# Pro-totalitarian works of fiction? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 27, 2009, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887 "2009-08-27T08:00:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/1 "2009-08-27T08:00:45Z")
Freedom’s all well and good, but are there any significant works of fiction that argue against it and instead advocate a totalitarian way of life? Something pro-1984, pro-Borg, etc.? It seems that whenever a perfectly controlled utopia is depicted in fiction, it’s always temporary and soon destroyed by human greed / a person who tastes freedom and starts a movement / corrupt, power-hungry authority figures / sheer stupidity. I’d like to at least entertain the thought of something different… ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/2 "2009-08-27T09:10:42Z")
Mein Kampf? ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/3 "2009-08-27T09:27:44Z")
**Starship Troopers** is, at the very least, pro-authoritarian. ---
**Author:** ![willthekittensurvive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/91b2a8/32.png) [@willthekittensurvive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/willthekittensurvive)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/4 "2009-08-27T09:34:33Z")
Well there was [Hero](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero_(2002_film)) according to the Wikipedia page > [@](#): > > **Political meaning and criticism** > > This film has faced criticism from abroad at a perceived pro-totalitarian and pro-Chinese reunification subtext. Critics also cited as evidence the approval that had been given to the film by the government of the People’s Republic of China. These critics argued that the ulterior meaning of the film was triumph of security and stability over liberty and human rights, analogous to the “Asian values” concept that gained brief popularity in the 1990s. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/5 "2009-08-27T09:51:53Z")
Judge Dredd, long-running comic-book series from the british 2000 AD magazine. During the eighties, the pro-authoritarian spoof that the series was became even darker, with Dredd lobotomizing a journalist who tried to uncover a mistake by the judges that cost thousands of lives, the judges fighting a democratic movement with torture and difamation, and so on. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/6 "2009-08-27T10:06:28Z")
There’s a book that just came out here in Sweden called “I was an Arian” that is set in 1970s Sweden after a Nazi victory in WWII. Albert Speer is Hitler’s successor, and from what I can gather out of this [review](http://www.dn.se/dnbok/bokrecensioner/tony-samuelsson-jag-var-en-arier-en-nordisk-fantasi-1.934390) in _Dagens Nyheter_ it’s not simply a good vs. evil kind of story: > [@](#): > > It’s not out to formulate a criticism of nazism at all. If anything, it’s an analysis of the conditions under which such an order would be possible. The book centers around a sports journalist, Thomas Robladh, and his romantic involvement with a woman who is part of an underground resistance movement planning to assassinate Speer when he visits Stockholm to inaugurate a new member of the German parliament, a poet laureate. Thomas doesn’t get swept up in it: > [@](#): > > For him resistance is no alternative. His only possible answer to a society on the point of expelling him is to expel himself. So maybe it’s not completely pro-totalitarian in that it depicts a fantastic utopia with an all-powerful leader at the head of society, but it certainly doesn’t seem to provide ideas that you can and should resist. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/7 "2009-08-27T10:15:55Z")
The Dark Knight Returns seems to be favorable to the idea of Rule of Batman. ---
**Author:** ![Darkhold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@Darkhold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darkhold)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/8 "2009-08-27T11:30:32Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > The Dark Knight Returns seems to be favorable to the idea of Rule of Batman. Quite the contrary he’s clearly a freak outside of mainstream society who ‘has to be chased’. He works only because he’s out of the system not running it. Even his own followers object to him gaining too much power. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/9 "2009-08-27T12:17:28Z")
I wouldn’t really say it’s _pro_-totalitarian, but the Draka in S. M. Stirling _Domination_ series do come across as kinda awesome. I mean, like in the same way Godzilla is. You wouldn’t _want_ him to attack your city, but you have to admit, he does a pretty impressive job of it. ---
**Author:** ![MarcusF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/67e7ee/32.png) [@MarcusF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcusF)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/10 "2009-08-27T12:25:03Z")
Authoritarian is certainly not the same as totalitarian. In \*Starship Troopers \*the level of individual freedom for all is given as is very high whether you were a veteran with a vote or otherwise. The nearest I can think of is Asimov’s \*Second Foundation \*and the proposed Second Empire - peace and harmony at the expense of real freedom, everything planned and controlled by the pscho-historians. ---
**Author:** ![MarcusF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/67e7ee/32.png) [@MarcusF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcusF)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/11 "2009-08-27T12:28:00Z")
> [@Ranchoth](#): > > I wouldn’t really say it’s _pro_-totalitarian, but the Draka in S. M. Stirling _Domination_ series do come across as kinda awesome. > > I mean, like in the same way Godzilla is. You wouldn’t _want_ him to attack your city, but you have to admit, he does a pretty impressive job of it. A good point about the _Domination_, rather too much indirect approval for my taste. But then I really don’t like that series. ---
**Author:** ![Dave\_Hartwick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@Dave\_Hartwick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dave_Hartwick)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/12 "2009-08-27T12:29:43Z")
Norman Spinrad’s _The Iron Dream_ was, on the surface, a pulp fantasy adventure. It had a fascist subtext because Spinrad wrote it as a what-if. As in, what if Adolf Hitler immigrated to America and wrote pulp fantasy adventures. The TV series _Rome_ favored Julius Caesar and Octavian and IMO made the Republicans look weak and stupid. At the least, as I remember it from watching, Julius was assassinated more because of snobbery and jealousy than his megalomania. While I don’t think the novel _Starship Troopers_ was fascistic unless you’re looking for it and ignoring the bits that don’t fit, the movie version IMO glorified fascism, albeit with hamfisted irony. I started reading a novel about Napoleon a couple years ago where the author seemed to worship the man but I can’t remember author or title. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/13 "2009-08-27T13:06:03Z")
Mark Twain has Hal Morgan say something along the lines of “Absolute Dictatorship _is_ the best form of rule, provided the ruler is beneficial and immortal.” Morgan is the titular **Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court** who becomes THE BOSS, and who finds that he can put in all sorts of improvements and relieve suffering almost by fiat, and who (of course) sees himself as that benevolent force. It’s hard to argue with the sentiment. Morgan sees his enlightened engineer/hero as bringing enlightenment and hygiene to a hopelessly custom-bound and stagnant world, and his nearly absolute power allows him to fix things up, release prisoners, and really make things better for people, brushing away the impediments of people who do things that way 'because we always have" and who exercise petty grudges. Of course, Twain satirizes Morgan as much as Arthurian England – he’s NOT perfect, or omnipotent, often has to trick people into doing what he wants, and is petty on his own. But he did use his power to improve a lot of lives ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/14 "2009-08-27T13:30:40Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#): > > While I don’t think the novel _Starship Troopers_ was fascistic unless you’re looking for it and ignoring the bits that don’t fit, the movie version IMO glorified fascism, albeit with hamfisted irony. I hate to reopen the whole \*Starship Trooper \*controversy and I must admit I haven’t read the book, but from the evidence in the movie I don’t see how that society could be called fascist. It would not be inconsistent with what we see in the movie for there to be a vigorous multiparty system in place with closely fought elections, a meaningful “Bill Of Rights”, a free press, an active ACLU-like organization, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/15 "2009-08-27T13:39:57Z")
Well, of course there aren’t many works arguing that we should give power to corrupt dictators bent on oppression for personal gain. That’s not how totalitarianism starts, you know. It starts by arguing that things are so bad that only strong trustworthy individuals can protect the common people. And that’s pretty easy to find in fiction. Take pretty much any “Dirty Harry” /Chuck Norris/“24”/“Die Hard” -type of movie/TV series where the main character does what has to be done, ignoring the petty rules and restrictions that only favor criminals and hamstring the legitimate authorities. They’re basically arguing against civil rights, meaningful restrictions on police powers, and democratic accountability for authorities. In fact, it’s hard to think of any work of fiction involving crime in any way (except the small “Les Miserables” genre of criminals-driven-to-it) that doesn’t implicitly argue for totalitarianism. Maybe the original “Law and Order” sometimes shows a lot of nuance in addressing issues of what the tradeoffs are with civil liberties, but even there, generally in L&O, civil liberties are what lets a perp go free, not what protects people from lazy or pissed-off cops. And pretty much any movie/novel that glorifies war or the military is implicitly totalitarian. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/16 "2009-08-27T13:42:24Z")
> [@Darkhold](#): > > Quite the contrary he’s clearly a freak outside of mainstream society who ‘has to be chased’. He works only because he’s out of the system not running it. Even his own followers object to him gaining too much power. Like many Libertarian writers, including Heinlein and Goodkind, Miller’s work suffer from a schizophrenic love for _“authoritarian rebels”_. Yes, his heroes won’t follow any rule but their own, but then will force their personal rules upon everyone else by force if necessary, never tolerating dissent. “300” is a better example of this contradiction. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/17 "2009-08-27T13:50:50Z")
Well, the elections and such are clearly delineated in the book. A great deal is made of the possession of the franchise only by those who have served in the services. So government is clearly of the elected sort. It’s also made clear that anyone at all may serve for any reason, regardless of ability or political affiliation. Heinlein’s controversy, in my opinion, is postulating that an electorate made up of those who served would maintain a stable, static government. Certainly the characters in the book assume that near-perfection has been achieved. But fascist? Not with free elections and a relatively open electorate. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/18 "2009-08-27T14:38:36Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#): > > Norman Spinrad’s _The Iron Dream_ was, on the surface, a pulp fantasy adventure. It had a fascist subtext because Spinrad wrote it as a what-if. As in, what if Adolf Hitler immigrated to America and wrote pulp fantasy adventures. More than a subtext – it was a history of the rise of Nazism couched in fantasy fiction terms. And Norman made it absolutely clear by way of the Afterward that he was doing it deliberately. In **I, Claudius** and _Claudius the God_, Claudius, though favoring a republic, comes to realize that it’s only a pipe dream and that it’s better to rule as a dictator. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/19 "2009-08-27T15:07:31Z")
> [@Quercus](#): > > And pretty much any movie/novel that glorifies war or the military is implicitly totalitarian. I think I’d have to question that. I don’t know what exactly you mean by “glorifies”, but you can have a film or book that is positive toward a war or the military that isn’t totalitarian. There’s not a necessary connection. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887/20 "2009-08-27T15:13:30Z")
> [@Ronald\_C.Semone](#): > > I hate to reopen the whole \*Starship Trooper \*controversy and I must admit I haven’t read the book, but from the evidence in the movie There was almost no similarity. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-totalitarian-works-of-fiction/507887.md?page=2)