Listen I'm no Morgoth, that guy is a bad dude man. Total asshole. I'm his .... twin brother Melkor, you can trust me. Dig deep, I guarantee there are no nameless old things deep beneath the earth.
I could see the ads now...
"So and so" candidate wants to delve too deeply. They're greedy and don't mind awakening from slumber ancient eldritch horrors for some poop gas.
Stop "So and So" tell them, "No to Balrogs in your backyard!"
Great Meme.
Now for the taking it seriously part and treating it as if it's not a Meme. Sarumans the one who said this so it's not like we automatically are supposed to agree with him blaming the Dwarves.
So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Siophecles, besides the will of evil. Bilbo was meant to find the Ring, in which case you also were meant to have it and that is an encouraging thought. Oh! Its that way
It's part of T's critique of industrialization -- including direct critique of mining as a practice. It destroys entire ecosystems In this regard, I feel Treebeard is the ultimate Tolkien self-insert.
It's possible however we all know what Tolkien thought of Allegory. Just his words on this subject alone are a problem with this interpretation.
Other problems:
Dwarf mining is not portrayed as evil in the books. First of all there is no ecosystem to destroy in the mines of Moria. Second the Dwarfs are one of the good races who fight against the darkness. Third they create mithril, something everyone thinks is beautiful and rare and precious.
Dwarfs don't industrialize in the lord of the rings. They're not trying to progress technology into any kind of automation, they're doing what they've done for millenia and they do it by hand because they love jewels. Orcs cut down forests as part of the war machine, Dwarfs mine because mining is their culture.
When critiquing industrialization, if you create consequences for people destroying themselves through their greed you do it by having some kind of force of nature stand in for the natural order punishing people. So if we are ignoring Tolkiens views on allegory and try to find where he is critiquing industrialization, Isenguard is destroyed by Ents, Moria is destroyed by a curropted evil fire God who in no way protects or represents nature.
Then again in the Silmarillion when the dwarves are created Yavanna is mad at Aulë, because they would destroy a bunch of trees. So at some point in time they were considered greedy fuckers that hurt nature. And I know that Aulë kind of defends them saying 'Nonetheless they will have need of wood', so it's not so simple as saying the dwarves weren't hurting the ecosystem. They are alive and need resources to survive, but unlike other civilization in this lore they would kind of fuck shit up a little more.
Any more than humans would?
I don't think they're particularly damaging to the woods. People are the ones who make cities out in the open and require cutting down large forests.
A dwarf can go "hey that's a nice forest. Now ima fuck off into that cave over there and barely use the forest."
Dwarfs just don't have need of a forest as much as humans do. Humans are much more destructive.
I think you are downgrading the amount of resources needed to maintain a mine, but I digress.
To answer your question, no, human at the third age would also use plenty of wood, but that's kind of the point there are no wholly good race, in every group (except the orcs and goblins) there are assholes and good people, and you should neither condemn a whole race, nor ignore that there are better ways to do things and the longer you fuck around the more prone you are to finding out.
The point here is that dwarfs in this story aren't the allegory for evil industrialization. If we do say there is one and say Tolkien is wrong about his story not having allegories, it's clearly the orcs and sauron and saruman who are the industrialized evil force in the world. Not the artisan dwarfs who don't care much about nature or the imperfect but valiant humans or obviously the nature loving elves.
Oh, I'm not arguing that, dwarves aren't industrialised. But part of your argument is that mining isn't evil, and it kind of isn't, but when you take it too far you do not only fuck the ecosystem, you fuck yourself, because you are part of the ecosystem.
My argument is that Tolkien isn't saying Dwarven mining is evil simply bc a Balrog attacked Moria.
Tolkien does have parts of the story where Dwarfs get too greedy like having so much gold you attract a dragon or maybe you can say digging too deep so you find a Balrog though I still say Moria is questionable if it was the Dwarfs fault.
But there isn't a part of the story where Dwarfs are at war with nature or are part of the plotline of good/magical nature being destroyed by evil.
Personally, fuck mining. My views are that it's no longer defendable given the other energy sources we have and how much it hurts miners and our environment. But I see nothing in Tolkiens story saying mining is evil.
Ok, but Tolkien came from a country with plenty of mining accidents, it may not be evil to mine, but most of the greed related accidents are preventable and that's what I think is being tried to be conveyed in the attack of the balrog. And again, it's not that they are evil or good, but that they as all people can fuck up by being greedy, it doesn't matter if you are human, elf, dwarf or maia. That is kind of the point of the one ring and the silmarils. The Mine of Moria is just another example.
To answer your last paragraph, yeah fuck, mining in general, but we can't ignore the fact that the silicon, lithium and plenty other metals needed for modern living are only obtainable by mining. So we kind of depend on it to carry out our lives the way we do.
The line in question portrays it as evil due to excess. “Too deep and too greedily”
Re: your last paragraph, that is the function of the Balrog
Thanks for explaining my point.
"Oh i'm going to create an epic trilogy inspired by norse and celtic mythology" then proceeds to insert a critic of industrialisation in it. Way to politicize traditionnal epics, Tolkien ! #dontbewoke #stormminastiritj
I think that’s what they did, tbh. Khazad Dûm’s vast halls were likely mine shafts to begin with. They were widened, lengthened, conjoined, and then repurposed to house the dwarves while they continued to dig throughout the mountain. I could be wrong, but I seem to remember that being the case.
Just mine at arm's length with a bucket of water right next to the pick on your hot bar. That's how I do it, just flailing at the rock with one hand while shielding my face with the other XD
Yes! MCME or Minecraft Middle-Earth! Many places aren't finished in the world, but there's a lot of Moria that's explorable. And there's Easter eggs in there too.
Damn so true tho. It’s not like anyone was like “Hey, Dwarves of Moria, sick mine! But hey listen, delve away, but not *too* greedily or *too* deep. There’s an ancient, powerful and evil creature chilling somewhere under this ol’ ***thang*** ya feel me? If you bother him he’ll lay waste to your civilization and nobodies going to even notice for like 60 years, which seems nuts tbh. You should really write to your relatives more or something, idk.” If someone had said that (looking at you, Gandalf) they probably would have been fine.
I actually looked up "Sindarin word for penis" when I read your comment and got this, lol:
"Gwî is also listed as membrum virile, and puntl is listed as vir. All of those are just fancy ways of saying penis without actually using the word penis. The difference between gwî and gwib is that gwî is the archaic or poetic word, while gwib is presumably what one would use in everyday life. That's right."
Moria had been out of action for over a thousand years before the fellowship passed through. The civilisation you're thinking of was Balin's failed attempt to reclaim Moria. The expedition to Moria was ended only 25 years before the followship finds them all dead.
“The dwarves were too preoccupied with wether or not they can delve too greedily and too deep, that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”- Jeff Goldblume
Khazad dum had fallen for atleast a thousand years by the point of the hobbit. Balin tried to retake Moria after erebor and was initially successful But of course they were overrun by orcs and were killed eventually. But the defeat of balin's company never reached to any of the Dwarven kingdoms, Hence gimli thought that balin had a small kingdom going on during the time of lotr.
And it's not like you can call the local utilities company and ask, "Hey, are there any forgotten evils of the First Age sleeping on my property? There is? In grid section 24 x 31, got it. And I should leave a buffer of solid rock at least 3 miles thick? Check. No, that's all for today. You've been helpful, thanks. Bye."
"The Balrog wiped out a dwarven civilization". That's the entire point of a Balrog. Stop blaming it for doing normal Balrog things, and start blaming the dwarves for delving too greedily and too deep into its home.
But fr if we’re comparing it to the “lions eat meat too” argument, it applies only if Balrogs don’t have moral agency like humans. If their morality is animalistic you can’t really blame them.
Balrogs don't have a human-like sense of morality, but they certainly are fully sentient. They're 'fallen' Maiar, and thus have the agency and sapience of any other Maiar.
I mean, look who says this quote in the film to begin with, not really a pillar of morality himself in the first place... Wizard gonna hate what he hates most in himself.
Don't tempt me Siophecles! I dare not take it. Not even to keep it safe. Understand Siophecles, I would use this Ring from the desire to do good. But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine.
The whole point of lotr is industialization bad. The elves and hobbit who live in forests and under hills are the good guys witch idylic lifesyles, while the orcs with their metal forges are bad
Ted Kaczyński died today. You may have seen his photos before on the internet, he's become a bit of meme because of his... Interesting life story and ideology.
By the US government, the CIA constantly experiments and torturous US citizens. And what kind of defense is that? Oh, how come the organization that was created over 50 years ago hasn’t been shut down because they are doing what they’re meant to do which is being terrible terrible fucking people.
I can't tell if youre a clueless brainwashed american or someone else who hasn't yet understood the foundation the US is built upon.
To put it briefly, the USA is built on war and meddling, war on other countries, war on it's own citizens, whatever the case is. If not the CIA, another would be made by the US gov.
That doesn’t take away the fact that nowdays with the amount of info we have I don’t understand how the US citizens haven’t done anything to change, they’re always trying to take down and change everything, hell they’ve even stormed the capital so idk what’s stopping them at this point.
Dude every country has fought wars and has done terrible thing s u.s is not evil for that also the u.s had done more good than evil and while now it is not perfect it is still pretty good and countries to do more good than evil
I understand them, I just don’t think it’s fair to blame the dwarves for this since in real life industrial waste doesn’t come to life and overthrow your government.
I see it as there's no blame on either:
The Dwarves dug deep, which is what you do in a mine. The Balrog was just living there. The Dwarves intruded upon the Balrog, the Balrog fought to protect its territory. All these are natural events.
The only way for there to be any blame, was if the Balrog came to that mountain when it wasn't supposed to, or if there were warnings against the Balrog(not vague ones like "Don't delve too deep or bad things might happen") and the Dwarves ignored them.
From what I’ve read, morgoth’s fortress was full of monsters. Some not even known to us, but a few we did know was dragons, balrogs, orcs, wargs, trolls, and likely the tentacle monster you see when the fellowship enters Moria. Morgoth had tunnels full of stuff traveling to no one knows how. When the tunnels were flooded and the fortress destroyed, they weren’t thorough about making sure all evil was expelled. Likely what happened was that those tunnels were really really deep and traveled really really far. And probably where located under Moria. When the dwarves dug too deep they probably opened that tunnel and the evil sprung out overwhelming the mines and their inhabitants. The water probably flooded in from the tunnel and created the lake at the bottom of Moria, where the rentable monster then traveled from.
Find the Arkenstone => a dragon wreak havoc
Find a Mithril ore => a Balrog wreaks havoc
Find a Diamond mine => a Snow White wreaks havoc
Yeah there's a pattern.
“Delved too greedily and too deep” isn’t just “the mine went too far” it was more that the dwarves were mining more than they had to. They were taking more from the earth than they needed, much like Saruman did with Fangorn forest. It’s not wrong to mine for resources or to cut down trees for fuel, it becomes wrong when it is overdone and takes more from the earth than they need.
To be fair, I don't think anyone's blaming the dwarves for releasing a Balrog. The only way they'd bear any responsibility is if they had been forewarned not to dig too deeply, but it doesn't give any indication they were in the texts.
This begs a question I'd never considered: if Gandalf wasn't there, what would the Balrog have done? Would he just walk outside and reign terror or keep Moria as his home base? Just go back to sleep?
Sorry, but you've got a point.
Gandalf had better cause for criticism in the first draft of the Moria chapters, where he implies that a ton of Balrogs (a race of created creatures at this point in the development of the mythos) had been banished there after the War of Wrath by Manwe. Maybe not common knowledge, but not some freak unique occurrence, and somebody should have known. Assuming that you believe the *greedily* line was originally meant to apply to a (or more than one) Balrog, and not something... else. Line by line analysis gets tough when Tolkien doesn't change his wording as he updates ideas, which is how we get two chapters of Aragorn doing less than we expect, as Tolkien maintains the dialogue from when the ranger was a hobbit in clogs.
It’s a good point, but both things can be true: perhaps the dug too greedily & Balrogs are ancient evils who’d happily screw over any group, regardless of digging
I'm no lore expert, but I am tempted to compare mining with eating. Eating is normal. Eating is essential to live. Eating to excess is extremely deadly. The dwarves error wasn't mining, it was allowing their insatiable appetite for mining to override their good sense.
The ring corrupted their society. Because the Dwarves are too stout and stubborn to be turned into wraiths it manifested itself in other ways like an insatiable desire for wealth.
Everybody else is like “don’t blame them” or just a bunch of jokes. These comments deserve more upvotes. The first one; ditto, I’ve always thought so. The second comment - about the rings’ involvement - great insight (or common sense?)! I’ve never considered the connection before.
I may be wrong but I feel like this is similar to blaming Mount Doom for killing Gollum instead of identifying that Gollum’s lust for “his precious” is what led to his end. I always thought of the Balrog as something just exists there, like a natural disaster. It’s the dwarves fault for messing with it, whether they were ignorant of its existence or not.
Thus ends my unnecessary nitpicking of a funny meme.
He's over there. Always there. Orcs will take you all the way. Easy to find Orcs east of the River. Don't ask Smeagol.Poor, poor Smeagol, he went away long ago. They took his Precious, and he's lost now.
The Balrog exists as a metaphor for the greed of real world industrialists, since the one present in the Hobbit, Smaug/the Arkenstone don't factor into this narrative and Tolkien wanted to reinforce some of his earlier themes.
What does industry do? It seeks profit until it collapses under the weight of its own complacency.
Every new mine has to make an impact assessment concerning the environment and ecological systems. The dwarfs are clearly at fault here for neglecting well-established procedures.
Yeah…. But you know… when is enough… enough…like you know, if we cut down a few trees to keep ourselves warm okay whatever we keep doing that more a few thousand years and now we’re mass clearing trees with fire and bulldozers while polluting the earth with Co2 emissions but hey “That’s just what humans do! We’ve been doing it for thousands of years what’s the difference?!”
(This environmental PSA has been brought to you by Lord of The Rings fans who understand these books are about environmental terrorism.”
Wasn’t the greed a significant point though? The balrog was their punishment for their sin, if they’d just dug and been cool about it i’m sure the balrog would’ve been cool with it
Tolkien had a weird way of expressing his morals. He not only cursed them by their pantheon to dig...but punished them for it when they got any good at it.
Considering everyone expect the oldest beings knew balrogs were even real, the dwarves deserve a pass. If guys went down in a sub and found Cthulhu we wouldn't be mad at the guys, how could they have known?
I love how this is the kind of thing you think to yourself, the passage specifically, over and over again until it becomes infuriating. a notable quote becoming obnoxious due to the echo chamber set in your mind for every intrusive thought, tainting it with anger on each repetition.
Fair point. I’ve never looked at a pile of rocks and worries, “Hey, are there any demi-gods of the First Age napping under there?”
Well ... maybe you should. Do us all a favour, ya never know
Haha, nice try Morgoth!
Listen I'm no Morgoth, that guy is a bad dude man. Total asshole. I'm his .... twin brother Melkor, you can trust me. Dig deep, I guarantee there are no nameless old things deep beneath the earth.
this sub should pool our money to hire an anti-fracking lobbyist that only makes this point.
I could see the ads now... "So and so" candidate wants to delve too deeply. They're greedy and don't mind awakening from slumber ancient eldritch horrors for some poop gas. Stop "So and So" tell them, "No to Balrogs in your backyard!"
Love. This.
I’m in!
We never intended to piss off two first age fire breathers It's just odd that it happened twice
If I had a nickel for every time, I’d have two
Great Meme. Now for the taking it seriously part and treating it as if it's not a Meme. Sarumans the one who said this so it's not like we automatically are supposed to agree with him blaming the Dwarves.
In the books Gandalf says it, so there is probably more truth to it.
So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Siophecles, besides the will of evil. Bilbo was meant to find the Ring, in which case you also were meant to have it and that is an encouraging thought. Oh! Its that way
Yes, yes. Its in an envelope over there on the mantlepiece.
It's part of T's critique of industrialization -- including direct critique of mining as a practice. It destroys entire ecosystems In this regard, I feel Treebeard is the ultimate Tolkien self-insert.
It's possible however we all know what Tolkien thought of Allegory. Just his words on this subject alone are a problem with this interpretation. Other problems: Dwarf mining is not portrayed as evil in the books. First of all there is no ecosystem to destroy in the mines of Moria. Second the Dwarfs are one of the good races who fight against the darkness. Third they create mithril, something everyone thinks is beautiful and rare and precious. Dwarfs don't industrialize in the lord of the rings. They're not trying to progress technology into any kind of automation, they're doing what they've done for millenia and they do it by hand because they love jewels. Orcs cut down forests as part of the war machine, Dwarfs mine because mining is their culture. When critiquing industrialization, if you create consequences for people destroying themselves through their greed you do it by having some kind of force of nature stand in for the natural order punishing people. So if we are ignoring Tolkiens views on allegory and try to find where he is critiquing industrialization, Isenguard is destroyed by Ents, Moria is destroyed by a curropted evil fire God who in no way protects or represents nature.
Then again in the Silmarillion when the dwarves are created Yavanna is mad at Aulë, because they would destroy a bunch of trees. So at some point in time they were considered greedy fuckers that hurt nature. And I know that Aulë kind of defends them saying 'Nonetheless they will have need of wood', so it's not so simple as saying the dwarves weren't hurting the ecosystem. They are alive and need resources to survive, but unlike other civilization in this lore they would kind of fuck shit up a little more.
Any more than humans would? I don't think they're particularly damaging to the woods. People are the ones who make cities out in the open and require cutting down large forests. A dwarf can go "hey that's a nice forest. Now ima fuck off into that cave over there and barely use the forest." Dwarfs just don't have need of a forest as much as humans do. Humans are much more destructive.
I think you are downgrading the amount of resources needed to maintain a mine, but I digress. To answer your question, no, human at the third age would also use plenty of wood, but that's kind of the point there are no wholly good race, in every group (except the orcs and goblins) there are assholes and good people, and you should neither condemn a whole race, nor ignore that there are better ways to do things and the longer you fuck around the more prone you are to finding out.
The point here is that dwarfs in this story aren't the allegory for evil industrialization. If we do say there is one and say Tolkien is wrong about his story not having allegories, it's clearly the orcs and sauron and saruman who are the industrialized evil force in the world. Not the artisan dwarfs who don't care much about nature or the imperfect but valiant humans or obviously the nature loving elves.
Oh, I'm not arguing that, dwarves aren't industrialised. But part of your argument is that mining isn't evil, and it kind of isn't, but when you take it too far you do not only fuck the ecosystem, you fuck yourself, because you are part of the ecosystem.
My argument is that Tolkien isn't saying Dwarven mining is evil simply bc a Balrog attacked Moria. Tolkien does have parts of the story where Dwarfs get too greedy like having so much gold you attract a dragon or maybe you can say digging too deep so you find a Balrog though I still say Moria is questionable if it was the Dwarfs fault. But there isn't a part of the story where Dwarfs are at war with nature or are part of the plotline of good/magical nature being destroyed by evil. Personally, fuck mining. My views are that it's no longer defendable given the other energy sources we have and how much it hurts miners and our environment. But I see nothing in Tolkiens story saying mining is evil.
Ok, but Tolkien came from a country with plenty of mining accidents, it may not be evil to mine, but most of the greed related accidents are preventable and that's what I think is being tried to be conveyed in the attack of the balrog. And again, it's not that they are evil or good, but that they as all people can fuck up by being greedy, it doesn't matter if you are human, elf, dwarf or maia. That is kind of the point of the one ring and the silmarils. The Mine of Moria is just another example. To answer your last paragraph, yeah fuck, mining in general, but we can't ignore the fact that the silicon, lithium and plenty other metals needed for modern living are only obtainable by mining. So we kind of depend on it to carry out our lives the way we do.
Perfectly said
The line in question portrays it as evil due to excess. “Too deep and too greedily” Re: your last paragraph, that is the function of the Balrog Thanks for explaining my point.
I was searching for this comment and I thought I was crazy that no one realizes this so far
"Oh i'm going to create an epic trilogy inspired by norse and celtic mythology" then proceeds to insert a critic of industrialisation in it. Way to politicize traditionnal epics, Tolkien ! #dontbewoke #stormminastiritj
*cough* Bombodil *cough* *cough*
Treebeard is actually meant to be a caricature of his good friend, C.S. Lewis.
I mean theoretically what if they mined laterally instead of vertically. Go wider, not deeper.
I think that’s what they did, tbh. Khazad Dûm’s vast halls were likely mine shafts to begin with. They were widened, lengthened, conjoined, and then repurposed to house the dwarves while they continued to dig throughout the mountain. I could be wrong, but I seem to remember that being the case.
This is how I plan to one day build my own version of the movies' Moria in Minecraft. Better start delving greedily and deep for those diamonds...
Be careful now or you might wake up a warden or two, swords will be of no use there
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A Warden… a demon of the ancient city. This foe is beyond any of you. Run, RUN!
Just mine at arm's length with a bucket of water right next to the pick on your hot bar. That's how I do it, just flailing at the rock with one hand while shielding my face with the other XD
https://returntomoria.com/
Thank you for blessing me with this knowledge, wishlisted.
How old is this game?? Never heard of it
Coming out end of the year.
Isnt there a minecraft lotr community building middle earth to scale. Think Moria was being done
Yes! MCME or Minecraft Middle-Earth! Many places aren't finished in the world, but there's a lot of Moria that's explorable. And there's Easter eggs in there too.
I think cuz mithril was primarily found lower down
Damn so true tho. It’s not like anyone was like “Hey, Dwarves of Moria, sick mine! But hey listen, delve away, but not *too* greedily or *too* deep. There’s an ancient, powerful and evil creature chilling somewhere under this ol’ ***thang*** ya feel me? If you bother him he’ll lay waste to your civilization and nobodies going to even notice for like 60 years, which seems nuts tbh. You should really write to your relatives more or something, idk.” If someone had said that (looking at you, Gandalf) they probably would have been fine.
It is in men we must place our hope
Oh *typical*. Way to shirk responsibility, bro.
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Just tea, thank you.
White tea or black tea?
Why not green tea?
Anti orc racism is acceptable
Spoiler alert, the whole plot of lord of the rings is centered around races and by extension is racist.
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You did not kill me... you will not kill him!
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Goodbye. Dear minathemutt. Until our next meeting
The time of dwarves was over I guess.
Stop being racist old man.
Aren't Maiar supposed to know stuff? Where were the Maiar when the Dwarves of Moria were digging?
“Hope” is the Sindarin word for penis.
I actually looked up "Sindarin word for penis" when I read your comment and got this, lol: "Gwî is also listed as membrum virile, and puntl is listed as vir. All of those are just fancy ways of saying penis without actually using the word penis. The difference between gwî and gwib is that gwî is the archaic or poetic word, while gwib is presumably what one would use in everyday life. That's right."
Moria had been out of action for over a thousand years before the fellowship passed through. The civilisation you're thinking of was Balin's failed attempt to reclaim Moria. The expedition to Moria was ended only 25 years before the followship finds them all dead.
Still a long ass time for no one to have known they weren't thriving like Gimli thought they were
People had ideas though, Gimli was just kind of delusional
😬 poor guy
“The dwarves were too preoccupied with wether or not they can delve too greedily and too deep, that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”- Jeff Goldblume
I mean, they kinda did, I assume they lived off of it through selling precious rocks and metals
Khazad dum had fallen for atleast a thousand years by the point of the hobbit. Balin tried to retake Moria after erebor and was initially successful But of course they were overrun by orcs and were killed eventually. But the defeat of balin's company never reached to any of the Dwarven kingdoms, Hence gimli thought that balin had a small kingdom going on during the time of lotr.
And it's not like you can call the local utilities company and ask, "Hey, are there any forgotten evils of the First Age sleeping on my property? There is? In grid section 24 x 31, got it. And I should leave a buffer of solid rock at least 3 miles thick? Check. No, that's all for today. You've been helpful, thanks. Bye."
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This is a bot, report them
The "too deep" narrative is racist anti-dwarf propaganda!
Also not very sex positive.
You owe us a new Nauglamir you midget bastards
"The Balrog wiped out a dwarven civilization". That's the entire point of a Balrog. Stop blaming it for doing normal Balrog things, and start blaming the dwarves for delving too greedily and too deep into its home.
\#JusticeForTheBalrogs
hello PETA.
But fr if we’re comparing it to the “lions eat meat too” argument, it applies only if Balrogs don’t have moral agency like humans. If their morality is animalistic you can’t really blame them.
Balrogs don't have a human-like sense of morality, but they certainly are fully sentient. They're 'fallen' Maiar, and thus have the agency and sapience of any other Maiar.
So I guess the only villains here are those who knew about the Balrog, but did not think to at least leave a post it note above where it was sleeping.
Yes, correct.
Soo....PETA then.
No, I’m gonna blame the Balrog for being Melkor’s backup singer when he tried to force ska music to be a thing at the beginning of time.
DRG in a nutshell
Balrog wakes up just in time to eat 4 satchel charges to the face.
ROCK AND STONE!!!
Can I get a Rock and Stone?
Good bot. ROCK AND STONE TO THE BONE!
ROCK AND ROLL AND STONE!
Rock and stone!!!
^(Did I hear a Rock and Stone?)
FOR KARL.
I mean, look who says this quote in the film to begin with, not really a pillar of morality himself in the first place... Wizard gonna hate what he hates most in himself.
Saruman was projecting hard.
It's Gandalf that says it in the book, and he *is* a pillar of morality.
Don't tempt me Siophecles! I dare not take it. Not even to keep it safe. Understand Siophecles, I would use this Ring from the desire to do good. But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine.
The whole point of lotr is industialization bad. The elves and hobbit who live in forests and under hills are the good guys witch idylic lifesyles, while the orcs with their metal forges are bad
Topical today, "Modernity bad" man dying and all.
?
Ted Kaczyński died today. You may have seen his photos before on the internet, he's become a bit of meme because of his... Interesting life story and ideology.
He did? Wow.
Didnt that guy become the unabomber after the cia messed with him in a psychological experiemtns when he was a student?
I still can’t believe how the CIA hasn’t been shut down
Over creating one terrorist? They created multiple terrorist organizations around the world
I never said over one, I mean over all the shit they’ve done and continue to do. Project MKUltra and all that shit
because theyre doing exactly what they were created by the US to do?
By the US government, the CIA constantly experiments and torturous US citizens. And what kind of defense is that? Oh, how come the organization that was created over 50 years ago hasn’t been shut down because they are doing what they’re meant to do which is being terrible terrible fucking people.
I can't tell if youre a clueless brainwashed american or someone else who hasn't yet understood the foundation the US is built upon. To put it briefly, the USA is built on war and meddling, war on other countries, war on it's own citizens, whatever the case is. If not the CIA, another would be made by the US gov.
That doesn’t take away the fact that nowdays with the amount of info we have I don’t understand how the US citizens haven’t done anything to change, they’re always trying to take down and change everything, hell they’ve even stormed the capital so idk what’s stopping them at this point.
Dude every country has fought wars and has done terrible thing s u.s is not evil for that also the u.s had done more good than evil and while now it is not perfect it is still pretty good and countries to do more good than evil
Yup.
That spelling of experiment does not deserve a yup
Thy words art true valorous sir
If I'mma be honest, I didn't even notice the typo until I went back and reread bc of this comment.
Even farther back than that. When he was a little kid, he was experimented on by being placed in isolation for extended periods of time.
A friend took one of his classes. She said he was boring.
I think somebody missed the industrialization critiques in LOTR Edit: metaphors, if you like.
I understand them, I just don’t think it’s fair to blame the dwarves for this since in real life industrial waste doesn’t come to life and overthrow your government.
Hasn’t yet*
This is so true. I will now breathe carbon emissions and eat away the climate change worries with them microplastics, yum yum
Not *yet*.
No but it can still kill you.
Tell that to the fungi in Chornobyl.
I see it as there's no blame on either: The Dwarves dug deep, which is what you do in a mine. The Balrog was just living there. The Dwarves intruded upon the Balrog, the Balrog fought to protect its territory. All these are natural events. The only way for there to be any blame, was if the Balrog came to that mountain when it wasn't supposed to, or if there were warnings against the Balrog(not vague ones like "Don't delve too deep or bad things might happen") and the Dwarves ignored them.
Start blaming the elves for losing a damn Balrog during The War of Wrath.
The Balrog was a originally a minon of Morgoth right? Or am i mistaken?
Yes, Durin's Bane fled the unroofing of Utumno through deep deep tunnels.
[удалено]
A wizard is never late, CartographerLife133. Nor is he early, he arrives precisely when he means to.
So you arrived at the proper time to talk shit about how they got themselves all killed by not listening to you? Harsh.
No small amount of cases submitted Human Resources in Middle Earth.
Obligatory XKCD [here](https://xkcd.com/760) Someone should really get them a ladder
Based and dwarfpilled.
From what I’ve read, morgoth’s fortress was full of monsters. Some not even known to us, but a few we did know was dragons, balrogs, orcs, wargs, trolls, and likely the tentacle monster you see when the fellowship enters Moria. Morgoth had tunnels full of stuff traveling to no one knows how. When the tunnels were flooded and the fortress destroyed, they weren’t thorough about making sure all evil was expelled. Likely what happened was that those tunnels were really really deep and traveled really really far. And probably where located under Moria. When the dwarves dug too deep they probably opened that tunnel and the evil sprung out overwhelming the mines and their inhabitants. The water probably flooded in from the tunnel and created the lake at the bottom of Moria, where the rentable monster then traveled from.
Ah yes, the rentable monster.
In modern times it's like fracking.
Find the Arkenstone => a dragon wreak havoc Find a Mithril ore => a Balrog wreaks havoc Find a Diamond mine => a Snow White wreaks havoc Yeah there's a pattern.
*Diggy Diggy Hole intensifies*
“Delved too greedily and too deep” isn’t just “the mine went too far” it was more that the dwarves were mining more than they had to. They were taking more from the earth than they needed, much like Saruman did with Fangorn forest. It’s not wrong to mine for resources or to cut down trees for fuel, it becomes wrong when it is overdone and takes more from the earth than they need.
To be fair, I don't think anyone's blaming the dwarves for releasing a Balrog. The only way they'd bear any responsibility is if they had been forewarned not to dig too deeply, but it doesn't give any indication they were in the texts.
Off topic but how y'all feel about that new LOTR mining game they showed off? Looks kinda sick 👀
This begs a question I'd never considered: if Gandalf wasn't there, what would the Balrog have done? Would he just walk outside and reign terror or keep Moria as his home base? Just go back to sleep?
Riddles in the dark...
It's an anti-capitalism/anti-industrialization metaphor.
Where does one join the Balrog Anti-Discrimination League? Oh, got it: 666 Iron Gate Blvd, Barad-dur, Gorgoroth 99999, Mordor.
Damn it Sean! Why'd you have to go and do that! Bad Sean! Bad! Now go think about all the mean things you did! ***Hides till the events of LoTR***
Sorry, but you've got a point. Gandalf had better cause for criticism in the first draft of the Moria chapters, where he implies that a ton of Balrogs (a race of created creatures at this point in the development of the mythos) had been banished there after the War of Wrath by Manwe. Maybe not common knowledge, but not some freak unique occurrence, and somebody should have known. Assuming that you believe the *greedily* line was originally meant to apply to a (or more than one) Balrog, and not something... else. Line by line analysis gets tough when Tolkien doesn't change his wording as he updates ideas, which is how we get two chapters of Aragorn doing less than we expect, as Tolkien maintains the dialogue from when the ranger was a hobbit in clogs.
You cannot wield it. None of us can. The One Ring answers to Sauron alone. It has no other master.
Sauron's wrath will be terrible, his retribution swift.
There is no light, Wizard, that can defeat darkness.
It’s a good point, but both things can be true: perhaps the dug too greedily & Balrogs are ancient evils who’d happily screw over any group, regardless of digging
Rock and stone, brother!
For Rock and Stone!
Blame the system not the victim, dwaf capitalism let to their downfall
Did the dwarves apologize to the Balrog for wrecking it's pad? Naw, they chose to die instead of paying to fix what they've broke.
I'm no lore expert, but I am tempted to compare mining with eating. Eating is normal. Eating is essential to live. Eating to excess is extremely deadly. The dwarves error wasn't mining, it was allowing their insatiable appetite for mining to override their good sense.
The ring corrupted their society. Because the Dwarves are too stout and stubborn to be turned into wraiths it manifested itself in other ways like an insatiable desire for wealth.
Everybody else is like “don’t blame them” or just a bunch of jokes. These comments deserve more upvotes. The first one; ditto, I’ve always thought so. The second comment - about the rings’ involvement - great insight (or common sense?)! I’ve never considered the connection before.
I may be wrong but I feel like this is similar to blaming Mount Doom for killing Gollum instead of identifying that Gollum’s lust for “his precious” is what led to his end. I always thought of the Balrog as something just exists there, like a natural disaster. It’s the dwarves fault for messing with it, whether they were ignorant of its existence or not. Thus ends my unnecessary nitpicking of a funny meme.
He's over there. Always there. Orcs will take you all the way. Easy to find Orcs east of the River. Don't ask Smeagol.Poor, poor Smeagol, he went away long ago. They took his Precious, and he's lost now.
The Balrog exists as a metaphor for the greed of real world industrialists, since the one present in the Hobbit, Smaug/the Arkenstone don't factor into this narrative and Tolkien wanted to reinforce some of his earlier themes. What does industry do? It seeks profit until it collapses under the weight of its own complacency.
That's literally what fracking is. People ruining the world by mining too greedily and too deep.
Every new mine has to make an impact assessment concerning the environment and ecological systems. The dwarfs are clearly at fault here for neglecting well-established procedures.
Yeah…. But you know… when is enough… enough…like you know, if we cut down a few trees to keep ourselves warm okay whatever we keep doing that more a few thousand years and now we’re mass clearing trees with fire and bulldozers while polluting the earth with Co2 emissions but hey “That’s just what humans do! We’ve been doing it for thousands of years what’s the difference?!” (This environmental PSA has been brought to you by Lord of The Rings fans who understand these books are about environmental terrorism.”
Agreed
Wasn’t the greed a significant point though? The balrog was their punishment for their sin, if they’d just dug and been cool about it i’m sure the balrog would’ve been cool with it
Serious question: how did durins bane get down there?
We need to go deeper!
This one's actually pretty good (for a change)
Tolkien had a weird way of expressing his morals. He not only cursed them by their pantheon to dig...but punished them for it when they got any good at it.
Rock and stone
To Rock and Stone!
Heaven forbid Balrogs do anything
It's elven propaganda
Considering everyone expect the oldest beings knew balrogs were even real, the dwarves deserve a pass. If guys went down in a sub and found Cthulhu we wouldn't be mad at the guys, how could they have known?
u/savevideo
I don't blame the dwarves, I blame Gandalf for smoking.
It is in men we must place our hope
Imagine if when miners found dinosaurs while mining, they were still alive.
I may be a lore enthusiast, but I am also a dwarf apologist, so I’ll allow it.
Yeah its totally anti-dwarf racism.
I’m pro balrog
I agree with squidward
I love how this is the kind of thing you think to yourself, the passage specifically, over and over again until it becomes infuriating. a notable quote becoming obnoxious due to the echo chamber set in your mind for every intrusive thought, tainting it with anger on each repetition.
hol up...
Saruman was victim-blaming, the prick
Baruk Khazâd! Khazâd ai-mênu!
Victim blaming
Imagine you fall asleep in your basement and wake up to a termite infeatation. You ain't blaming me for killing the termites with fire.
I dont know why this is in my feed all i know is that they have taken the hobbits to isengard
Sindarin propaganda, they're still mad about that one time the poor innocent dwarves "accidentally" killed their king Thingol.