The Face of Guy Fawkes

Today, once again, we ‘remember, remember the fifth of November’. I have, already, given my opinion of the Gunpowder Plot and have nothing to add to that or any change of position worth mentioning. Lately though, with all of the protests particularly in America and western Europe, I have also mentioned how tired I am of the ubiquitous wearing of “Guy Fawkes” masks by these professional placard bearers. It is altogether an odd thing to do, for they really have nothing to do with the historical Guy Fawkes (I doubt any have the slightest knowledge of the actual history of the man or the Gunpowder Plot) but rather was popularized by the 2005 film “V for Vendetta” which was quite a bizarre piece of work in and of itself. It has frequently provided the inspiration for anarchist groups, most blatantly the internet community “Anonymous”. The film was based on a comic book, though the author wanted nothing to do with the movie because of the distortions made to his original story. Whether the original was better or worse, I don’t know, I don’t think I’ve read a comic book after the age twelve. As far as the movie goes, about the only positive thing I can say about it was that whoever wrote the dialogue for the main character has some talent. Otherwise, it makes very little sense at all.

For those unaware, the film is set in a dystopian London of the not-too-distant future in which Great Britain is essentially a Christian fundamentalist dictatorship run by a collection of police state bureaucrats, government and church officials all of whom compete with each other for who can be the most cruel, corrupt and degenerate. It is all very Orwellian and the main character, a masked, vigilante bomber called “V” works to incite the population to rise up against their totalitarian dictator (played by John Hurt) with the help of his report sidekick played by Israeli-American actress Natalie Portman. Much of the odd nature of the film can be illustrated by looking at the character played by Stephen Fry, which seems to have been written in such a way that Fry basically plays himself. Fry, a homosexual Jewish Briton who has opposed celebrating the foundation of the State of Israel and who is a member of “Jews for Justice for Palestinians” plays, of all things, a television funnyman who is a closeted homosexual and who keeps an antique copy of the Quran in his private collection, he says for its artistic qualities, and is eventually arrested and executed for owning a Quran.

Certainly, someone will correct me if I am wrong, but I know of no Christian country in the world where one can be fined, arrested or executed for owning a copy of the Quran. I do know numerous non-Christian countries where one can get into serious trouble for owning a Bible or an “unauthorized” version of the Bible. It also seems rather ridiculous that a homosexual man would keep a Quran even for the sake of artistic quality. He could keep any book for such a reason, but why a Quran? Why not an antique Bible? Again, in the world today and looking forward, I know of no country from the Christian tradition that puts homosexuals to death but in some Muslim countries this does still happen (though not very often because such laws tend to discourage people from being openly homosexual). A homosexual appreciating the artistic value of the Quran would be like a Jew keeping a copy of the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” because he thinks it is so well-written. I suppose it is possible, but certainly highly unlikely. I suppose an African-American could appreciate the cinematic artistry of the film “Birth of a Nation” but, again, I would consider that highly unlikely. But that is the whole flavor the film.

The first time I saw it, I really thought I had missed the joke. Initially, it didn’t even occur to me that the filmmakers could be serious about this. England (Scotland and Ireland are never mentioned as I recall) becoming a fundamentalist Christian dictatorship? England being dominated by “conservative” state-run media? I thought it had to be some kind of joke. England has been moving away from Christianity (of any sort, to say nothing of the fundamentalist flavor) not towards it. Acceptance of homosexuality is on the increase in England, not the decrease. Muslims, far from being persecuted in modern-day England, can have the most radical and fundamentalist in their ranks march down the street calling for the overthrow of the British government and they are protected by the police. And where is the threat from right-wing media in Britain? British media seems as far from that as possible. Take the most prominent right-wing politician in recent British history, Baroness Thatcher. On the BBC even a show as far-out as “Dr Who” criticized Thatcher, over on Channel 4 “Spitting Image” regularly derided Thatcher (and the Royal Family, Ronald Reagan and conservatives in general) and there were a million more. Where exactly is the government-backed media giant in England that the filmmakers behind “V” are so afraid of? I cannot find it for the life of me. Sky News is not government controlled and though I have heard it leans to the right, I cannot give an opinion as I’ve never seen it. I also have the feeling that such a reputation may be solely due to Rupert Murdoch who is not a right-wing, conservative ideologue. He’s an anti-monarchy republican with liberal social views who cashes in on untapped markets; sometimes that’s the left and sometimes the right, he just goes where the money is.

The only way it is fitting that the modern crowd that does so uses the image of Guy Fawkes from the “V for Vendetta” movie is that they make as little sense as the film does. Any honest person can see that Britain is in no danger of suddenly becoming a Christian fundamentalist police-state (which, by the way, did happen once -many hundreds of years ago during the only period in British history when there was no monarchy -keep that in mind). Similarly, Guy Fawkes was not an anarchist or even a libertarian. He didn’t really have a problem with “the system” at all but merely those controlling it. He was a Catholic who didn’t like England being ruled by Protestants and he wanted Protestant rule to go out with a bang -to put it mildly. Moreover, those invoking the image of Guy Fawkes do not even appear to be terribly consistent with their own views. Who ever heard of anarchists demanding more government programs? How much sense does it make to say you are protesting against the power of government but want that same government to have more power over the lives of the people by enacting more programs and laws and regulations? None of it makes any sense no matter which way you come at it. Here is the typical thought process:

“I hate big government controlling my life. They should just provide me with a free education, free medical care, a guaranteed job at a government-set wage, a government paid pension for when I am not working, housing, transportation, childcare and an old age pension for when I retire. And other than that, stay the hell out of my life! Yeah, because I’m a radical who believes in total freedom and individual rights, that’s why we need more collectivization. We should have a march or a protest or something and show how radical we are in supporting our individual rights and disdain for the government by all wearing the exact same mask in the image of a centuries old would-be terrorist who wanted to blow up Parliament and put a Catholic Queen on the throne of Britain! Who’s with me?!”

So, that is the logic: rail against “the system” while demanding it become ever more powerful and you become ever more dependent on it. And show what a rebel you are by becoming the most conformist creature on the planet. It’s enough to make even a monarchist feel sorry for Guy Fawkes to have his image associated with such idiotic rabble.

Remember, Remember...

...the Fifth of November...

Remember, Remember

Everyone is familiar with the names, the Gunpowder Plot, Guy Fawkes, Bonfire Night and so on. Growing up all I knew was that November 5 was “British Halloween” when children roamed the neighborhood demanding a “penny for the Guy” instead of “trick or treat”. Today it is generally a tradition for the sake of tradition, like most national holidays these days, with few people thinking about what it was all about. Most Britons are probably familiar with the basic story they heard in school. Guy Fawkes was a Catholic terrorist who tried to blow up King James I and the houses of Parliament with gunpowder. He was caught, arrested and executed and ever since the night of his capture, November 5, has been celebrated as a triumph over treason and attempted regicide. However, even this rather simplistic story had become more muddled in recent years thanks to the media and pop culture. A number of misconceptions seem to have taken root regarding Guy Fawkes and November 5. Given that, it is worth looking in to what we know and what we do not.

We know that King James I had whispered sweet things to English Catholics about tolerance and religious freedom, as he whispered sweet things to about every group to smooth his transition from King of the Scots to King of England. However, once on the throne and a worrying number of recusants coming out of the woodwork James refused to repeal the anti-Catholic laws. A disgruntled group of Catholics led by Sir Robert Catesby (not Guy Fawkes) hatched a scheme to blow up the King and Parliament together with gunpowder (King James knew his father Lord Darnley had been almost killed by means of gunpowder and was terrified of the stuff). Catholic convert Guy Fawkes, a veteran soldier who had fought with the Spanish in Holland, was put in charge of the explosives and Catholics were warned to stay away from the houses of Parliament on November 5.

However, on October 26, 1605 the Catholic Lord Monteagle received a very poorly written and unsigned letter warning him to stay away from Parliament on November 5 and he immediately reported this to Robert Cecil. Cecil sent troops to search the cellars of Parliament on 4 November and there they discovered the stockpile of gunpowder and the now notorious Yorkshire mercenary Guy Fawkes. He was taken away and tortured until he named the others involved in the plot on November 8 after which the plotters were arrested, drawn, quartered and beheaded. November 5 became a national holiday. Many parts of the official story, on the other hand, do not quite add up and have led some to suspect a conspiracy. For instance, it is unclear how the plotters came to possess such a large amount of gunpowder when it was a government monopoly. It also seems suspect that Robert Cecil would not order an investigation into the missing stores of gunpowder from the Tower of London which was assumed to be the source of the explosives. How was it that the plotters obtained access to a house right next to Parliament that was owned by a government official? Why did he die mysteriously on November 5? Why were two of the plotters shot on sight instead of being arrested and interrogated? How was it that several plotters were arrested on November 5 when the government claimed that they only learned the identity of these men on November 8 when Guy Fawkes named them under torture? Why was the sitting of Parliament postponed from February until November which gave the plotters the time they needed to arrange the attack?

The answers to these questions will never be known but even at the time the whole episode was deemed highly suspicious. This has caused some to speculate that the plot was actually a conspiracy arranged by Cecil to cause an anti-Catholic backlash which would harden the Stuart line against them and encourage a ‘rally effect’ around the monarchy as the King of Scots was not widely popular when he arrived in England. Whether or not this was what was intended it certainly was the effect. The treaty made previously with the Catholics in Ireland was broken, the Act of Uniformity was enforced again with increased zeal and things became rather unpleasant for both Catholics and dissenting Protestants alike. However, King James was clear that the plotters were an isolated minority not reflective of English Catholics as a whole and he assured the Catholic powers that the plot would not effect his foreign policy. The Catholic countries condemned the plot as well, though a Jesuit executed for involvement in the plot was regarded by some as a saint afterwards. In any event, religious policy was not very extreme throughout the reign of James I or indeed the whole Stuart reign over the British Isles. In the end, ironically enough, it would be the Protestants who brought down the House of Stuart.

This annual reminder probably does not help the situation regarding Catholic-Protestant relations in Great Britain (which as we have seen lately are far from being as friendly as we once thought). However, political movements have become more of a problem in co-opting the Gunpowder Plot for their own purposes. Pop culture had made the situation worse and this has led to the misconception about Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot that annoys me the most. That is, the image that has been painted in recent years of Guy Fawkes as some sort of liberal revolutionary or even an anarchist. Nothing could be farther from the truth! These treasonous oddballs only focus on the attempted bombing, the attempted regicide and pay no attention to the stated goals of the plotters. These conspirators were not revolutionaries, indeed not even republicans and indeed not even wishing for a change of dynasty. Their only goal was to eliminate the Protestant monarch and leaders with a Catholic monarch and leadership. Had they succeeded their goal was to place the young Princess Elizabeth (later Elizabeth of Bohemia) on the throne as Queen and to see her brought up as a Catholic. Those who celebrate Guy Fawkes today as some sort of heroic, left-wing anarchist are actually insulting not only the memory of King James I but even Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators who were all monarchists to a man -odd as that may sound. Which is of course not the same as romanticizing a regicide and not even because you thought he was innocent or because he was a principled sort of renegade but specifically for being an attempted mass murderer!