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Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc
The point of what I had in mind was going to the extreme and including even the absolutely uncontributive and "unfit" members. Okay, a cripple who isn't capable of doing anything in the group of stone age hunters may contribute still in some way, perhaps by telling stories or whoknowswhat, but what if he doesn't do even that? There are and have been people who cannot, but still are cared about. I wonder - does it mean, then, if holding this theory you propose, that keeping these disabled is somewhat contributive in itself, let's say, strenghtening the bonds within the society and giving them more chance to accept even those who do not seem to be contributive, because even though we don't see it now, they eventually could?
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Anyway, were we not supposed to turn this discussion back to Tolkien?
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Bilbo (or was it Frodo?) thinks that the Shire could use a good awakening, a thinning or dethatching, via a brood of Dragons descending upon the place. He, in essence, would like to 'select' for a specific type of Hobbit, one that is 'awake' and looking upward and not just down at the earth, whose thoughts were more lofty and long range.
But, in the end, what is 'good' about the Shire is that, among individuals like Bilbo and Frodo and his friends (and Lotho and Ted
), it also contains 'simple folk' that have no mind for Dragons and other worldly events.
It's these Hobbits that Frodo saves, though they are not world-wise warriors with swords in one hand and copies of
Quenta Silmarillion (in the original Klingon) in the other. Even Ted serves as a good negative example in hygiene.
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I must say, anyway, that I dislike the idea that it would be so "just" because it would be advantageous or anything like that. Because, wouldn't it be just blind determinism again? And if there is something I am strongly against, it's determinism.
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Not actually sure what you mean.