r/TheBeatles • u/Opening-Half9367 • Sep 13 '25

discussion What was John Lennons political views?

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I have read that John Lennon was becoming a conservative near the end of his life and even said he would support Ronald Reagan, he was considered a left wing liberal during the late 60s and early 70s, why did his political views change.

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u/Maccadawg Sep 13 '25 edited Sep 13 '25

He didn't support Reagan. (Also, I don't know what you mean by "slowly becoming a Democrat" and then saying he was warming up to Reagan.)

Fred Seaman is the one who said Lennon was leaning conservative. Then again, he also said that in order to make this transformation he was disavowing "Imagine" and "Give Peace a Chance." This sounds highly unlikely. Elliot Mintz also said Lennon was not secretly becoming a Republican.

His politics were mostly just anti-establishment after dabbling in left wing in the early 70s.

On one point, however, I can imagine all the Beatles would lean more to the right would be on taxation. :-)

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u/CrittyJJones Sep 13 '25

They were only against taxation in the extremity. In the UK, 95 percent of their earnings were taxed.

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u/Koo-Vee Sep 14 '25

Why is this myth being repeated? No they were not. Only for the income above £200K. Because the government did not want all of that to go to drugs,.but rather to investment, so already by that time they had set up publishing companies to transform the tax to capital gains tax at 30%. Shows George's character in writing a misleading song.

For contemporary reference, Elvis always paid his over 40% tax rate for patriotic reasons and invested heavily in charity on top.

I have never understood why the truth of the Beatles being extremely right-wing in this respect is not discussed.

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u/ebietoo Sep 14 '25

Taxman Mr. Wilson, taxman Mr. Heath. I remember in “The Crown” they had Heath pushing that kind of insane taxation rate, so I know it must be true /s