In the comic I was able to find a fine
line between terrorism and an aggressive person fighting for freedom that might
change depending on people’s perspective. Many times we make sense of past
events with rebelling against imperialism, such as France, England, or Spain, or
the people of South America against the colonization (ex: Portugal-Brazil) as
freedom fighting, still they used violence to accomplish their objectives.
Definitions
According to Cambridge dictionary,
terrorist: “Someone who uses violent action, or threats of violent action, for political purposes”
According to “free dictionary”,
terrorism: “Unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or
an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating
or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political
reasons”
Examples
Regarding the definitions above we can
think deeply and theorize that any person who is fighting for freedom and uses
violence is a terrorist. We can think of many examples of freedom fighters who
were not a terrorist and occupied non-violent strategies such as, Mandela who led
the struggle against South African apartheid even while in prison and become
President soon after his release. Gandhi, who used non-violence to free India
from British rule. Abraham Lincoln, who was a U.S president who fought for the
abolition of slavery while keeping the country united, and so on.
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So, perhaps V can certainly be
characterized as a terrorist. Therefore, the question that comes to my mind is:
is this naturally a bad thing? Can we support violence or justified it? Only
analyzing the surroundings of the world of “V for Vendetta” we are capable of
noticing that the people is going through a totalitarian society (the state holds total authority over the society
and seeks to control all aspects of public and private life wherever possible) where the government has gone outside
limits in demanding or disturbing people, or even being discriminating towards a
group of people. This society has entire authority, control and manipulation. In
addition to this, there is an authorized time limit in which no one is allowed
to abandon their homes, and a monitored black list of culture in general like
music, books, art and cinema that are banned (illegal).
No other way
So, reaching a logical reason and a conclusion, in a society such as the one described above, where non-violent fight
and protest would never have a good outcome, perhaps the terrorism of V is the
only possible method to fight for what he and lot of other people have wanted: a greater
good. Finally, it’s important also to bear in mind that we can find another
aspect in the comic that gives energy to the purposes of V: the aspect of
revenge, an individual vendetta that V acquires and pursues.
Here is one of my favorite quotes:
References
- · Moore, A. & Lloyd, D. (1988) V for Vendetta. New York: DC Comics, Inc.
- · http://www.guiadelcomic.com/alanmoore/v-de-vendetta.htm
- · http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/terrorist
- · http://www.thefreedictionary.com/terrorism
- · http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2014/11/economist-explains-3
Answering to your question, I would say that “V” is not a terrorist. He wants to destroyed the establish order. Everything is contaminated in “V for vendetta”: politics, religion, police officers, and so on. I sincerely believe that he is a fighter of freedom, who uses extreme methods. For example, what “V” did to Eve, putting her in jail, was a very radical way to open someone’s mind to be conscious of how oppressive and unfair the system was. Extreme situations require extreme solution. As we can see in the whole graphic novel, society was under full control of the government; as a consequence, there was no privacy or justice. The only solution for society to recover its freedom was chaos and anarchy.
ResponderEliminarIn all honesty, I do believe that V is a terrorist, but not because the use of violence, but quite simply because V goes against everything that was been stablished.
ResponderEliminarIf we take a look at history, everyone who think different or expresses a difeerent opinion than what is stablished have been concidered a terrorist, does not matter wheather their opinions are good ir not. everything that puts in danger a given way of thinking or behaving is concidered terrorist.
For me the important characteristic of V is are not his/her vioent acts, but the feact that he is intellectualy a rebel, he is able to think differently than what is said to be thaught.
Terrorist or hero, his intentions were to bring justice and power to people under a totalitarian government. It is true that he uses violence to accomplish his goals, but by and large the outcome always give benefits for the population. His fight was against the corrupt system, the government and the religion, to name a few. So, yes maybe he was a terrorist, but if it wasn’t for his work, the history would never be changed. It reminds me to the legend of Zorro, who steals wealthy persons to help people in need.
ResponderEliminarAs a conclusion, I think that V is a terrorist and Zorro is a thief but, it does not make them the enemy of the society.
Terrorist or a fighter of the freedom? It is a very good question and a frequent one, at least for me. For example, I am a The Walking Dead lover and the same question applies to the main character of the serie, Rick. He was a police officer who always obeyed the law or in other words the fighter of the freedom, even when the zombie outbreak came and the only important thing was to survive. However, there was a moment in which he had to begin doing things against the law such as killing people so as to survive and protect his people. Because of that, some people called him a murderer or if you want to, a terrorist.
ResponderEliminarI believe that all is a matter of perspective. In the case of Rick, he started to kill people but always following and protecting his code of protecting his people. The same applies for V since he was a terrorist maybe because he killed people but he also was following his code.