I didn't realize that I would get my wish so soon - temperatures in the 20's by day and the teens at night... the corn stove is doing a fine job at keeping the basement toasty warm and reducing the need for the furnace to run. We go through a sack of corn every day or two - just one sack a week if we run only during daylight hours.
Thanksgiving was a quiet affair for just the immediate family we all even managed to eat reasonable quantities of food so there are lots of leftovers which will make for great meals for the next several days. It is also a time that I took to listen to the actors' commentaries on the extended DVD of Lord of the Rings. What struck me was this bit of dialog in The Two Towers after Eomer has returned from a battlefield after Theoden's son Theodred has been mortally wounded and Eomer confronts Theoden and Grima Wormtongue about Saruman's attacks:
EOMER
If we won't defend our country, Saruman will take it by force.
GRIMA WORMTONGUE
That is a lie.
EOMER
Orcs are roaming freely across our lands. Unchecked. Unchallenged. Killing at will.
(Then Eomer throws down the proof)
GRIMA WORMTONGUE
Why do you lay these troubles on a already troubled mind? Can you not see? (Referring to the king) Your uncle is wearied by your malcontent... your warmongering.
EOMER
Warmongering?
We hear the wormtongue today accusing us of warmongering. We hear the lies of the antiwar activists saying that we are to blame for attacks upon us and that 'we wouldn't be attacked if...' and 'we have driven them to this - they are blameless'. If only the Numenor hadn't shut the Orcs into Mordor... the Orcs are just misunderstood elves...
And as Saruman incited the Wild Men to kill:
SARUMAN
The Horse-Men took your lands. They drove your people into the hills to scratch a living off rocks.
WILD MEN LEADER
Murderers!
SARUMAN
Take back the lands they stole from you. Burn every village. We have only to remove those who oppose us. It will begin in Rohan. Too long have these peasants stood against you. But no more.
The same lies are told today: we are the aggressors; our evil corporations and military-industrial complex; Wal-Mart is evil; Bush is a criminal, a terrorist, a liar; poverty breeds terrorism; the terrorists are really freedom fighters and they fight a just cause - or more subtly: one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. Is this not the same song we hear from the ACLU defending child molesters and suing the Boy Scouts? And Amnesty International seeming more concerned about Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib than the torture going on in regimes not unlike Saddam Hussein's?
And this bit of dialog reminds me of the blindness of the gun control advocates:
ARAGORN
You have some skill with a blade.
EOWYN
Women of this country learned long ago: Those without swords can still die upon them.
ARAGORN
What do your fear my lady?
EOWYN
A cage.
The violent love a victim who is defenseless. The hypocrites for peace can not trust nor respect others and thus prefer to cage us all for our own good. Too dangerous to allow the average person to use their best judgement. And freedom and liberty don't appear consequential to those same advocates - criminals rights trump 'victim rights'. Remember how N.O.W. criticized the administration for going to war - because this would harm women and children? Wormtongue.
After we have been attacked countless times: Buenos Aires, World Trade Center in 1993, then 9/11, Spain, London and recently Amman - we know that war was declared upon us and we have to fight or surrender. This is not a religious war - it is not about Christians, Muslims and Jews - it is a Spiritual War - a power grab by those who 'speak for the voiceless' and really hate choice and freedom. This is the theme of the 'one ring' - the evil in a line of thinking or religion that requires strict obeisance. The Sarumans and Wormtongues are strong and the Wild Men have fallen victim to their guile. Sadly the puppets must pay the price as well as the puppet masters. Some claim that if everyone just stopped fighting and started making nice all would be well - this is not to be - that is a recipe for massacre and enslavement.
This is a Thanksgiving that I wish to thank our own troops - our Rohanim - our Horse-Men who hold justice so high they are willing to sacrifice their lives to fight the evil attacking us. In The Two Towers King Theoden is urged by Gandalf to take the fight to the enemy, instead Theoden orders the people and troops to retreat to Helm's Deep. Do you think Helm's Deep was a victory? I see the battle at best as staving off defeat. Tolkien's heroes avoid war and long for peace but also know when it is time to engage in war and attack - to this point the elves are the best examples, not pacifists but warriors.
Tolkien was a brilliant man having experienced the horrors of war first hand. He understood that men who really wanted peace were loath but prepared to go to war. Lord of the Rings took much heat by the antiwar crowd for not rewriting Tolkien to make the heroes into fools and scoundrels.
Well put.
Posted by: Clark Stiles | November 27, 2005 at 01:52 AM