If the explicit message of WALL-E is an exposure of liberalism’s ultimate end, the implicit message is the essence of conservatism. Conservatism derives its name from its fundamental tenet: to conserve, to maintain the status quo, which often requires a returning to the practices and policies of an earlier time.

Liberals recoil at the notion that something earlier or older could possibly be better. After all that’s why most liberals would rather be known as progressives. But progress devoid of an historical orientation, based only in our fascination with the novel and a rejection of all things classic, may take you into a promising future but ultimately brings you back to earth and the reality that what has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done (Ecclesiastes 1:9).

Additionally, WALL-E is an appeal to return to our humanity, to free ourselves from captivity to an ever encroaching technology. Human beings need real conversation, not communication mediated through an electronic device. In this sense WALL-E is an Orwellian depiction of the future we are even now living, one where there is a whole lot of communication taking place but very little conversation, and no love. In the process, the robots have become what humans ought to be—relational and loving—and humans have become robots, disinterested and unaware that anything at all is occurring outside of their limited technological universe.

Resisting the siren song of technology will require all out war against it, not just merely a passive resistance. It means tuning out, turning off, shutting down, unplugging. It means, in essence, being unavailable. It means that when you reach out and touch someone you actually do. The personal liberty promised by the gadgets bequeathed to us by the likes of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs have in reality enslaved us to an anticipation of the next personally liberating device.

WALL-E is a call to an armed resistance against two very real enemies. First, government control of every aspect of our life and second, our own depraved hearts which are so easily lulled into a technologically-induced passivity. The second threat creates the opportunity on which the first threat capitalizes. Conquer the second threat and you’ve eliminated the first. We have met the enemy, and he is us.