V and Terror

Is this man a terrorist?

I've taught Alan Moore and David Lloyd's V for Vendetta a couple of times--I'm teaching it again this week--and I'm surprised at how rarely that question comes up.  Its absence wasn't so surprising back in 2000, when the subject of terrorism was safely remote for American readers and unlikely to surface in our class discussions.  (Since the comic was written during a peak time for terrorist attacks on British soil, I suppose the events of September 2001 have only brought us a little closer to its original context.)  But one of the most remarkable things about the post-2001 discussions is how little they deviate from that first time.  This is a comic whose hero runs around London blowing up its landmarks and assassinating England's leaders, and we're reading it in a time when our own leaders suggest that merely questioning their wisdom lends aid to terrorists.  And yet the question never comes up.  That's too bad, since the answers the text offers are both surprising and troubling.

The word has been part of the text from the beginning.  England's leaders call V a terrorist, but then their judgment is already suspect; they are, after all, Nazis in all but name, and V's mission to end their reign should not be unsympathetic.  But terrorism denotes a methodology, not an ideology, and a sympathetic goal doesn't excuse it.

Part of the problem with pinning V down may be that there's so little agreement as to what constitutes terrorism.  However, this Wikipedia article collects the major criteria of most official definitions.  They are:  the use of violence; civilian targets; an objective of terrifying or intimidating a target audience; a political motive; non-governmental perpetrators; and unlawful acts.  Does V fit the bill?

Violence.  Oh most certainly yes.

Civilian targets.  Questionable.  Britain's fascist government appears to have a military separate from its police apparatus--they're glimpsed only briefly in the "Interface" episode in Book 2, Chapter 3, "Video."   None of V's victims appear to be members of the military. However, they are almost all agents or officials of the police state, and as such are not exactly "civilians," either.  Killing them makes V an assassin, but does it make him a terrorist?  Would we call Claus von Stauffenberg or Dietrich Bonhoeffer terrorists?

But how many true civilians die as a result of V's actions?  Even if we rule out the officials he assassinates; and the Fingermen and other guards like Bishop Lilliman's assistant, Dennis, who die in the process of his assassinations; or the Fingermen he catches and kills in the act of attempted rape or murder of innocents; or really just the Fingermen in general; he's still blowing up an awful lot of buildings, isn't he?

V begins by destroying his targets in the dead of night, when occupants are likely to be minimal or nonexistent.  In fact, Parliament and the Old Bailey may be abandoned:  the narrator in Book One chapter 1 tells us "there was power here once," implying it resides there no more, and the Norsefire government shows no evidence having a legislature or even a judicial system.  So these structures may be deserted.

That is a pretty big "maybe," though, and if even one squatter is caught in those blasts then V has killed an innocent.  Attempting to minimize civilian casualties by bombing in the dead of night wouldn't preclude V from being a terrorist.  Conveniently, though, Moore and Lloyd never mention any collateral casualties of these early bombings; these early chapters follow the logic of comic books and action movies, in which only the bad guys die and any other fatalities are discreetly glossed over.

At the beginning of Book 3, V destroys two unequivocably occupied buildings, the P.O. Tower and Jordan Tower.  These are the headquarters of the Eye, the Ear, and the Mouth, key structures in the government's intimidation and control of its populace, but destroying occupied buildings escalates V's crimes above the assassination of select officials and demolition of purely symbolic structures.  Were the janitors and cafeteria staff on duty at the time so complicit in their government's crimes that they were political and not civilian targets?  (Yes, I realize this is a "contractors on the Death Star" type of question.)

Finally, V manipulates Fate to create food shortages and blackouts, triggering, in conjunction with his destruction of the Eye and the Ear, arson, looting, and rioting.  Civilians unquestionably die in the chaos; we see one woman shot for looting.  The Finger pulls the trigger, but V has put all the dominoes in place.  Therefore, whether or not V directly commits violence against noncombatant targets, we can say that he causes the deaths of many civilians.

Other factors distinguish V's actions from conventional definitions of terrorist target selection, however.  For one thing, they're selected away from civilian casualties and they're the opposite of "indiscriminate."  "How purposeful was your vendetta," Eve says in the book's climax, "how benign, almost like surgery."  (Rather appropriate:  the state created V by performing medical experiments on his body; he repays the debt by performing surgery on the state, amputating Fingers and putting out Eyes, enacting somatic revenge on a government that patterns itself after a body as if such hollow symbolism will replace the body politic it has disenfranchised.)  V's actions are never targeted specifically on civilians, as most terrorist actions and plenty of state-approved military operations are.

Nor does V act with disregard for human life.  He is unquestionably callous in fomenting the chaos that will topple the government (and, of course, in his treatment of Evey--generally agreed upon as his most reprehensible act). On the other hand, several incidents show V acting with great concern for human life, always greater than that of the government he's opposing.  He saves Evey from rape and murder by Fingermen.  He prevents Evey from shooting Ally Harper (this is clearly for Evey's benefit, not Harper's, since he will offer to pluck Harper's rose himself and later arrange for his murder at the hands of Conrad Heyer).  Both of the ancillary episodes, "Vertigo" and "Vincent," show this concern.  In "Vertigo" he saves the falsely accused Ryan, "a zero," from falling to his death, and in "Vincent" we see that he'll even spare a smile for a Fingerman.  Best not read too much into that one:  he can't do anything but smile, and I have no doubts that if Vincent had reached for the gun instead of the door he'd be wearing one of those strange puncture wounds.  But the incident is revealing because it shows that V doesn't kill unnecessarily or indiscriminately; he has no quarrel with people, even officers of the Finger, who aren't trying to kill or subjugate someone else.

V's actions are difficult to evaluate because they follow the logic of the action-movie hero, the comic-book vigilante, in which any troubling collateral damage is discreetly pushed off-panel.  And yet the comic has a disconcerting tendency, increasing as the story progresses, of illustrating some of the unsavory consequences of V's entirely justified resistance against his fascist government.  This moral self-awareness, and this deliberate provocation of our own conflicting tendencies to celebrate V's aims and condemn his methods, are some of the book's strongest features:  the things that make it worth discussing.

Objective.  Doubtful.  V undoubtedly courts widespread attention for his deeds.  But is he trying "to provoke fear and intimidation in a target audience"?  Among the government, possibly, but not to coerce them into performing any particular action; he doesn't use fear as a tactic in any but the most narrowly interpersonal sense.  Even the Leader notes, in Book 1 chapter 4, that V isn't behaving "like a conventional terrorist."  He doesn't need to coerce or intimidate the government since he kills them all, making him more of an insurrectionist or resistance fighter than a terrorist.

And what about the British people?  He's trying to instill just the opposite of fear and intimidation, which are the government's primary implements of control.  He's actually trying to empower them, making this criterion a poor fit.

Motive.  Yes.  V's goals are political; he seeks the destruction of the Norsefire government.   However, this criterion exists primarily to distinguish terrorism from other, apolitical forms of public mayhem such as organized crime.  Satisfying it precludes V from being a gangster, but it doesn't guarantee he's a terrorist.

Moore and Lloyd include several gangsters in V for Vendetta, to contrast their form of lawlessness with V's.  In the best cases (Gordon and Robert), these gangsters merely exploit the empty niches in the government's social order, supplying black-market goods not readily available in an economy of scarcity and rationing.  In the worst case (Harper), the gangsters actually become an unofficial arm (ahem) of the government, putting to rest the notion that government guarantees law or order just as V argues that anarchy is not the same as chaos (and in the same chapter, no less--Book 3, chapter 2).  By the end of the book, the government is all but indistinguishable from the gangs.  The criminals are complicit with the government and even quite chummy with the heads of its police.

Compared to that, V's motive of political liberation is a badge of honor.  Not, I hasten to add, one that would excuse terrorism, if V is a terrorist.  But if he is, it will be morally damning for reasons other than this one.

Gordon's an interesting little figure, by the way.  More on him later.

Perpetrator and legitimacy.  Yes, but these are the most arbitrary criteria in the definition of terrorism--the criteria that exist only to exclude states from the definition.  As an individual seeking to destroy his government V undoubtedly meets these criteria, but as someone who resists and finally ends the state terror of Norsefire he turns them in his favor.

It's time we had a word about the government.  As instigators of violence directed specifically against civilians, intended to provoke fear and intimidation in the populace, for political goals, the Norsefire government is easily the biggest terrorist in V for Vendetta.  The criteria of perpetrator and legitimacy may let them off the hook on a technicality--but let's not forget that etymologically the first terrorists were the state terrorists of the French Revolution and, per Wikipedia, the term once denoted the tactics totalitarian regimes used to suppress their own populations.  Among the criteria that describe action and purpose, and not those that exist to rule out or provide cover to governments, Norsefire fits the definition better than V does.

That V should resort to many of their methods--most infamously their unlawful detainment and torture--to end their rule compromises his eminently moral aims, a harsh reality that the comic and V himself know all too well.  After initially allowing us to give V our full approval, Moore and Lloyd gradually recast his actions until we see that methodogically, at least, he is no better than the terror state he seeks to destroy--even as they show us why he and everywoman Eve are morally obligated to destroy it.  It's V for Vendetta's willingness to confront its protagonists' compromised morality that makes it a great comic; it's V's willingness to submit himself to judgment and pay the price for his crimes that just might redeem him in the end, and allow a better England to arise without him.

But what about V and terrorism?  The criteria he satisfies most easily are those that exist only to exclude other parties from the word's stain; the most appalling ones are those he fits least.  Even worse, the things he does that most appall us don't qualify him as a terrorist at all.  (Lucky for us.)  If V, a freedom fighter who resists a genocidal police state, is a terrorist then maybe the word has no meaning; but if V, a homicidal maniac who assassinates and destroys non-military targets, is not a terrorist then maybe the word has no meaning.

Maybe the problem is that there is no universally agreed upon definition of terrorism; or rather, that the only definition we all agree upon is elusive and universally unspoken. This Guardian article names it:  "terrorism is violence committed by those we disapprove of."

But is V a terrorist?

Comments

[kelvingreen]

One thing about the "civilian targets" bit. Quite often, and particularly towards the end of their campaign, the IRA sent coded warnings to the police before an attack. This allowed time to evacuate, so that only property damage occurred.

As I recall, V doesn't do that, but it's worth noting that there are (or were, this is one reason why more extreme splinter groups of the IRA popped up) terrorist groups that avoided civilian casualties on occasion.

[Rasselas]

I have never come across a description of Dietrich Bonhoeffer as a terrorist, but Pat Robertson's appeal to his example, in defense of his approval of the murder of judges, came close to being as horrifying a misunderstanding.

[Liam]

Yes, V is a terrorist, or at least Moore and Lloyd seem to think so. It's explicit in the title and in V's costume.

An explanation for anyone who isn't British or part of the Commonwealth:

V dresses as Guy Fawkes, the most famous of the gunpowder plotters, who was caught beneath the Houses of Parliament on Nov 5th 1605. For more info on Guy Fawkes, check the wikipedia.

And, as we all know, V is the Roman numeral for five, thus strengthening the 5th November links.

Certainly the Guardian's definition of terrorism seems pertinent.

[Marc]

Guy Fawkes is a problematic example of terrorism for many of the same reasons V is (as the Wikipedia entry notes).

Attempting to minimize civilian casualties doesn't disqualify actions from being terrorist--not only because they may inflict civilian casualties anyway but because they're still designed to coerce, intimidate, or frighten a populace.

Whether property damage alone qualifies as terrorism is another interesting question. Certainly governments and corporations would like us to think so (hence the ridiculous term "eco-terrorism"), but if adopted that definition would apply just as well to the suffragists who tore up golf courses. It seems like an attempt to extend property rights to equivalence with human rights, not a useful definition of terrorism.

[kelvingreen]

No, Im not sure property damage alone qualifies as terrorism, certainly not in the case of things like golf courses. But I do think that utterly decimating a large and well-known building or structure for intimidation purposes, whether there's anyone in there or not, is.

I think it's a question of scale of the act. While the suffragists were certainly after a political goal, tearing up a golf course strikes me as vandalism. Blowing the club house into bits I would say is terrorism.

But I'm not sure, and it is a very slippery definition.

However, all that said, I do think V is a terrorist. He may also be a freedom fighter, but he's certainly a terrorist in my view.

[Aya Ayuvara]

Indeed, this is a difficult question, and I think you are right: It is a difficult question because the terms terrorists and terrorism are not clearly defined. If I recall correctly there has been an attempt to define it more clearly for UN puproses, but that failed. Wonder why - maybe because it would have put americans in the line... I don't know the details here, but I am only suspecting.

Okay, back to the topic. I suppose that what is called a terrorists indeed is very slippery and most likely used for persons who use violence in cases disapproved by the societies calling them terrorists. V is most likely not a terrorist for us, and most likely wouldn't even turn into one if the book were more realistic and used less comic books logics, because we would sympathize with him. We do see what system he goes up against and why he does it. Maybe we would nto approve all his actions, but basically we would agree. I don't think we would call such a person a terrorist... and that's the point, because the "definition" is hazy and will likely stay so.

With the recent events (starting from 9/11) very harh words were exchanged between countries. There was suddenly an axis of evil, and an axis of waverers (I don't know if that was the actual term used for countries like germany and france) because they didn't follow all actions and partly disapproved them.
And as these terms were used very quickly the words terrorists weere also used and commonly accepted very quickly and usually without looking at the circumstances what really drives those people.

You article did one thing though: I want to read V now. I dislike Alan Moore, because usually I feel like I need to consume some hallucinogens to understand him, but this here sounds very interesting.

[Rich Johnston]

http://newsarama.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28792

[Greg Morrow]

V is certainly a rebel; he attempts to overthrow the government by force.

Historically, non-governmental terrorists have had no reasonable hope of overthrowing the government; their goal is to change the government's policies.

The different goals result in different actions. Terrorist actions are more likely to be aimed at civilian targets (but not always: Pentagon 11 Sep) in order to create public pressure. Rebels aim at government targets in order to prevent the government from functioning.

Another factor in distinguishing is that rebels have typically more resources than terrorists, which also affects their choice of actions; in this case, V is more like a terrorist. He can't engage the military, so attacking military sites doesn't advance his goals.

Ultimately, V is closer to being a rebel than a terrorist. It is, of course, grey territory without strict boundaries.

[Dave Intermittent]

The better question, I think, is "does it matter if V is a terrorist?" Or, "are terrorist tactics really terrorism if done with the purest of intentions?" Which of course collapses into: "has the term terrorism been so bastardized that it hinges now entirely on how we understand its practicioners relation to freedom, etc?" This is, as you rightly note, really the power of the book: it forces us to root for a morally comprimised protaganist, and it very intentionally implicates the reader in the carnage. It makes us confront our subjective understanding of the methodology of terror (and torture too, while it's at it).

I do think I owe you a response on the Evey question from an HC comment thread; begged off to go reread the book--I should get on that....

[G. Bob]

I had the same question last month as I was going through my comic collection and re-read the series. I had the same uncomfortable feeling as I got the first St. Patrick's day party after 9/11 when I started taking out the Irish rebel albums. Terrorisim seems less fun after your country lives through an attack.

To UBL, the workers in the twin towers were little different than the workers of the Voice that V slaughtered. If we accept the notion that killing innocents for political reasons is wrong and that death camps are wrong as well, then we must ask "What could V have done as an alternative?" Well, nothing that would have been entertaining to read as a comic book, that's for sure. Ghandi in a cape and mask wouldn't make for good reading no matter who the author is.

I imagine that writers in Rome must have had the same problem at one point. Imagine publishing a poem glorifing the slaying of Tarquinius by Brutus after his ancestor killed Caesar. A reader at the time might feel the same degree of unease that we have reading "V".

[Marc]

"To UBL"--that's a pretty big difference, though, isn't it? It asks us to compare V and Bin Laden simply because both men think they're right--which is, ironically, the kind of relativist argument that September 11th supposedly buried, at least according to its loudest interpreters.

I don't think the comparison works for two reasons, one very simple--because Bin Laden was wrong--and a more complicated one that supports it, relating to V's imperfect fit to that imperfect term "terrorism." (Bin Laden, needless to say, fits every criterion perfectly. Speaking of which, Greg, the Pentagon target may have been military, but think of the weapon.)

Neither V nor Guy Fawkes fit comfortably with the modern definition of terrorism because both men attack governments in which the populace--the prime target and audience for terrorism--have little to no political power. When the king or Leader is the state, you can't always separate attacks on the state from attacks on their person. In fact, Adam Susan deliberately confounds any distinction between the two by exploding the parts of his own body into the branches of his dictatorship.

And, as seen above, I have a hard time determining whether V does kill innocents. Bunny Etheridge doesn't seem like such a bad fellow but he's helping the Leader control the British people through intimidation and surveillance, practicing the older, fascist-era form of state terrorism. It seems impossible that no innocents could die in the destruction of the Eye, the Ear, and the Mouth--that Moore and Lloyd don't show us any is perhaps a dodge--but they are are all legitimate targets for an insurrection or rebellion. Both V and Fawkes try (or tried--tenses are getting awkward here) to foment revolts, again distinguishing them from the modern terrorist's objectives of intimidating and coercing the public. (Notice the public's reaction after the cameras and microphones go down.) Terrorists attack the public; V doesnt, although he doubtlessly instigates a lot of deaths in the process of bringing down the government.

Finally, Gandhi in a cape and mask might well make good reading. But he's probably not going to prevail in the world of V for Vendetta unless the government finds itself depleted by two world wars and unable to control its own subjects anymore.

[Marc]

Note to Rich Johnston: one of my students used your Newsarama piece in her presentation on V today. You're an authority now!

Note to everybody else: this was the class that broke the pattern by raising the question of whether V is a terrorist.

[Iron Lungfish]

I don't think the comparison works for two reasons, one very simple--because Bin Laden was wrong

Terrorism really isn't a matter of "wrongness." It's a tactic. V causes large-scale destruction specifically to intimidate, and that's the essence of terrorism no matter how right or wrong your politics are. "Terrorist" does not include "very bad person" as a necessary criterion, any more than "guerilla," "bombadier" or "cavalry officer" does.

Neither V nor Guy Fawkes fit comfortably with the modern definition of terrorism because both men attack governments in which the populace--the prime target and audience for terrorism--have little to no political power.

Do you really think that it's impossible to act as a terrorist against a state in which the people have little say in the actions of the state? Iran is a tyrannical theocracy, but the Mujahideen-e Khalq certainly look and act like terrorists. Similarly, Putin's Russia is a corrupt, centralized autocracy masqueradng as a democracy, complete with rigged elections, but that hasn't prevented grievous acts of terror from being perpetrated against Russian citizens by Chechen terrorists as a means of influencing and intimidating Putin's regime. Terrorism is defined by its practice as a tactic, not by who it's used against, or how effective it might be on different forms of government.

V's status as a terrorist becomes obscured in part by the fact that we see precious few of his victims, which is part of what makes the conflict in "V" so facile. We're presented with a hideous fascist police state on one side, so really, anything is going to be preferable to it, even a lunatic who tortures his friends and blows up innocents in "legitimate targets for an insurrection or rebellion." Of course we're rooting for the downfall of the state; that V can do it almost single-handedly makes him just so much cooler, and all his faceless victims are killed off-panel. Can he rebuild it into something better, something that actually works? Well, he's not sticking around for the sequel, is he? Like most terrorists, he bombs and runs.

[Iron Lungfish]

Finally, Gandhi in a cape and mask might well make good reading. But he's probably not going to prevail in the world of V for Vendetta unless the government finds itself depleted by two world wars and unable to control its own subjects anymore.

"Gandhi in a cape and mask single-handedly bringing down a fascist dictatorship" might be unrealistic, but does it sound any less realistic than "Batman-style terrorist mastermind and super-hacker in a cape and mask single-handedly bringing down a fascist dictatorship"?

[Marc]

Four responses:

1. Terrorism really isn't a matter of "wrongness." It's a tactic.

As I acknowledge several times in the post to which you're ostensibly responding (starting with "But terrorism denotes a methodology, not an ideology, and a sympathetic goal doesn't excuse it"). The sentence that you quoted--grossly out of context, I might add--was responding to the idea that V and Bin Laden are comparable purely because they both think their targets are valid; that doesn't mean both are correct. You might also note, although your comments don't acknowledge, that my second objection, which explains the first, was rooted in their relative compliance with the definitions of "terrorism" and not any moral comparison. This is an argument of definition, not (just) a moral evaluation.

2. Terrorism isn't just a tactic, as most definitions make clear. It's also dependent on motives, objectives, targets, and audiences. (And on legality, but that's the trait that carries the least moral authority as it exists to let states off the hook.) If V or Fawkes don't fit those criteria then they won't make unproblematic examples of terrorists.

V causes large-scale destruction specifically to intimidate

Intimidate whom? The English people? He's trying to inspire them to revolt--quite the opposite. The government? He plans on destroying them anyway (and does so)--the actions of a rebel, not a terrorist. (Again, this is primarily an argument of definition; there are plenty of morally appalling rebels as well.) The worst you could say is that he's trying to intimidate those who tormented him at Larkhill, but that's a personal motive, not a political one, and so it doesn't easily fit the criteria either.

The modern (post-World War II) usage of "terrorism" denotes attempts to coerce government policy or public opinion through acts of violent intimidation directed against civilian targets. That doesn't mean it's exclusively used against democracies, but historically it's a practice that's been developed for effectiveness against the modern liberal (in the sense of universal enfranchisement) state. Not only does V not attempt such coercion, he's doing it in a state where such coercion, directed against the populace, would be all but meaningless. The context matters.

3. V's status as a terrorist becomes obscured in part by the fact that we see precious few of his victims

As stated several times in my original post and the subsequent comments.

4. Can he rebuild it into something better, something that actually works? Well, he's not sticking around for the sequel, is he? Like most terrorists, he bombs and runs.

No. He arranges his own death to insure he won't be around to screw up the rebuilding. First I wondered whether you'd actually read the post that had you responding in such high dudgeon; now I wonder how recently you've read the comic. In Book 3 V tells Eve, about as point-blank as he ever tells her anything, that his methods of destruction will have no place in the new world and that his tools themselves must be destroyed. Then he goes out and allows himself to be shot by Finch, voluntarily paying the price for his own crimes. It's one of the least terroristic things he does.