When a book becomes a movie, the story inevitably finds new audiences and resonates in different cultural spaces—and, as a result, new interpretations and possible meanings bubble to the surface. That’s what’s happening today with Divergent, as a story that was enjoyed by readers, albeit a lot of them, is nevertheless getting much broader cultural exposure with a movie release. And the new meanings and interpretations that are popping up as a result? Well, for that we’ll go to Vulture’s David Edelstein, who appears to regard the story as a sort of conservative fantasy, enjoyable only “if you can forget what it’s saying.”
A quick summary of Divergent‘s premise for those who haven’t read the book: in the future, people are placed into factions based on their talents and temperament, and those who are factionless because of talents in multiple areas—the Divergent—are persecuted.
It’s Roth’s treatment of the Erudite faction that bugs Edelstein:
The novelist, Veronica Roth, reserves her loathing for the “Erudites,” who spend their days in intellectual pursuit. She appears to be one in a long line of religious conservatives (her first acknowledgement is to God, “for your Son”) who think there’s nothing more dangerous than intellectualism, which makes people apt to seize power and impose Maoist-like uniformity on entire populations — on pain of death. I happen to share her belief that some ideologies (Maoism among them) can lead humans to commit horrific acts. But it seems to me that knowledge is our best hope against the sort of brainwashing that produces true conformity, and that Roth’s view of higher education has another agenda altogether.
The first thing to say about this is that making broad assumptions about someone’s politics based on an innocuous expression of religious sentiment isn’t exactly fair, or pretty. But neither is anti-intellectualism. Though some on the right might view intellectualism as a step on the path to totalitarianism, many of the oppressive regimes of the 20th century in fact targeted intellectuals for imprisonment, torture, and killing; Pol Pot, for instance, infamously targeted intellectuals and people who wore glasses, thinking them to be signs of learning. If Divergent does indeed have an anti-intellectual streak, that’s a serious charge worth considering.
Edelstein’s review was the second time I’d encountered someone accusing Divergent of not-so-savory politics. Not long ago, I was talking with a friend about the book and impending movie, and he gave the opinion that the book was basically a “libertarian fantasy.” When I asked him to explain, he said: “It’s about a world where people who are good at everything are persecuted for being extraordinary. Isn’t that what rich people are always saying Obama does to them?”
And I thought: Huh. Well, if you look at it that way, I guess it does sound like something Ayn Rand might have written.
Some quick Google research didn’t turn up a ton of people reading Divergent as conservative propaganda, though. A few bloggers have noted similarities between the book and Ayn Rand’s Anthem, and Lean Reviews, “A review site for conservative, libertarian, center-right readers,” has a 2012 review of the book that basically parrots the anti-intellectualism that Edelstein fears:
[T]he story itself was relatively conservative. The bad guys in the story come from the Erudite faction, who are obsessed with knowledge–basically, the faction of college professors. In typical left-wing college professor fashion, Erudite tries to take everything over, thinking that they know better than everyone else how to run society. Obviously, they’re wrong. Because of that plot point, I would say that Divergent leans conservative. Any story that inculcates a healthy skepticism of academics in the ivory tower is doing conservatism a favor.
Of course, just because a few reviewers read conservative ideology into the narrative doesn’t mean that it’s really there or that it reflects Veronica Roth’s intent. My contention is that Divergent is more about adolescent anxieties than it is about politics or society, per se. Roth, like Suzanne Collins before her, constructed her dystopia so that it mimicked certain aspects of a completely different world where all that matters is which faction you belong to, and where teens just happen to spend most of their time: high school.
“The future belongs to those who know where they belong,” says a villain in Divergent, a stand-in for the adults who are always pushing teens this way and that, pushing them to get better grades, to do more extracurriculars, to have a look at those college brochures that keep coming in the mail, to think about the future. Where do I fit? Will I be a Dauntless or an Erudite, a jock or a brain? Why can’t I be both?
Of course, this theme of fitting in resonates beyond just teens, and does have political content. One reason for Divergent‘s appeal to adults is almost certainly their own anxieties about themselves and their children in a world of increasing economic uncertainty, where workers change careers frequently and those who lose their jobs often drop out of the economy entirely as our society’s version of the “factionless”: the long-term unemployed. This makes Divergent anything but conservative—on the contrary, like The Hunger Games, it becomes a rallying cry for the 99 percent, a story that entertains even as it resonates with our dim certainty that we’re getting a raw deal.
None of this is to say that Edelstein and others who see conservative undertones in the story are reading or watching Divergent “wrong.” There’s no such thing, really. And the conservative undertones are there for those with eyes to see them; right alongside the invocation of anxieties about fitting in. As much as we might like to think that books and movies have a single discernible Point, a Moral of the Story that you can perceive either correctly or incorrectly, stories don’t work that way. The answers aren’t in the back of the book. Not even Veronica Roth has them. A story, on some level, is a Rorschach test, with interpretations that vary by the person: from the teen readers Roth wrote the series for, to the elite Erudites like David Edelstein who are getting their mitts on the story at last.
Which means that Divergent‘s politics are ultimately as messy, as fractious and divided and contradictory, as our own.
Wes (@MnNiceFC) says
A good assessment. Having not read the book, I will add this piece as well: Marx was entirely against the division of labor that might give the intellectual duties to a particular class/group. The Communist Manifesto could be read as a rallying cry for “Divergents.”
It may be that this is a particularly conservative book, but often when I see/hear this sort of commentary it feels lazy.
Yes, and Edelstein’s comment was very much a random potshot at the film’s politics, which wasn’t really explored much more than that. A review isn’t a great place for such things, but still, if you really think there’s some dark political subtext to a film, doesn’t a critic owe it to an audience to make that explicit?
All lefties like Edelstein can do is make random potshots, because they don’t actually know what they’re talking about. Like most lefties . . .
Being anti-govt. & anti rule of man thus pro rule of law are 2 different things
More deaths & misery attributed to Marx’s flawed ideology than any religion thus far
——————————————————-
Socialism always masks itself in Humanitarianism when NOT in Power throughout history but it’s true intentions of robbing the Individual of there Artistic Individuality & Independence to “fit” a Uniformally More-Correct Model and The Collective always becomes exposed eventually
Furthermore:
Socialism robs the person of selling there “labor” to the highest bidder
and replaces the potential “buyer” with Plutocratic “Monopoly”
Rob Haan says
What I enjoyed about the book is that it made me think first, “this is absurd… why would people have to pick and ascribe to such a rigid set of values?!” and eventually “oh… that is pretty much what we actually do… here in this real life… right now… with our political affiliations”.
I agree that it is somewhat of a Rorschach test. You could really make an argument for the Erudite and Dauntless faction being a parallel to either major political party. I definitely didn’t get any sort of agenda vibe reading the book. If anything the message I got was, “there’s value in a number of perspectives, don’t get too unbalanced”.
Has anyone noticed that the chief bad gal in the film, played by Kate Winslett, is a dead ringer for Hillary Clinton, complete with pantsuits?
Yep.
Clearly with the anti-gov’t and anti-social control aspects(the movie of course drips with the fear of gov’t telling us where to work) then the so obvious personage of Hillary Clinton it is clear this is an attempt at propaganda to sway the upcoming 2016 election. Could the landslide opposition to Hillary Clinton by young adults be the result? Maybe.
. . . furthermore, there are a lot of conservatives in the so-called “99” percent. Why would anyone suspect a conservative tone in “Divergent”? It is the Left today that insists on its superiority based on its embrace of science. That’s Erudite every day of the week. Liberals may identify with the compassion shown by the Abegnation bunch, but check the surveys on which side of the political spectrum gives away more of itself. In general, Christians and Southern Conservatives give more money to charity than people on the Left. Every survey done over the past dozen years shows the same thing. Erudite doesn’t just think things would be better if it was in charge. Erudite is morally offended by the idea that anyone else is. And so Erudite is out there using lies and slander to embarrass, discredit and dispirit the Abegnation bunch. That’s what Liberal voices are doing every day to Conversatives in this country. And remember that in the film, And remember that Erudite’s leader unmistakably channels Hillary Clinton. Kate Winlett’s character has the iron will and icy calm of the dictator Hillary would be if she weren’t so given to self-righteous hysteria when confronting people who don’t agree with her.
uhmmm there are no 99% against the 1% its the occupy wall street types whom are pushing this 99% vs. 1% by making the federal govt. overreaching and stronger then need be and only those “industrialists/bankers” in bed with govt. will get ahead
So conservatives have it EXACTLY CORRECT in America we have the 1% the 5% the 10 and 15% the top 20% and the top 53%
its the far left trying to drag down most of the top 53% down into the bottom 99% … not the right WAKE UP
The first time I saw the trailer I knew it was conservative propaganda and called it out on youtube. I was attacked right away but I later convinced the more intellectual debaters who just liked the books. Amazing how blind some people are to it - even after they read it.
It’s a drop in the bucket compared to the lefty propaganda we’re forced to deal with from Hollyweird on a daily basis. But then again, lefties never did like opposing points of view.
Your losing your arguement when you resort to personal attacks instead of facts.
James D Lewallen says
The book series is much more libertarian and anti-statist than it is conservative. The key messages are anti-government and proclaim the dangers of concentrating power and allowing one group to control the rest because they “know best”. And that is a good message for young people today. Government does NOT know best.
PRECISELY. It’s against the idea of a self-proclaimed intellectual aristocracy knowing what’s ‘better’ for you. And since the intellectual left really DOES think it knows what’s better for you, they hate it.
I enjoy the thought of them squirming in their pants while watching this film.
argh. Lost my entire post after accidentally hitting the back button. Here we go again.
I’d been meaning to watch this for a while and saw it on a plane. I’ve never read the books and I’ve never heard of David Edelstein. However, I came away from that film with very similar conclusions to him.
I may be wrong (I don’t live in the US and I’m not American so there may be subtleties that I’ve missed). It could all be just a silly teen romp with no implied meanings at all - and I just ended up thinking too hard about it.
But I don’t think so.
To me this presents a world where a benevolent ruling class based on wholesome, conservative, protestant ideals (though with a few of the less wholesome bits left out) is deceived and usurped by an intellectual elite who co-opt the power of the state (in the form of the Dauntless) to their devilish ends. They are saved from this dastardly plot when one of their number adopts a muscular, gun toting approach to stand up to the evil intellectuals so that they can no longer tell everyone what to do.
To me this reads like a tea partyer’s wet dream. Unlike some commentators I would say there is little room for ambiguity in the message of this film. The fact that it’s aimed at teenagers makes it all the more sinister.
Anyway my tuppence worth. I doubt anyone will read this since its about 3 months after the event.
I completely and utterly agree with you
Tea Partiers: you mean those crude, unwashed folks who want to be left alone to pursue their own destinies, unhindered by a crackpot, self-proclaimed intellectual aristocracy that thinks it knows better than us?
Yeah . . . that’s me. I love this film. And I love that you hate it.
Hey JHAN6120 and I’m glad that you love that I hate it. But actually I dont hate it completely - take out the message and its an entertaining film. Also I’m sure extreme libertarians have generally good personal hygiene for the most part, even if you don’t.
You all missed the point totally. You cannot understand this movie without knowing philosophic history. The system of factions is the class system of Marxist fame. The system is currently run by the trusted collectivist-altruist morality(self abnegation) the other factions are agriculture (amity), justice-law (candor), mitary(dauntless), and industry-science-tech(erudite). The communal wealth redistrubuting abnegation is supposed to be subverted by the unity of military-industry(“military-indusrial complex”)this is the classic enemy of the communist-the fascist. The film has the divergent theme as a repudiation of categorization or reason based explanation based on the identity of the particulars in the category. These who’s “minds work in a million ways” cant be categorized and are seen as a threat to the class society. After drinking the aptitude serum Triss first sees herself in the mirror which is a reference to the Marxist dialectical epistemology. She sees her front and back,reverse etc.(opposites) Tris diverges from her communal-religous morality roots by using her mind to break the glass etc. Instead of using the material identity of fire to burn ropes etc. This suggests the message is that this new divergence from her communalism roots is the repudiation of the classical Marxist dialectical materialism for the historical enemy of dialectical idealism “this isn’t real”. The movie has the usual fascist element of blood-ethnic tribalism replaced with class warfare-economic occupation (faction)before blood. Several times in the movie people touch other peoples blood unflinchingly to give this message. The main point is that this new divergent class needs to infiltrate the military-industrial complex to be able to not be crushed by them in a coming coup-like cleansing that will be based on a anti-“human nature” sentiment that justifies the use of technology to prevent the human tendency to “keep secrets, lie and steal” (government spying etc). The movie ends with Tris and four on the train and Tris saying “we have no home” (property) This is the Marxist dream of the classless society that rids society of the theft that is “property”. So the libertarian uprising in America is supposed to be taking over the system and repudiating the wealth redistributing morality of atruism that both Marxist and the religious right share.”brothers keeper” The funny thing is this film is exactly backwards and heres why:http://www.johnmccaskey.com/joomla/index.php/blog/71-new-libertarians
Blah blah blah . . . the film promotes the idea of individual liberty and the notion that there should be no self-proclaimed class of ‘experts’ who rule over everyone else.
Marxism is complete bunk. I and my fellow conservatives/libertarians will make sure it dies the cruel death it deserves,
What I like about this book is that it’s a clear promotion of libertarian values that pisses Hollywood lefties off.
These comments are so interesting. The whole time I was watching it, I kept thinking “liberals think they are abnegation.” I know they think they are smart, but the thing they lead with is that they care, they are selfless. They are the ones who should lead us, because they have no ulterior motives (even if it’s, you know, maintaining the need to be needed and hence maintaining their power. Even though they sometimes say that conservatives are stupid, they are more likely to say that conservatives are evil and selfish. Liberals announce ownership of the moral high ground, and conservatives cede it to them because they need Ayn Rand to show them that they themselves (to the extent that they champion rights and freedom) possess the moral high ground.
In saying the film supports objectivism (Ayn Rand) or even libertarianism, let’s examine how it supports the idea that those whose goal is complete self-sacrifice should be our leaders.
If liberals thought about this movie politically, they wouldn’t be threatened. They would see themselves as Abnegation- those who should rightly rule because they are selfless and without ulterior motive. They think they are smart, but they are prouder of being moral. They think conservatives are stupid, but are usually more interested in portraying them as evil and selfish. Conservatives need Ayn Rand to show them that they actually (insofar as they champion rights and freedom) already possess the moral high ground.
Once something passes through Hollywood it is blended into those specific person’s worldview. Typically Hollywood is left leaning and is something to consider while watching. However, each individual also has a world view and it is so interesting to notice the vast differences in interpretation after having watched the exact same movie. At first I thought, why would they who govern allow an anti-government propaganda film to be made, to what purpose? Then I realized that the majority of people, particularly young adults, would associate Abnegation with the current ruling class - the current government officials of any party. Therefore, the Erudites would refer to modern day groups who have been targeted and labeled as being anti-government (by their own elected officials nonetheless!): people who don’t agree with the current government narrative (regardless of political party) and especially corporations who don’t agree and don’t want to be on board with the direction of where our country is going. Unfortunately everything is topsy-turvy these days and rational conversations can’t be held and I don’t see it straightening itself out anytime soon. In any case the film was designed so that you sympathize with Abnegation, it just depends on your worldview what you see.
“Marxism is complete bunk. I and my fellow conservatives/libertarians will make sure it dies the cruel death it deserves,”
Both conservatives and libertarians have fumbled completely on a moral defense of capitalism so I doubt you’ll be doing anything more than promoting a mixed economy as has been the usual case for decades. Unless of course you think you are talking about the an anarchist wing of libertarianism. In which case that would have nothing to do with conservativism at all….. This movie in no way promotes Objectivist views of reason or morality.
” Conservatives need Ayn Rand to show them that they actually (insofar as they champion rights and freedom) already possess the moral high ground.”
Conservatives share the morality of the left.Like it or not they’re all altruists.