,
the Pauls are very libertarian and have the support of libertarians across the
country. Who is the biggest enemy to the
conservative libertarian? That would be
the liberal democrat. Based on the
evidence shown in the film, I don’t think V would be libertarian in the
slightest. He would have supported an
economy where everyone benefited (i.e welfare program). He would have supported same-sex
marriage. He would be an advocate for
stricter gun-control laws as he never used firearms. And he definitely would not be a supporter of
someone who talks about God in every speech (remember the Norsefire regime was
based on radical Christianity). You
wouldn’t see him at a Ron Paul speech.
He is more of a Barrack Obama kind of guy. Oh, and please don’t misquote me. I’m not comparing Ron Paul’s politics to the
Norsefire party in the film. I think the
Paul family have some great men in Ron and Rand, and either would make
wonderful leaders. V just doesn’t strike
me as the religious type. It was
religion that scarred him.
Speaking of religion, has anyone
reading this ever heard of Aleister Crowley?
He is, after all, referenced by Alan Moore in the comics. In an interview about his inspiration for the
graphic novel, Moore said this:
“My real interest in Crowley, i.e. in
actually reading his books, thoroughly - and yes, I've got a signed Crowley as
well - that only goes back to '94 when I became seriously interested in magic
but obviously, I'd known about Crowley ever since I was twelve, when I had my
spate of reading Dennis Wheatley occult paperbacks and being told that Aleister
Crowley was the wickedest man in the world. There are references to Crowley in
V for Vendetta.”
One
example is the phrase, “Vi veri universum vivus vici.” It’s a Latin phrase, meaning, “By the power
of truth, I, while living, have conquered the universe." In the story, V uses this phrase, kind of as
a personal motto. Though the comic and
movie attribute the quote to a “German gentleman named Dr. John Faust,” this
quote was also one of the motto's that Crowley said he lived by.
So, who
was Aleister Crowley? He was a man that
had earned the title of “The Wickedest Man In The World.” What exactly did he do to become so
wicked? Aside from drug addictions, he
was a sexist, racist, cult leader, and self-appointed prophet with violent
tendencies. Read his own words about sexual
gratification and murder:
“For the highest spiritual working one must accordingly choose that
victim which contains the greatest and purest force. A male child of perfect
innocence and high intelligence is the most satisfactory and suitable victim…But
the bloody sacrifice, though more dangerous, is more efficacious; and for
nearly all purposes human sacrifice is the best.”
Yes,
you read that right. He is talking about
raping and murdering little boys for the sake of his cult.
Though he was never found guilty of
murder, historians believe he did in fact murder at least 7 people. Some he murdered personally, and others he influenced others to kill for the sake of his
cult. His writings point to the belief
that the more one sins, the more powerful he was. Though he never straightforward said he
worshiped Satan, many dissenters of his cult described his religion as
Satanist.
The reason why I bring this up is
because libertarians tend to bring up every person, place, or thing that liberal
leaders have every associated themselves with.
For example, they like to bring up that President Obama smoked weed in
college and had a crazy preacher. And,
yet, they practically idolize a fictional character created by a man who quotes
a Satanist. Now, I’m not saying that
libertarians are Satanist and murderers because they idolize V. But, I am asking you to not critique the
opinions of liberals because you found a connection from their beliefs to
thievery. Your false idol has a connection to Satanism.
Libertarians are not evil. Maybe they are slightly hypocritical, but
they are not evil. I know that their
intentions are good, though I don’t agree with many of their ideals. My only wish is that more people would do a
little more research and take a little more thought on a subject before they claim
it as their own beliefs. It makes you
look quite foolish to those who know more about the background.
So, my truth-seeking libertarian
friends, next year, when the fifth of November comes around, please remember
these things. Please remember what you
are really saying when you wear your Guy Fawkes masks. And, most importantly, before you call a
liberal friend uninformed, take a look at yourself. Always ask yourself how informed you really are.
Now, with the truth behind Guy
Fawkes and V For Vendetta, you can
more appropriately, “Remember, remember, the fifth of November.”
