Robespierre is not for your ‘eat the rich’ jokes

By Kate Norrish Staff Writer In today’s culture of distrust of billionaires, and the increasing discussion of rich politicians in the American election, the events of the French Revolution have become a common subject of gallows humor. While I find most of these jokes, such as over-the-top imaginings of guillotining billionaires, to be harmless, I become concerned when historical figures involved in the revolution are brought into the conversation, especially Robespierre. The cultural idea of Maximillian Robespierre, a major political figure during the French Revolution, is that he was a tyrant and terrorist who was involved in the execution of thousands of people. However, while researching 1700s European history on my own time, I found the information about him, even among respected resources, to be incredibly contradictory. From the primary sources I could find, he was heavily against the death penalty. To quote a speech he wrote, as translated by Mitch Abidor, “In the eyes of truth and justice these scenes of death that (the state) orders with so much ceremony, are nothing but cowardly assassinations.” Additional research using scholarly sources seemed to indicate that the vast majority of the crimes he was accused of were the results of scapegoating to cover other politicians’ actions. This is discussed thoroughly in the book “Robespierre and Conspiracy Theories” by Geoffrey Cubitt of Cambridge University Press, as well as the Encyclopedia Britannica’s webpage on him. The belief that he was a terrorist originates from his radical beliefs toward how human rights should alter the functions of government, something which was corrupted and misinterpreted by his political rivals, according to “Misgivings about Revolution” by Barrington Moore of Harvard University. He was guillotined as a result. However, the belief that he was a terrorist has been used for real-world harm. Many consider Robespierre to have been the moral center of the revolution, focusing much of his leadership on Jewish and Black rights. Therefore, there has been speculation that by ignoring this, the romanticization of the French Revolution has led to violent crimes. For example, in France, words often attributed to him - specifically “liberté, égalité, fraternité,” or “liberty, equality, fraternity” - have been used by the far right to gain large amounts of political control, according to Liberites.eu, and there has been speculation that this has led to an increase in police violence in the country, according to Time Magazine. Additionally, both during his life and after, elements of his personality, such as introversion, a dislike of being touched, and habitual behavior, have been used to villainize him. I have seen him described as narcissistic, in a way which implies that people with narcissistic personality disorder are inherently violent. These traits, which are common among people with various neurodiversities such as autism, are used to dehumanize him. Therefore, in context, these jokes, many of which imply that “maybe Robespierre was right to kill all those people,” feel incredibly damaging, perpetuating a ripple effect that is used against racial, religious, neurodivergent, and mentally ill minorities. If you do your own research and subscribe to the belief that Robespierre was a terrorist, I think you can agree that romanticizing such actions is incredibly dangerous. If you agree with my research, please let a scapegoated, brutally executed man rest.