Dogmatism In The Film Planet Of The Apes

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The film Planet of the Apes is an explicit depiction of dogmatism and free inquiry within a hierarchical society, depicting the power of the few over many, much like religion specifically Catholicism. Whilst the film veils the indisputable first world connections through the use of apes and a “fictional” world, the theories and ideologies subliminally placed create many juxtapositions to the power within religion. Catholicism is the oldest and authoritative religious groups, which put in place many of the dogmatic practices still used today. By observing the practices of the Catholic Church it will be readily seen how institutions who are put in places with high authority often take advantage and oppress those below them. In order to comprehend …show more content…
The rare few in charge deny the existence of humans and start to mistreat the other species of animals and any deemed lower than them. This is much like current day politics, as well as religion, in which groups impose law over one another due to the disillusion of power. The Catholic Church created a form of dogmatism, much like planet of the apes, since they set in place universal law and deem themselves the only true religion. There is no room to question the ideologies that are set in place in Catholicism, the universal laws are meant to encompass all individuals, even those who do not relate to the church, as a form of classification on innately “good” or “bad” people. This transgresses into the conversation on whether or not an authority should exist to rule over entities of people, in the case of Planet of the Apes and Catholicism the ideology of free inquiry ruins the attempted dogmatism over entire populations and …show more content…
In this the only reason for the break from dogmatism was to reveal the origin of the fictional universe, which turned out to be earth in the end. Unlike in the film, the imperative nature of questioning religion is innate in all humans since it is important to understand what happens at the end of life. Catholicism rejects all other notions of religious belief, as well as the notion that a God does not exist. In inquiring whether or not a God exists, each individual is practicing free inquiry by setting off to discover their own truth. These individuals who broke away from Catholicism to observe faith in God through other means created their own subsections of religion in their own faiths such as Lutheranism and Presbyterian. Which is exactly like that of Planet of the Apes in which one man leaves with a few to create a brand new civilization, providing evidence that there needs to be a balance between dogmatism and free inquiry in order to have a productive

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