Does the LOTR have a class problem?

Does the LOTR have a class problem?

britain has a class problem, especially in tolkiens time

citations on the hobbits?

no breakdown of their respective tax brackets

Tolkien is such a hack

hirelings receive a cut of treasure and half experience points. once they gain XP they can take on a class.

the hero of the story is the 'working class' gardener.

Gandalf is there by providence

Gimmi, Legged-Lass, and Borislav are there because Rivendell is like Ibiza for Middle-Earth

Aragorn is just a coincidence/fate

The only real class dynamic going on is the three aristocratic friends and their servant.

taxation is theft

nothing wrong with class as long as there's some degree of class mobility

the character of Sam was based upon Tolkien's experiences with the common Tommy in the trenches of WW1, who he said was "far superior " to him in every way.

Why are there no black elves or hobbits or dwarfs?

There's no Hobbit aristocracy.

wouldn't be a far stretch of the imagination to think that a 'Sam' character managed to pull the Tolkien out of the shit in the battle of the Somme. Probably through some heroic shit that Tolkien metaphorically recreated in LOTR. That was a horrific battle for the Brits, and the fact Tolkien survived it at all, is against the odds.

black people didn't exist back then

blacks are the orcs, Tolkien represented all races

LOTR is meant to be a European folktale/myth. Same reason you don't see any white guys in Journey to the West.

fighter, rogue, wizard, ranger

barbarian, midges

Orcs are just mutant elves.

No they are golems made of stone / earth

class problem

what's problematic about everyone knowing their place?

Tooks and Brandybucks were two of the oldest families of hobbits, and the office of Thain (basically lord of the Shire) was hereditary to the Took family. Not sure about the Baggins official standing, but Bilbo was half Took on his mother’s side and his family was rich enough to own Bag End, which was a very nice home by hobbit standards, even before he came back with a shitload of dragon loot.

Proof? Orcs bleed.

No. Poors don't have the time or resources to accomplish anything

Considering Bilbo and Frodo are related by a paternal line, that'd suggest Frodo is somewhere closer to middle class than any type of noveau-riche. He has some claim to financial and political power via his uncle, but not enough to really pull rank on anyone.

rogue

bruh....

based largely on ethnic groups in the British Isles that did persecute and kill each other. Americans don't seem to grasp this because they just think the world is

white

black

Hispanic

Asian (as in, Oriental)

we had separate kingdoms. that's why it's the United Kingdom. what's modern Wales (elvish inspiration), or celts, or picts, whatever, today weren't best buds with Mercia, or whatever.

Isn't Aragorn there because Gandalf told him to be at the Prancing Pony?

this shit image may have worked without the snarky redditor comment attached to the bottom of it. boromir and gandalf DIE in service of the mission; gimli, aragorn, and legolas sprint across all of middle earth and kill hundreds of orcs, nearly dying multiple times; and merry and pippin are comic relief but still suffer plenty

sam and frodo, all things considered, are the ones getting carried - and frodo is literally carrying a physical personification of evil around his neck the whole way to the end. the story of LOTR is immune to this kind of nitpicking, subversive faggotry and all attacks against it fail pathetically

Frodo is Pippin's dad's second cousin. Frodo is the great grandson of the Old Took

Why would there be?

fighter archer wizard ranger
barbarian, bard, rogue, living macguffin, fighter (stealth specced)

It is interesting to think about the fact that the entire genre of fantasy owes its existence to the pure luck of an artillery shell not launching a splinter through tolkeins skull during the war. Who knows what other potentially massively influential minds were splattered across the mud.

Frodo and Bilbo are more closely related through their Took side. Bilbo's mother, Belladonna Took, was Frodo's mother's aunt. On the Baggins side, Bilbo's great-grandfather is Frodo's great-great-grandfather

really makes you think

I swear I never heard of this comparison until the woke types started making it recently. When Tolkien said they had black skin he means the literal color black. Like it's right there in the text. Also the haradrim are the black people.

also it is a known fact in tolkien lore that he made the hobbits (and their lore, for that matter) after the scots and the angles (bilbo and frodo's lineage).

Why do leaders take an active interest in the fate of their world?

Real life should be like that. Instead we get car salesmen, jeets and embezzlers. But I repeat myself.

It doesn't have a problem with class specifically because the royalty and aristocracy of the good guys are the ones putting their lives on the line in the conflict.

yea, the not-so working class

to be fair, Gandalf lives as essentially an undying road-bum as an Istari and can't fully remember his immortal life from before he left the Undying Lands, as he is diminished

people with good pedigrees...LE BAD

slave brain

UMMM IT'S 2025 SOMEONE DOESN'T WATCH RoP

Kings and nobles used to lead people in battle. It was only when "democracy" took over that the rulers of the world- bankers and their ilk- could stay home and send others to fight for them.

Based Morgoth and Sauron genocided them

Probably through some heroic shit that Tolkien metaphorically recreated in LOTR

Sam's whole tower shenanigans are basically a Tommy giving up on giving a fuck and diving straight into a Jerry trench to save his C.O.

"All those of the Quendi who came into the hands of Melkor, ere Utumno was broken, were put there in prison, and by slow arts of cruelty were corrupted and enslaved. Thus did Melkor breed the hideous race of the Orcs in envy and mockery of the Elves…"

We're entering a new Dark Age, don't be surprised that survival of the most cunning is making a comeback.

Except before the mid 1900s the nobility and 'quasi-royalty' served in battle all the time. They served in the military more per capita than any other class.
Go back to the pre-rifle era and they served in direct blood and guts battle more than any class as well.

'The Rich' being a bunch of stay-at-home pampered faggots living in complete safety while everyone else does the fighting and dying is a very recent phenomenon.

Hell, WW1 wiped out like half the heirs of the British aristocracy.

Hell, WW1 wiped out like half the heirs of the British aristocracy

This and communism were the biggest Godsend for the Jews, dead aristocracy meant less actual competition.

It's disturbing when you look up the pro-democratic movements in the last 500 years and see that they were mostly financed and spearheaded by wealthy merchants and businessmen who simply resented not having any institutional power themselves and hated having to pay taxes to the aristocracy.
The aristocracy may have sucked up wealth but their clearly defined class position also came with responsibilities like defending the realm.

When the wealthy profiteers took their place they took all the benefits of aristocracy and none of the responsibilities, because they could convince the commoners that 'I'm just like you bro'. So now we're ruled by untitled lords and kings with no link to the land, no loyalty to the flag, and no responsibility towards the people or nation.

Sark, for example. The last feudal domain in the British Isles. It was the billionaire Barclay brothers who put paid to that, petitioning the ECHR to declare the island's system of government as badwrongnotallowed because they didn't like the local lord's tax rules.

Absolutely, the new Lords are scourges of our lands who ought to be executed for their shameless tyranny.

Out of everything I've ever read on this website, this post upset me the most. Now that I've concluded my breathing exercises, I'm working on the first draft of my essay on why this is incorrect. Please bump the thread until this matter is resolved. Thank you.

Please elaborate, I'm genuinely interested in your perspective

I miss stories about the plight of low ranking aristocrats.

The aristocracy may have sucked up wealth but their clearly defined class position also came with responsibilities like defending the realm.

By rallying common people to fight against the common people other nobles rallied. A great system.

Braveheart

King: "Arrows cost money. Deaths cost us nothing."

Uh what? Trained soldiers are one of your most valuable resources, not to mention the fact that any witnesses to such behavior would desert or potentially even foment rebellion

It was a better time

Because Elves are beautiful and niggers are ugly. Paint a nigger white and you get an Orc. Shitskins and niggers live in Rhun and Harad far away from civilization and anything that matters.

what's problematic about everyone knowing their place?

Yes, saar, please respect I’m Brahman

Anon, the archers are the trained ones. The dudes swinging axes and spears in the melee are levied peasants, they're worth jack shit.

So now we're ruled by untitled lords and kings with no link to the land, no loyalty to the flag, and no responsibility towards the people or nation.

And fucking tacky fashion sense, truly non-noble.

Its a very simple system anon, there's the upstairs people and the down stairs people.

They may be just warm bodies filling a up a spot but they are still a finite resource

you understand what a PEASANT is... right? ancient nobility needed those guys to make all the fucking food and build everything. the lives of the peasantry were SO IMPORTANT to the aristocracy of the day that there were literally allotted times of the year every nation abided by as "war season" - being the time before harvest, but after sowing, or after harvest, but before winter - because if all your levies were off dying of exposure and sickness in a war camp everybody back home would die from a total collapse of the economy and food supply

Yeah, that's why you leave just enough to work and fuck during the winter at home and dispose of the ones fighting as you see fit. I.e. they're fucking expendable.

peasant

no such thing.

I fucking hate loading the game Middle Earth: Shadow of War and the loading screen is an ugly nog "Gondorian" which they push to have a romantic relationship with the human white female girlboss behind the frontlines epic warrior. And holy shit they keep this DEI/woke slop while maintaining the LotR dialect "The Elves, the Dwarves and the Men" (they never say "human"), that just makes a dissonance and at least makes it very clear how we've become retarded.

This might be why mercenary companies became big in the late middle ages, especially in germany.

who are you leaving behind exactly? it's just women, children, and the elderly left after you take all the fighting aged men who are also healthy enough to muster for war. this isn't a video game lmao

mainly the black death combined with linearly increasing technologies in metallurgy, siege warfare, and the general improvement in tactics and strategies as europe left the dark ages behind is what led to that militarial restructuring, focusing on private retinues and proto-paramilitary forces