History Main / PersecutedIntellectuals

* This even happens in Western democracies on occassion:

** In the 1790s, the English government in fear of UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution taking root in England passed laws of sedition driven to suppress dissent and pro-French support within England. English rioters burned down the house of pro-French scientist reformer Joseph Priestley and Creator/ThomasPaine found himself driven away from England to France.

** In America, during the RedScare, there were the Palmer Raids which deported many suspected intellectuals, local and international, out of America. During the era of [=McCarthyism=], you had [[UsefulNotes/TheHollywoodBlacklist the Blacklist]] where many Hollywood film-makers, screenwriters and actors were forced out of work and into exile because of suspected and actual communist sympathies and affiliations. Similar persecution existed during UsefulNotes/TheCivilRightsMovement and [=FBI=] chief J. Edgar Hoover was notorious for wire-tapping and building files on many artists who they suspected of being subversive.

** In the episode "HOMR", Homer [[FlowersForAlgernonSyndrome becoming incredibly smart for a short time]] leads to his [[IntelligenceEqualsIsolation temporarily becoming a pariah]]. In a parody of a DrunkenMontage, he even wanders past signs saying "Dum-Dum Club" and "No Smart People Allowed".

* ''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken''. The episode, "Black Sheep of the Family," invokes and lampshades this. Because Cousin Black Sheep is actually a very articulate sheep, and the rest of this universe is a CloudCuckooland, other characters [[CallingMeALogarithm take Black Sheep's big words as insults]], to the point that even [[WhyDoYouKeepChangingJobs Red Guy, who is Officer O'Fannihee]], deems Black Sheep as a wanted criminal.

* [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in the ''Series/CosmosASpacetimeOdyssey'' episode "Hiding in the Light", which depicts the Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars that took place in [[UsefulNotes/DynastiesFromShangToQing the Qin dynasty]]. Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson points to this as one of the great dangers to science and human achievement.

** China's CulturalRevolution included a war against academia, with many scholars, teachers, scientists and especially historians (a major goal was to abolish old traditions) beaten up, foreclosed on, killed or drafted for menial labor.

Some communities regard all intellectuals as suspicious at best, and a danger to society at worst. This kind of prejudice sometimes crops up in isolated rural areas where most people lack a formal education and intellectuals are outsiders by default. Other times, such an attitude is the hallmark of a totalitarian dictatorship. If knowledge is power, then all that book-learning could pose a threat to the regime--better to keep the people ignorant and complacent. In a speculative fiction setting, the government might fear that scientists or other scholars are dangerously close to uncovering the truth behind TheMasquerade, and must be suppressed at all costs.

* In ''OnePiece'', in Robin's backstory, the scholars of Ohara got annihilated by the Marines because they pursued forbidden knowledge. Specifically, they sought the history of the "Void Century" which the World Government keeps hidden at all costs. Since Robin was affiliated with them and managed to escape, she became a wanted criminal at the age of 8.
* In ''AttackOnTitan'', this is the true purpose of [[spoiler: the Military Garrison's 1st battalion. They are charged with brutally persecuting scientists, inventors, explorers, and anyone who tries to find out too much about the outside world.]]

* In ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', those who are too openly intelligent are quietly [[{{Unperson}} eliminated]], both from the Party ranks and the proletariat. This happens to Winston's friend Syme - even though he's a vociferous supporter of the regime, he "sees too clearly and speaks too plainly", and simply disappears one day.

* In ''Literature/ACanticleForLeibowitz'', this is part of the aftermath of global nuclear war. After the enraged survivors slaughter the scientists who developed the bombs, they begin to target other scientists...and then other scholars...and then anyone with a formal education. The ultimate result is a society where it's dangerous to admit that you know how to read.

* In an episode of ''{{Becker}}'', Becker is called to jury duty but keeps getting rejected. He believes that lawyers don't want him because they believe as a doctor he is too intelligent. At one point he almost gets accepted on a jury until he mentions he was reading a book. Meanwhile his ditzy assistant Linda is quickly put on a jury and made foreman.
* [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in the ''Series/CosmosASpacetimeOdyssey'' episode "Hiding in the Light", which depicts the Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars that took place in the Qin dynasty. Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson points to this as one of the great dangers to science and human achievement.
* Several episodes of ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' dealt with this:

* [[TheEmpire Coalition States]] in ''TabletopGame/{{Rifts}}'' promote this trope to their general population, to the extent that Rogue Scholars and Rogue Scientists are playable character classes. This is [[{{Hypocrite}} hypocrisy]] however, as the CS is ruled by an elite class of educated technocrats. CS Propaganda teaches that only government-trained scientists are safe. Which is ironic because their foremost think tank, the Lone Star Genetic Research Complex, is staffed by a raging pack of MadScientist[=s=] whose leader [[AGodAmI considers himself a god]]!

* ''{{Parade}}'': The violently anti-Semitic people of rural Georgia are already suspicious of Leo Frank because he is Jewish, but the fact that he is one of the few men in town with a college degree doesn't help matters. Prosecutor Hugh Dorsey, milking the SimpleCountryLawyer persona for all it's worth, even cites Leo's "big fancy talk" as evidence that he can't be trusted.

* In ''[[VideoGame/MetroidPrime Metroid Prime 3: Corruption]]'', the planet Bryyo's backstory involves a war between the intellectual Lords of Science and the traditional Primals, which eventually ended with the Primals hunting down and killing any of intellectuals that remained after the war.

-->'''Grampa:''' Burn him!
-->''(A reporter takes a picture of him)''
-->'''Grampa:''' You've stolen my soul!

** In "Bart's Comet", when the titular comet almost destroys Springfield, the first reaction of the Springfeldians is to set the local observatory on fire "[[InsaneTrollLogic to prevent it from happening again]]".

** Anti-intellectualism is a common motif in fascist rhetoric, and such persecution was rampant in both Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain.

** During the [[DynastiesFromShangToQing Qin Dynasty]] in China, intellectual discourse was suppressed in order to consolidate power in the hands of the emperor. Known as the "burning of books and burying of scholars", this period in time saw the murder of many intellectuals and the destruction of their works in an attempt to eliminate dissenting political opinions.

See also BookBurning, which often accompanies the persecution of academics. Compare and contrast EvilLuddite and IntelligenceEqualsIsolation. For ''works'' that portray intelligent or learned people in a negative light, see DumbIsGood and ScienceIsBad.

Some communities regard all intellectuals as suspicious at best, and a danger to society at worst. This kind of prejudice sometimes crops up in isolated rural areas where most people lack a formal education and intellectuals are outsiders by default. Other times, such an attitude is the hallmark of a totalitarian dictatorship. If knowledge is power, then all that book-learning could pose a threat to the regime--better to keep the people ignorant and complacent. In a speculative fiction setting, the government might fear that scientists or other scholars are dangerously close to uncovering the truth behind TheMasquerade, and must be suppressed at all costs.

See also BookBurning, which often accompanies the persecution of academics. Compare and contrast EvilLuddite and IntelligenceEqualsIsolation. For ''works'' that portray intelligent or learned people in a negative light, see DumbIsGood and ScienceIsBad.

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!!Examples

[[AC: Anime and Manga]]
* In ''OnePiece'', in Robin's backstory, the scholars of Ohara got annihilated by the Marines because they pursued forbidden knowledge. Specifically, they sought the history of the "Void Century" which the World Government keeps hidden at all costs. Since Robin was affiliated with them and managed to escape, she became a wanted criminal at the age of 8.
* In ''AttackOnTitan'', this is the true purpose of [[spoiler: the Military Garrison's 1st battalion. They are charged with brutally persecuting scientists, inventors, explorers, and anyone who tries to find out too much about the outside world.]]

[[AC: Comic Books]]
* The DCComics series ''The Atomic Knights'' featured a post-Atomic War setting where scientists were blamed for creating the superweapons that destroyed civilization and made the world a radioactive wasteland. The Knights wore their concealing helmets partially to obscure the fact that some of them were scientists, and thus AcceptableTargets for the mob.

[[AC:Film]]
* At the end of the Spanish movie ''La lengua de las mariposas'' (or ''Butterfly'', as it was called in English-speaking countries), the wise and kindly old teacher is rounded up after the Falangists take over.

[[AC: Jokes]]
* In Soviet Russia, cops move in threes: one to ask questions and write them down, one to read what the other wrote, and the third to keep an eye on these dangerous intellectuals.

[[AC: Literature]]
* In ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', those who are too openly intelligent are quietly [[{{Unperson}} eliminated]], both from the Party ranks and the proletariat. This happens to Winston's friend Syme - even though he's a vociferous supporter of the regime, he "sees too clearly and speaks too plainly", and simply disappears one day.

* In ''ACanticleForLeibowitz'', this is part of the aftermath of global nuclear war. After the enraged survivors slaughter the scientists who developed the bombs, they begin to target other scientists...and then other scholars...and then anyone with a formal education. The ultimate result is a society where it's dangerous to admit that you know how to read.
* The reason for the existence of the Firefighters in ''{{Fahrenheit 451}}''.
* Solzhenitsyn's novel ''The First Circle'' dramatises Stalin's imprisonment of scientific intellectuals. The paradox, as noted in may of Solzhenitsyn's novels, is that intellectuals are actually freer in the Gulag, where the worst has largely already happened to them, than they would be in the Soviet Union outside. Their bodies might be imprisoned, they might be on a poor diet, but their minds are free to interact and think and speak heresy.
* In ''Literature/HardToBeAGod'', intellectuals of all kinds (derisively dubbed "book-readers") are persecuted by the EvilChancellor Don Reba and his stormtroopers, to better prepare the country for annexation by an Enlightenment-hating theocracy.
* In the ''Literature/HIVESeries'', this is how Dr. Nero sells the Alpha program to the scared first-years who have just been kidnapped and told they will not be able to go outside for the foreseeable future: that had they stayed in the outside world, they would be treated as outcasts for their intelligence.

[[AC:Live-Action TV]]
* In an episode of ''{{Becker}}'', Becker is called to jury duty but keeps getting rejected. He believes that lawyers don't want him because they believe as a doctor he is too intelligent. At one point he almost gets accepted on a jury until he mentions he was reading a book. Meanwhile his ditzy assistant Linda is quickly put on a jury and made foreman.
* [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in the ''Series/CosmosASpacetimeOdyssey'' episode "Hiding in the Light", which depicts the Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars that took place in the Qin dynasty. Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson points to this as one of the great dangers to science and human achievement.
* Several episodes of ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' dealt with this:
** In "Time Enough at Last", everyone looks down on and picks on Henry Bemis (Burgess Meredith) for being a reader.
** In "The Obsolete Man", Romney Wordsworth, the librarian (also played by Burgess Meredith) is considered obsolete, as books have been banned.
** In the '80s revival episode "Examination Day", the government exterminates anyone who scores too high on a mandatory examination at a young age.
* In the miniseries ''Series/{{V}}'', [[ANaziByAnyOtherName the Visitors]] begin [[InferredHolocaust persecuting and rounding up scientists]] and getting humanity to go along with it, because scientists had readily identified that the Visitors were actually reptilian aliens with [[ToServeMan a nefarious agenda]].

[[AC: Tabletop Games]]
* [[TheEmpire Coalition States]] in ''TabletopGame/{{Rifts}}'' promote this trope to their general population, to the extent that Rogue Scholars and Rogue Scientists are playable character classes. This is [[{{Hypocrite}} hypocrisy]] however, as the CS is ruled by an elite class of educated technocrats. CS Propaganda teaches that only government-trained scientists are safe. Which is ironic because their foremost think tank, the Lone Star Genetic Research Complex, is staffed by a raging pack of MadScientist[=s=] whose leader [[AGodAmI considers himself a god]]!

[[AC: Theatre]]
* In ''Theatre/HenryVIPart2'', Dick TheButcher says "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Although this is often interpreted as a standard EvilLawyerJoke, the [[http://www.nytimes.com/1990/06/17/nyregion/l-kill-the-lawyers-a-line-misinterpreted-599990.html implication]] is that without lawyers, there would be nobody who knows any law to get in the way of Jack Cade's autocratic rule.
* ''{{Parade}}'': The violently anti-Semitic people of rural Georgia are already suspicious of Leo Frank because he is Jewish, but the fact that he is one of the few men in town with a college degree doesn't help matters. Prosecutor Hugh Dorsey, milking the SimpleCountryLawyer persona for all it's worth, even cites Leo's "big fancy talk" as evidence that he can't be trusted.

[[AC:Video Games]]
* A Vox Populi rebel in ''VideoGame/BioshockInfinite'' tells his comrades to kill anyone they see wearing glasses, probably in reference to the Khmer Rouge doing the same. The Vox are not specifically anti-science or anti-intellectual, but as the poorest and most oppressed citizens of Columbia they oppose anything that represents the upper classes.
* In ''[[VideoGame/MetroidPrime Metroid Prime 3: Corruption]]'', the planet Bryyo's backstory involves a war between the intellectual Lords of Science and the traditional Primals, which eventually ended with the Primals hunting down and killing any of intellectuals that remained after the war.

[[AC:Western Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken''. The episode, "Black Sheep of the Family," invokes and lampshades this. Because Cousin Black Sheep is actually a very articulate sheep, and the rest of this universe is a CloudCuckooland, other characters [[CallingMeALogarithm take Black Sheep's big words as insults]], to the point that even [[WhyDoYouKeepChangingJobs Red Guy, who is Officer O'Fannihee]], deems Black Sheep as a wanted criminal.
* Used several times as throwaway gags on TheSimpsons to illustrate how much of a CrapsackWorld the town is (at least once to the point that [[EvenEvilHasStandards even the corrupt mayor gets sick]]). TorchesAndPitchforks are a common sight.

** In the episode "HOMR", Homer [[FlowersForAlgernonSyndrome becoming incredibly smart for a short time]] leads to his [[IntelligenceEqualsIsolation temporarily becoming a pariah]]. In a parody of a DrunkenMontage, he even wanders past signs saying "Dum-Dum Club" and "No Smart People Allowed".

[[AC: Real Life]]
* The association between this trope and totalitarian dictatorships is very much TruthInTelevision:
** Anti-intellectualism is a common motif in fascist rhetoric, and such persecution was rampant in both Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain.
** Intellectuals were targeted as part of Stalin's "Great Purge". The primary example was persecution of biologists who disagreed with "Lysenkoism", a crackpot theory proposed by an uneducated plant breeder that {{Lamarck was right}}. For ideological reasons the regime favored Lamarck over Darwin/Mendel. Persecution of dissidents from Lysenkoism went on into the 1950s, helping to cause the Soviet famines as its methods were painfully disproven and setting back genetic science in the country by decades. To a lesser extent, astronomers began to disappear when sunspot research was deemed "un-Marxist", linguists who disagreed with Stalin's preferred pseudoscientific "Japhetic theory" were killed or imprisoned, and the Meteorological Office was purged for failing to predict weather harmful to crops.
** One extreme example is the massacre of academics under Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge In UsefulNotes/{{Cambodia}}, who would kill people for merely wearing eyeglasses (as it suggested literacy).
** China's CulturalRevolution included a war against academia, with many scholars, teachers, scientists and especially historians (a major goal was to abolish old traditions) beaten up, foreclosed on, killed or drafted for menial labor.

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* In ''Literature/{{Anathem}}'', mathematicians (called "Avout") are confined to monasteries (called "Maths"), and only allowed contact with the outside world once per year, decade, century or millennium. On three occasions the Maths were invaded because the Avout invented technologies considered too dangerous ("new matter", genetic engineering, and [[spoiler: magic]]).

Sometimes, the fear and hatred of intellectuals stems from a past disaster: if half the world was destroyed in the Great RobotWar of 3052, for example, the survivors may be wary of mechanical engineers. More often than not, however, the educated are merely a convenient [[TheScapegoat scapegoat]]. After all, nobody likes a [[InsufferableGenius know-it-all]]. ''That jerk with his fancy college degree thinks he's better than you!'' Like other forms of institutionalized prejudice, this can be a brutally effective tool for directing the public's anger away from the government.

* In ''AttackOnTitan'', this is the true purpose of [[spoilers: the Military Garrison's 1st battalion. They are charged with brutally persecuting scientists, inventors, explorers, and anyone who tries to find out too much about the outside world.]]

* In the ''HIVESeries,'' this is how Dr. Nero sells the Alpha program to the scared first-years who have just been kidnapped and told they will not be able to go outside for the foreseeable future: that had they stayed in the outside world, they would be treated as outcasts for their intelligence.

** Seymour Skinner ''saying that the Earth rotates around the Sun'' almost has him torched on the stake once.

** One extreme example is the massacre of academics under Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, who would kill people for merely wearing eyeglasses (as it suggested literacy).

** In the episode "HOMR", Homer [[FlowersForAlgernonSyndrome becoming incredibly smart for a short time]] ended up with him [[IntelligenceEqualsIsolation temporarily becoming a pariah]]. In a parody of a DrunkenMontage, he even wanders past signs saying "Dum-Dum Club" and "No Smart People Allowed".

** When tests of a mysterious skeleton fail to prove that it was the remains of an angel, the citizens of Springfield become enraged at science. The resulting riot culminates in the local research laboratories being bombed with Molotov cocktails and the museums being thrashed.

** Intellectuals were targeted as part of Stalin's "Great Purge". For example, astronomers began to disappear when sunspot research was deemed "un-Marxist", linguists who disagreed with Stalin's preferred pseudoscientific "Japhetic theory" were killed or imprisoned, and the Meteorological Office was purged for failing to predict weather harmful to crops.

* During the [[DynastiesFromShangToQing Qin Dynasty]] in China, intellectual discourse was suppressed in order to consolidate power in the hands of the emperor. Known as the "burning of books and burying of scholars", this period in time saw the execution of many intellectuals in an attempt to eliminate dissenting political opinions.

* [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in the ''Series/CosmosASpaceTimeOdyssey'' episode "Hiding in the Light", which depicts the Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars that took place in the Qin dynasty. Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson points to this as one of the great dangers to science and human achievement.

* [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in the fifth episode of the ''Series/{{Cosmos}}'' revival, which depicts the Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars that took place in the Qin dynasty. Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson points to this as one of the great dangers to science and human achievement.

* In ''OnePiece'', in Robin's backstory, the scholars of Ohara got annihilated by the Marines because they pursue forbidden knowledge - specifically, that of the "Void Century" which the World Government refuses to tell at all costs. Since Robin was affiliated with them and managed to escape, she became a wanted criminal ever since she was 8.

* During the [[DynastiesFromShangToQing Qin Dynasty]] in China, intellectual discourse was suppressed in order to consolidate power in the hands of the emperor. Known as the "burning of books and burying of scholars", this period in time saw the execution of many intellectuals in an attempt to eliminate dissenting political opinions.