this post was submitted on 05 Jan 2024
262 points (91.5% liked)

Political Memes

5509 readers
1842 users here now

Welcome to politcal memes!

These are our rules:

Be civilJokes are okay, but don’t intentionally harass or disturb any member of our community. Sexism, racism and bigotry are not allowed. Good faith argumentation only. No posts discouraging people to vote or shaming people for voting.

No misinformationDon’t post any intentional misinformation. When asked by mods, provide sources for any claims you make.

Posts should be memesRandom pictures do not qualify as memes. Relevance to politics is required.

No bots, spam or self-promotionFollow instance rules, ask for your bot to be allowed on this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 
top 33 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] grue@lemmy.world 41 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Communes w/ no real government or class structure

Yeah, that's what upper-class Hobbits like the Bagginses want you to think.

[–] DragonTypeWyvern 25 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

With a literal servant class that does all the actual work, no less.

The reality is there isn't a "left" in Tolkien, even under the original definition from the French Revolution, it's monarchism all the way down because at the end of the day he was a pretty firm monarchist making a pseudo-Catholic fantasy setting.

[–] dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Sorry, missed that part of the book and movies. When do we meet the servant class that works for the Baggins' and the other ruling class Hobbits?

[–] Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Sam is Frodo's gardener despite Frodo having no job. Neither did Bilbo have a job and Baggins were referred to as aristocracy along with Brandybucks and Tooks.

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Baggins_family

[–] StarPupil@ttrpg.network 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

And I believe Frodo became mayor of either Hobbiton or the entire Shire before he left for the Grey Havens at the end of ROTK. Could be misremembering, though

[–] Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago

Sam became mayor.

[–] Infynis@midwest.social 4 points 10 months ago

Let's take their spoons, and hang them from the tree on top of Bag End!

Some animals are more equal than others

[–] hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.com 25 points 10 months ago
[–] Ryan213@lemmy.world 18 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] casmael@startrek.website 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Kardashians on Lemmy!

[–] AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 14 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Just as with the Ferengi in Star Trek, actual Humanity aligns far more with Orcs than it does in universe humanity.

[–] GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Don’t you slander the ferengi like that! Their economic system is mega fucked, but it is at least honest about that and consistent.

They have a specific code of (business) conduct they for the most part always adhere to, and no ferengi will cry foul when someone else fucks them over as long as it’s done according to the rules.

And as Quark points out in that one episode, we did and do a bunch of barbaric things the ferengi never did because they wouldn’t go that far, like slavery and genocide.

[–] Delta_V@lemmy.world 20 points 10 months ago (2 children)

The Ferengi totally do slavery, they just lie to themselves about indentured servitude and jobs that pay less than a living wage being not-slavery.

[–] AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago

Oh, so interns.

[–] Infynis@midwest.social 8 points 10 months ago

Also their women

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 13 points 10 months ago (2 children)

They say they don’t do slavery but hen you hear how they regard feeeeemales

[–] AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 13 points 10 months ago

That's the fun mental trick slavers have used since slavery has existed:

"Slavery can't be bad if you don't consider the class of people you enslave to be people at all."

[–] bi_tux@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

that's not really slavery, since the feeeemales aren't/weren't allowed to work outside of the household

[–] DragonTypeWyvern 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] bi_tux@lemmy.world -1 points 10 months ago

on the one side it was meant as a "but that's different" parodie, but there are some differences between slavery in history and the way ferengi treat freeeemales

[–] veganpizza69@lemmy.world 12 points 10 months ago

Hobbits

Hobbits lived in feudalism, Baggins was aristocracy.

Stop trying to make anarcho-tolkienism or anarcho-feudalism happen, it's not happening. And political compass memes are horrible intrinsically.

https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/tolkiens-feudal-socialism

[–] Urist@lemmy.ml 8 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Hear me out. Dwarves are actually communists and not serfs in an absolute primogeniture monarchy. Here is how and why: Once the dwarven guilds/unions had distributed the wealth produced by dwarven labour evenly among the dwarves, they realized they were already in a post scarcity utopia. Now, they started diggy digging just for fun and named one person king as a joke so they had an excuse to forge exquisite regalia, coins and other stuff. At some point they just started putting it in a hole so they could make space for new creations.

[–] dwalin@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] Urist@lemmy.ml 2 points 10 months ago

Thanks! Source: me. Target: you.

[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 7 points 10 months ago

I am 100% Hobbit.

[–] NoSpiritAnimal@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Samwise literally calls Frodo "Master"

[–] Bgugi@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (2 children)

In England, that word was used as a polite honorific, a forerunner to "mister" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_(form_of_address)

[–] NoSpiritAnimal@lemmy.world 8 points 10 months ago

Yes, it's common in most English speaking countries, but Samwise is literally an employee of the Shire Baggins.

The Gamgees are of a lower social class than the Baggins. Samwise' father, The Old Gaffer, also worked at Bag End. Frodo has generational wealth, not just from Bilbos adventure with the Dragon, but his Mother was well-to-do also. Bilbo and Frodo had servants, groundskeepers, and housekeepers. That doesn't even include the party staff they hired on.

He also calls himself "your Sam", and Frodo is called his master even when the narrator is speaking:

he had stuck to his master all the way; that was what he had chiefly come for, and he would still stick to him. His master would not go to Mordor alone.

[–] root_beer@midwest.social 2 points 10 months ago

It’s still used (even in the US) by older people for boys not yet of age. My grandma, who died in 2009 and would have been 103 this April, would send me birthday cards addressed to “Master [root_beer]” when I was a kid.

[–] dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 10 months ago

Even conservatives are like "damn, I could get me some of that social anarchy/libertarianism.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Definitely “elves”. As an east coast educated elitist snob, I do believe I know what’s best for those orcs and dwarves in the red states