Tolkien vs The Tech Bros

“This day does not belong to one man but to all. Let us together rebuild this world that we may share in the days of peace.”

Aragorn at his coronation, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

“Elon desperately wants the world to be saved. But only if he can be the one to save it.”

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, on Elon Musk for a piece in The New Yorker

"I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you!" If you don't tear up at this scene, I'm not sure I trust you.

I love Lord of the Rings, both the books and the peerless film trilogy. As the film adaptation of The Fellowship of the Ring turns 25 this year, I thought that this would make a good topic for an article. But, I thought, what should I focus on? There’s so much in the trilogy to discuss. Then I remembered something that I find deeply repugnant – the culturally illiterate takes on Tolkien that seem to be loved by the Tech Bro billionaires and their sycophants.

All of these men (and they are all men) seem to have gone out of their way to misinterpret the central messages of JRR Tolkien’s masterpiece. In October 2025, Elon Musk asserted on X that the hobbits were only able to live in rural peace in The Shire thanks to the ‘hard men of Gondor’. Quite apart from the fact that it’s two hobbits that ultimately defeat the forces of Darkness in Middle-Earth (and that it is one of Musk’s ‘hard men’ who is the first to succumb to the power of the Ring), the Shire is a long way from Gondor (yes, I’ve examined the maps). But, there seems to be almost a wilful desire to misuse the names and terms of Middle-Earth these days, especially in the fields of technology and finance, two things that Tolkien was firmly against in his works.

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

Thorin Oakenshield to Bilbo Baggins, The Hobbit

He [Saruman] is plotting to become a Power. He has a mind of metal and wheels; and he does not care for living things, except as far as they serve him for the moment.”

Treebeard discussing Saruman, The Two Towers

Despite the fairly obvious messaging in quotes like these (and many others), we now have the following companies in existence:

Anduril Defence Industries. Named after the sword wielded by Aragorn, forged from the shards of the legendary Narsil and a symbol of the battle against the oppression that Sauron seeks to impose on Middle-Earth, this is an arms manufacturer that is embedding AI into its weapon systems.

Erebor Bank. A US-based bank named for the Dwarf Kingdom of the Misty Mountains that Bilbo helps Thorin and his party to reclaim in The Hobbit. Once they have reclaimed their homeland from Smaug, along with all the treasure, Thorin suffers from Dragon-Sickness, an obsessive desire to hoard and guard treasure. It's almost as though Tolkien was warning of the dangers of greed and the love of money over all else.

Palantir Industries. In Middle-Earth, the Palantir are mystical ‘seeing-stones’, capable of allowing the wielder to see over vast distances, even time. But, in Lord of the Rings, Sauron uses a Palantir to send misinformation to Denethor, Steward of Gondor, breaking his spirit and his mind with despair. He also uses it to control and manipulate Saruman. And, if you weren’t aware of the 21st-century Palantir, it is a data analytics and AI company that helps support decision-making for large corporations, governments and militaries. Absolutely nothing sinister sounding about that at all.

There are others, but I won’t go into them now. It makes me angry and upset to see the fictional world I have loved for most of my life perverted in this way. Tolkien’s writing is not about these things – it is about fellowship, sacrifice, courage and how it is often those who are seen as unimportant that make the greatest contributions. 

Anduril is a blade that embodies hope and the power of Light against the Dark, but it also represents a missed opportunity to prevail over evil, when Isildur, who had wielded Narsil to cut the Ring from Sauron’s hand, took it for himself and was corrupted by it. To name a company of warfare after it is wrongheaded and malevolent. It is not military power that defeats Sauron, he cannot be beaten through sheer might and force alone, only held back. That the One Ring makes it to the fires of Mount Doom at all is largely thanks to the selflessness, dedication and love of a Hobbit who just wants to get back home to his garden.

Then, there's the current online obsession with what constitutes masculinity. The self-proclaimed 'Alpha Men' of social media love to portray manliness as purely about strength, self-sufficiency and a twisted bastardisation of Stoicism. The same men who have plundered Tolkien's legendarium to misname their toys all seem to subscribe to this misogynistic, misanthropic school of thought, even as they claim inspiration from a book series that portrays masculine strength as being gained through comradeship, support and rising from your failures.

Theoden, King of Rohan is one such example, but we all know who the greatest of them is. Aragorn, son of Arathorn, whether you know him as the reluctant heir of the films or the King-in-waiting of the books, is a man who loves his friends, who leans on them for support, who feels the weight of his failures and who experiences doubt but is ultimately the one true King of Middle-Earth and one of the very few men that Sauron actively fears.

The King is crowned. Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

″‘At last all such things must end,’ he said, ‘but I would have you wait a little while longer: for the end of the deeds that you have shared in has not yet come. A day draws near that I have looked for in all the years of my manhood, and when it comes I would have my friends beside me.‘”

Aragorn to his comrades ahead of his coronation, The Return of the King

So, in this anniversary year of one of the greatest film trilogies ever made (I’m with Stephen Colbert but I know Eris will go with Star Wars), don’t listen to emotionally impotent men when they try to sound authoritative on Tolkien. The man himself would have loathed them, and deep down they know it. Instead, pick up the books, watch the movies, immerse yourself in the tales, the bravery, the friendship, the excitement and ultimately the true power of Middle-Earth. 

I’ll end with a quote that, although not actually written by Tolkien, does manage to encapsulate what I believe the great man was ultimately trying to tell us in his work. This is from an exchange between Gandalf the Grey and the Lady Galadriel in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey when she asks him why he chose Bilbo to join the quest for Erebor:

“Saruman believes that it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. I’ve found it is the small things, everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Simple acts of kindness and love. Why Bilbo Baggins? Perhaps it is because I am afraid, and he gives me courage.”