The Man Who Created 'Dune' Was an Anti-Government Republican
Amid the scenery and splendor of the landscapes splashed across the screen in the new hit movie “Dune: Part Two” are some messages from a man who feared the power of government.
Elon Musk recently delved into that man’s mind on X as he quoted “Dune” author Frank Herbert’s thoughts on government.
“All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible,” the quote read.
Musk seconded that notion, writing, “The power of government grows ever stronger with each passing year.”
The power of government grows ever stronger with each passing year pic.twitter.com/ofHjz8DwSR
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 6, 2024
“Dune: Part Two,” which is based on Herbert’s writings, won last weekend’s box office, opening to an astounding $81.5 million.
As Chris Dite noted in Jacobin, although the “Dune” books the films are based on were embraced by what he called “leftish student hippies… Herbert himself was never part of nor related to this layer.”
Herbert supported what Dite called a “macho and conservative individualism. In his thirties, he worked for a series of Republican politicians and candidates and became increasingly anti-government.”
Herbert embraced a “conservative understanding of American values,” Haris A. Durrani wrote in New Lines.
“In 1982, he praised Ronald Reagan for keeping ‘that dream of the idealized America firmly in mind,’ seeking to ‘restore the individual to his preeminent position in this society,’” Durrani wrote.
“We should grant power over our affairs only to those who are reluctant to hold it and then only under conditions that increase the reluctance.”
Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune #quotes pic.twitter.com/v5XgSqxFhF
— Chris Phelps (@chrisbphelps) December 17, 2019
In writing about “Dune: Part Two” for the Washington Examiner, Mark Judge wrote that the “Dune” books “form a massive argument against big government, high taxes, and superhero leaders and political messiahs who promise to save the world.”
Herbert had “hostility toward the federal government,” Judge wrote.
He quoted Herbert as saying he “rejected ‘any kind of public charity system’ because he ‘learned early on that our society’s institutions often weaken people’s self-reliance.’”
“What many critics get wrong is that Dune is not an argument for a messianic leader to come and save us. It’s about resisting the lure of such a figure — a Barack Obama who is deified as the answer to our spiritual desires and is the fulfillment of ‘the arc of history,’” he wrote.
“Surely you know bureaucracies always become voracious aristocracies after they attain commanding power.” Odrade, from Frank Herbert’s book
— Rachel Gail Jones (@tyrsia) May 14, 2010
Judge noted Herbert’s comment about the downfall of former President Richard Nixon.
“Nixon taught us one hell of a lesson, and I thank him for it. He made us distrust government leaders,” Herbert said.
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