Who knew Locke and Hobbes were
still being brought up in the 21st century, outside of Polisci 101 I
mean. While watching the new show “Revolution” on NBC I realized the two
separate groups portrayed in the show follow the beliefs of both Hobbes and
Locke.
For those of you who don’t know or simply
don’t have time for TV, “Revolution” shows the U.S. after a mysterious power
outage. Everything that ran on any form of electricity, from cell phones to
computers suddenly went off and never turned back on. We meet the main
characters fifteen years after the “black out,” or loss of power. The United
States doesn’t exist anymore. Instead the U.S. has been broken up into multiple
republics, run by absolute dictators (sound familiar yet?) The one we are most
familiar with at this point in the called the Monroe Republic. Sebastian Monroe
has control of the majority of all firearms, as rare as they are now, and his
militia enforces anything and everything Monroe deems “necessary.” When people
see the militia coming, they hide if they can or they do whatever it is they
ask, because they fear the militia more than they want to protect what is
theirs. (Please tell me this is starting to ring bells!)
If it hasn’t, let me lay it out for
you. In Hobbes’ The
Leviathan, Hobbes believes that when a government goes into effect, it
is because one man gains all of the weapons and power; everyone else follows him purely out of fear. Monroe follows this definition to a T, in
“Revolution.” He does not allow civilians to own firearms, giving him military
superiority over the majority of the population. There is, however, a rebel
group trying to fight against Monroe, which The
Leviathan does not mention about government. This rebellion is trying to
bring back the government of the United States of America, as opposed to the
Monroe Republic. But there is also another story to this show besides the
government.
The audience mostly follows the
story of a young woman named Charlie as she tries to find her brother, who was
taken by the militia. Their father is believed to have known how and why the
black out occurred and even how to turn the “lights” back on. When the militia
comes to get their father, he is accidently shot and the militia takes
Charlie’s brother, Danny, instead. As Charlie intends to search for Danny by
herself, but two other people from her small community choose to go with her.
This is something neither of them has to do. They are not related to Danny, in
no way are they responsible for him and they are not to blame for Danny being
taken. Regardless, they still choose to go with Charlie, even against Charlie’s
own will. (Hmmm…people working together…familiar much?) Charlie goes in search
of her uncle, Miles, at her father’s suggestion and he also agrees to help her
get Danny back, even though he has never met Danny or Charlie, he agrees to
help them on the bases of their family ties and nothing else. Charlie is not
threatening him. She is not bribing him. All she can do is ask, beg, Miles to
come with her.
I will admit that this does take
Locke farther than what he wrote in his Treatise.
In The
Second Treatise, Locke says we should be part of communities only if it
does not cause harm to ourselves. In “Revolution,” it is obvious those helping
Charlie are risking harm to themselves and I don’t want to spoil this series
for anyone, but you do see harm come to these individuals as their quest
continues.
In closing, I think it’s
interesting how today in the 21st century, when a writer decides to
write about a situation that is, basically, post apocalyptic, society is thrown
back into a state of nature similar to the one described by Hobbes and Locke
written centuries ago. Those who were or are involved in the government, or
even society in the big cities, in this state of nature support Hobbes’ idea
that you cannot trust anyone. While those who have no experience with the
Republic, or have stayed in more rural areas, have a more “Locketian” view of
human kind being inherently good. For example Charlie regularly convinces
Miles to not kill individuals working for the militia. By no means do I know if
the writer was inspired or drew on the Locke’s and Hobbes’ writings, but the
similarities are awesome, surprising, and worth discussing.
