Life at the Shire: A Christian Libertarian’s Dream; The Shire has a word to say, Part 1

Tolkien is superb! How could I have waited this long to read the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Volume one is captivating and intriguing. Unfortunately, I saw the movie before reading the book. This, of course, leads to unwarranted assumptions while reading the book. Nevertheless, when I conclude volume one I will sit down and watch The Fellowship of the Ring.

There is, however, something fairly unique about this volume. Tolkien affords an excellent introduction to life at the Shire; a prologue detailing the day-to-day life of the hobbits. It is there where the art of smoking the genuine weed ^a begins and spreads to the rest of the world. Imagine a land where the war on drugs is abolished. Imagine a land where marijuana is legalized and our tax-money actually remains with us, instead of serving the interest of a failed and miserable war that has not in any way stopped murder, trafficking, nor addiction. Here, let me speak for my fellow hobbits and so take heed to what I say: Let drug addicts, like drunkards, roam in their misery if they like; and do not interfere with the way we want to live here in this Shire. The hobbits have a long and noble tradition of peace and non-intervention. If Sam Gamgee or even Frodo wants to smoke the genuine weed, let them do it. Do not take away their liberty as human beings by taking away our hard-earned money. If you want to help addictions, give us: the church, the charity agencies, individual Christians that responsibility. You are here to protect our liberties and you cannot do so when you take away a drug that will alleviate in some cases even our pain. As one wise man once said: “Those who support the war on drugs may well change their views if one day they find themselves experiencing serious pain because of an accident or old age.”

So leave us be! We have been doing well without you interfering in our business for centuries. We were doing very well until you began to think our way of life at the Shire was a threat to society at large; but this I say, it is you sir (Government) that has lost your way. We meant you to protect our liberty and allow us to worship our God, the triune God, in my case. Remember that Constitution we established to be the law of the land. I understand it is a procedural document, but it would certainly cut 90% of your endeavors if you took it seriously. Instead, you attempt to regulate what we preach at the Shire when we say that homosexuality is an immoral sin. Learn from us! We are not coercing anyone to give us money so we may fight our anti-homosexual or yes, even our anti-drug addiction cause. We believe at the Shire that addiction to anything is wrong, but you don’t see us installing devices to watch how people live inside their homes. In our land, we wish to deal properly in every case, but we do not use your means. For instance, if we hear that one hobbit has been beating his wife and by the mouth of two or three witnesses we discover that it is so- be sure-that we will take this hobbit outside his home and in the middle of the entire community we will strike him many, many times until he acknowledges that wives in the Shire are treated like human beings and are to be loved as St. Paul has once said.

The church gives willingly because she believes that Christ’s message changes hearts, not governmental tyranny. Let us care for the poor and the drug-addict; we simply ask that you not take our money and use your own secularized means to do so. Let the church do what she does best here at the Shire: heal the spiritually and physically sick.

1. Pipe-weed, as they call it  (back)