Leaving God

Leaving God: Why I Left God and Why So Many Others Are Too

John Follis (2017)

Film Review

In Leaving God, a lapsed Catholic traces the steep decline in organized religion in the US. After running for decades at 4-5%, the percentage of Americans designating their religion as “none,” began shooting up in the early nineties. It reached 25% in 2016 (38% in 18-29 year olds). In fact only 1% of 18-29 year olds acknowledge belief in God.

These figures are accompanied by a big increase in American church closures – between 4,000 – 10,000 a year. This even though religion permeates nearly every facet of of American life – not only our government and courts, but our colleges, organized sports events and currency.

Follis agrees with IT researcher Allen  Downey that Americans’ growing disillusionment with organized religion is directly related to Internet access.* When people start to question religious dogma, the web is a great way to touch base with like minded people, as well as to research the brutality and violence of the Judeo-Christian religions.

Most of the film traces the personal journey that led Follis to leave his church. He was very much influenced by The Clergy Project, a website that links clergy who have lost their faith with pastors who have publicly “come out” against organized religion.

Hollis asserts that 2001 was the real turning point for him. He could never to come to grips with a loving God allowing 9-11 to happen. Nor the revelations that came out over the next year that the Catholic Church had systematically covered up the sexual abuse of 17,000 minors by 6,000 clergy.

The film includes a great clip of George Carlin describing religion as “the greatest bullshit story every told,” and comedian Ricky Gervais reading from the Old Testament.

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*See Allen Downey and the Internet Religion Debate

The CIA Operation to Dismiss Dissent as “Conspiracy Theory”

The Conspiracy Theory Conspiracy

Directed by Adam Green (2015)

Film Review

The Conspiracy Theory Conspiracy is about the US government psychological operations strategy of dismissing critics of government crimes as mentally unbalanced “conspiracy theorists.”

The documentary consists mainly of clips of corporate media pundits denouncing journalists, historians and social media activists who question the government’s official version of events. I haven’t watched the major TV networks in years and was shocked at some of the extremely bizarre denunciations – labeling dissident Americans as schizophrenic, mentally ill anarchists who drive people to violence and make life more miserable for everyone else.

Maintaining that the CIA has “weaponized” the term “conspiracy theory,” the film traces the origin of this psychological operation to a 1967 CIA memo to field agents dealing with CIA assets in the mainstream media. Filmmakers quote specific recommendations in the memo for techniques journalists should use to discredit scholars who were questioning the official version of the JFK assassination.

The film goes on to explain Operation Mockingbird, divulged during the Church Committee hearings in the mid-seventies, and Carl Bernstein’s 1977 expose (“The CIA and the Media”) in the Rolling Stone. Both sources thoroughly document the CIA’s history of paying editors, journalists and publishers across the media spectrum to publish government propaganda.

The filmmakers also feature excellent commentary by Abby Martin, Alex Jones, Charlie Sheen, George Carlin, Rosie O’Donnell, Jesse Ventura and Ed Asner challenging the government campaign to shut down all dissent by dismissing it as “conspiracy theory.”

The only weakness of the documentary is its failure to address the government strategy of “false sponsorship.” This is where government trolls invent extremely bizarre and contradictory “conspiracy theories” to compete with more credible critiques based on scientific or journalistic investigation. New World Order* “false sponsor” scenarios that incorporate antisemitic or apocalyptic narratives, talk about Wall Street plans to impose a socialist or communist world government, or accuse wealthy elites of being reptiles, demons and/or space aliens are examples of disinformation deliberately planted by intelligence trolls.

Over the past decade, the 9-11 Truth movement has also been heavily infiltrated by government agents disseminating extremely bizarre false sponsor scenarios.

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*The strongest neoliberal “new world order” advocates (Bill Clinton, Bush senior, Bush junior and Henry Kissinger) never define exactly what they mean beyond vague notions of world peace through greater global cooperation. In the film, former congressman Ron Paul gives the clearest explanation of what neoliberals mean by “new world order” by linking it to the loss of national sovereignty through pro-corporate free trade treaties such as NAFTA, the WTO and TPP.

Exposing the Myth of Capitalist Democracy

Lifting the Veil: Barack Obama and the Failure of Capitalist Democracy

Scott Noble (2013)

Film Review

Lifting the Veil is a well-crafted expose of the myth of so-called capitalist democracy Based on interviews and archival footage of Senator Bernie Sanders, Noam Chomsky, Chris Hedges, George Carlin, Glen Ford, Harold Pinkley, John Pilger, Richard Wolfe, William I. Robinson, Bill Moyers and other prominent dissidents, it makes an ironclad case that democracy is impossible under a capitalist economic system.

Using Obama’s extensive list of broken campaign promises as a starting point, Noble convincingly demonstrates how Wall Street corporations have seized absolute control over all America’s so-called democratic institutions. In addition to highlighting the essential role team Obama played in crippling a large, highly vocal antiwar movement, he presents historical examples to reveal how this has been the traditional role of the Democratic Party in the US – to co-opt social movements that threaten the status quo.

The first half of the film focuses on Obama’s 2008 campaign and his long list of promises to reverse specific abuses of George W Bush’s government. In a series of archival clips, we see Obama promising to

• Restore habeas corpus
• Close Guantanamo
• End government secrecy
• End wireless surveillance
• Stop foreclosures instead of enriching bank CEOS
• Expose corporate backers of tax and corporate welfare legislation
• End torture
• End extraordinary rendition*
• Withdraw from Iraq in 2009 and Afghanistan in 2011
• Pass banking regulation to prevent a new Wall Street collapse

Besides breaking every single one of these promises, Obama enacted new policies that were even more oppressive and pro-corporate than Bush’s. Among them were an indefinite detention provision in the NDAA, an executive order giving himself power to assassinate American citizens, the new war in Pakistan and Libya and $7 billion in loans guarantees for the moribund nuclear industry.

The film makes the point that the 2008 election was merely a PR exercise in marketing Brand Obama and had absolutely nothing to do with the candidate’s political agenda.

My favorite segments were those in which comedian George Carlin explains to audiences how powerful corporations sucker them into believing they live in a democracy.

The film ends on an optimistic note with a sampling of opinion polls indicating that more than 60% of Americans oppose the pro-corporate agenda Obama has foisted on them: 63% of Americans would pay higher taxes to guarantee health care for everyone, 70% oppose nuclear power, 81% want to reduce the deficit by taxing the rich and cutting the military budget and only 3% support cutting Social Security.

The only criticism I would have of Lifting the Veil is that it fails to offer specific solutions for Americans seeking to get their democracy back. The dissidents featured are pretty much unanimous that Americans need to stop looking to electoral politics as a way to reform either government or the economic system. However they are a little vague on what activists should do other than protesting and engaging in civil disobedience. Neither is likely to accomplish significant change without serious organizing and movement building to develop alternatives to the current system of government.

Given a lot of this movement building is already occurring in Spain, Greece, Italy, Ireland, Iceland, Mexico and South America and it would have been great to see examples of what this looks like.

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*Extraordinary rendition is the kidnapping and transfer of a detainee to the custody of a foreign government for purposes of detention, interrogation and torture.