Two Hundred Nuts and an Uber

Have you ever heard something super crazy and never really believed it, until one day you experienced it firsthand? Well, such a thing happened to me last night. I had heard about the "New World Order" conspiracy theorists for years, and could never quite believe that the people who believed this tripe exist. Well people, I'm here to tell you that they do exist, and they have made a movie. Last night at the Alamo Drafthouse was a screening of Alex Jones' movie "911: The Road to Tyranny", a movie which thoroughly scared yours truly. I was not scared because I believed the controversial content of the movie, but because there were about 200 people yelling along with it and wholeheartedly behind Jones's beliefs. Last night, I wept for the future.

Let's kick off here by trying to examine what exactly the "New World Order" folks believe, much of which is covered in the movie. The belief is that all the governments in the world, especially in western Europe, are secretly in cahoots to reduce the population of the world to 500 million people, herd them into compact cities, and keep the rest of the land for themselves. More beliefs of the NWOists are that the true leaders of this world (again, the people behind the power) are after the "Life Extension Technology" and want to keep it out of the hands of the masses, that the governments of the world are truly the perpetrators of terrorism, and that one day the military police state will rise up start herding us all into concentration camps. A believer in the New World Order theory does not want a national ID card, does not want fingerprint or face recognition technology, believes that God is being removed from society, that the government is going to round up their guns, and believes that a cashless society is the root of all evil.

Anyway, on with the show. The 'Mo was packed last night, with the management having to bring in extra chairs for the back row to fit everybody into the theater. I had never heard of Alex Jones before, but apparently he's a pretty popular independant radio talk show host based out of Austin, TX, and has been a cult hero to the NWO'ers for years. The crowd who went to see this film was, for the most part, already aware of Alex Jones's message, and were regular listeners of his radio show. The show opened with an intro by Mr. Jones. I think it took about 2 sentences for me to get scared, as people all around me started shouting in support of him. Mr. Jones riled up the crowd with his talk of the NWO and the government evils and whatnot, and we kicked off the film.

At this point, let me say that if "Bowling for Columbine" was not your kind of movie because of the controversy that it stirred, you shouldn't try to watch "911: The Road to Tyranny". The entire movie expounds upon the NWO theory and how the public has been deceived and will soon face tyranny of a type never before seen. It attempts to tie together the various terrorism events of the last decade (the first WTC bombing, Oklahoma City, September 11 2001) and to implicate the governments of the world in these atrocities. As you watch this movie and listen to what is said, most rational people will ask one question: "Where is the proof?" Well, Jones attempts to prove his theories by using clippings of newspapers and websites. He uses documents generated during the Vietnam Era as proof that the governments are plotting against us. In short, his "evidence" is flimsy at best, and absolute tripe at worst. More than once I saw him using an opinion article clipping as "evidence". I remember having to write papers in Poly-Sci in college, and if I dared use such documentation as solid proof of any fact I would have been strung up by my thumbs. I have never seen such blind theorizing before in my life.

So what was the movie like? It was a low budget DVD/VHS affair that was assembled on a Macintosh G4 (yes, I read the credits) and is available for sale on Jones's website (see end of article for website information). The film itself mainly consists of audio and video clips superimposed over images of terrorism's outcome. On a few occasions, Jones attempts to make himself into the next Michael Moore by getting in front of the camera and centering the action around himself and some protest he's perpetrating. His film is nowhere near as effective as Moore's at getting across it's message. The main difference I saw was that while Moore attempted to answer his questions, he mainly left the conclusions to the viewer, whereas Jones throws out his beliefs and says "ACCEPT THIS OR YOU WILL BE LOCKED UP LIKE CATTLE". Yes, I meant to use caps there, because the guy is always yelling.

The experience of watching this zealot's film was one I will not soon forget. All throughout the film, people from the audience were shouting back in agreement with the film's message. These are clearly people who have had some hardship in their life, and are looking for some sort of message to cling to. When you have people in this situation, and someone else stands up and points a finger and says "These are the people who are to blame for your problems", then odds are some will believe it. The audience here clearly believed that the events at the Branch Dividian compound at Waco were illegal, that their rights are being stripped away and that they have less freedom than ever. The movie itself points out how the military-industrial complex is trying to shut out God and how people need to rise up against the NWO. Scary stuff.

Before I go on to my opinions (ok, some are pretty darn clear in the above paragraphs), Alex Jones's website is InfoWars.com, and contains a lot more articles on the NWO theory. Definately worth a read.

So what did I think? The guy's a scare-tactics master. He is good at manipulating the crowd, at getting them fired up, and at knowing his audience. The audience for this film was, for the most part, scared white folks. These are the same people who were the driving force behind United We Stand America. The beliefs this joker puts forth in his 'film' are the worst parts of Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan and Mel Gibson's character in "Conspiracy Theory" combined. He talks of how he might be assassinated one day by the government for telling the truth. Yeah, they're too busy laughing at you, you putz. The few sane people in the audience listened to his claptrap and tried not to laugh (for fear of the 200 psychos in the audience). The scariest thing is that these people are such firm believers in their cause, that they are not really any different from a religious extremist who will kill for his cause. Not a pleasant thought.