Why the Left Has to Destroy The Lord of the Rings

I first fell in love with J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings" in 2001, when I saw the first movie, The Fellowship of the Ring, in the $1 second-run cinema a total of 27 times. I was mesmerized by everything about the film: the characters, the story, the cinematography. That experience led me to read both "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings," and my love of Tolkien grew even deeper and richer.

That's why I bristle at the Left's attempts to ruin "The Lord of the Rings" — whether it's Amazon's dumpster show, The Rings of Power, or the professor at the University of Nottingham who teaches that the books are racist and need to be "deconstructed."

I was privileged enough to visit the Tolkien archives at Marquette University in Milwaukee earlier this summer, where I contributed my thoughts to the university's oral history of Tolkien. There, I was able to see some of the Professor's handwritten notes, timelines, and sketches.

Tolkien spent years building the world of Middle-earth. Rooted in his work with Old English and Norse languages and literature, Tolkien built an entire universe, complete with an origin story. That work has led to legions of fans around the globe.

Which is why, of course, the Left hates it and seeks to destroy it. The latest attempt comes from Vox, which argued that conservatives are the ones who don't understand "The Lord of the Rings."

Among the many humiliations of being American in the current moment is this: Members of the tech right and the conservative ruling class continually fetishize objects of nerd culture while also displaying a willful inability to grasp the very basic messages those objects are sending. While there are certainly worse problems (e.g. white nationalism in the White House), the blazing lack of reading comprehension from people who are allegedly smart does give one pause. Put simply, these people are bad nerds.
Probably the text they are most consistently prone to misreading is The Lord of the Rings. J.R.R. Tolkien’s beloved fantasy trilogy deals with the corrupting influence of power and the necessity of death. Yet, the right keeps using it as a parable for why powerful people should be given more power and human beings should be immortal.
Most recently, Elon Musk posted to his platform X that Tolkien’s peaceful hobbits were able to live idyllic lives on the Shire only because “they were protected by the hard men of Gondor,” referring to the human kingdom entrenched in battle against Mordor. England, Musk declared, must also ally with hard men — in this case, the far right anti-Islamic activist Tommy Robinson — to restore its own peace and tranquility.

"Yet, the right keeps using it as a parable for why powerful people should be given more power and human beings should be immortal."

I had to reread that sentence a couple of times to be sure I understood it. Because it's one of the stupidest things I've ever read. Later on in the article, the writer, Constance Grady, says:

However, you do not need to be a deep scholar of The Lord of the Rings — and friends, I am not one — to understand that this metaphor completely falls apart after a single step back.

And it shows.

Throughout "The Lord of the Rings," the Dark Lord Sauron sought absolute power and corrupted many men, who were susceptible to such corruption, with promises of expanded power. The Hobbits are quiet, peaceful Shire folk, but even they are not immune to the creeping darkness and threat of Sauron. In the books, the Sackville-Bagginses — Hobbits themselves — help bring about the Scourging of the Shire through their greed and desire for power.

Yes, the heroes of the book are the Hobbits, particularly Sam and Frodo, but they cannot do their job without the sacrifice of the men of Gondor. This includes Aragorn, who eventually assumes his rightful role as the King of Gondor. In short, it is good men who help the Hobbits destroy the Ring — often at great personal cost.

The problem is the Left hates the fact that "The Lord of the Rings" is a profoundly Catholic work that addresses and identifies evil clearly and vocally. That the Left sees the Orcs as a racist trope says more about the Left than it ever could about the Right. The themes of friendship, sacrifice, and selflessness are foreign to people who make themselves the main character of every situation on a daily basis. We see that in their insistence that the relationship between the Hobbits, especially Sam and Frodo, is secretly gay (it's not). They cannot fathom a world where they leave the comfort of their existence to do something bigger than themselves, without regard for personal fame or gain.

They also dislike anything that brings people happiness, joy, and a sense of community. They have to divide people and inject politics into everything so they can gain power and control. To that end, they must destroy it and make sure that no one can ever visit the idyllic Shire again.

Sounds familiar, no?

In that regard, they are very much like Sauron, the Orcs, and the ruffians who scourge the Shire and destroy part of Fangorn Forest in the pursuit of their powerful agenda. The similarities between the two are obvious and profound. And the Left knows this.

And that's why they have to tear Tolkien apart and relegate his work to the dustbin of history. It's a threat to their ideology and existence, albeit a smaller one, and that cannot be tolerated. They know exactly what they're doing, too and claiming conservatives are the problem is pure projection.

The Left has to destroy "The Lord of the Rings" not because they don't understand it, but because they do.