The Zeitgeist Movement can now boast over half a million members across over three hundred countries; in 2009 it was a quarter of a million members. Peter Joseph, the founding father of the movement, has recently released his third movie, Zeitgeist: Moving Forward (as written about by Fouad Al-Noor on Wessex Scene), and in mid-March the celebration of ‘Zeitgeist Day’ will begin across the globe.
The Zeitgeist movement advocates the abandonment of currency based society in exchange for the establishment of the resource based economy first suggested by Jaques Fresco, pioneer of The Venus Project, ideological forefather to Peter Joseph and former member of the Ku Klux Klan.
This last qualification of Fresco may be deemed an irrelevant Ad Hom assault by some and there are those who will believe Fresco’s imaginative claim that his membership in the Klan (as well as the White Citizen’s Council) was part of an elaborate infiltration to convince them to change their minds about race hate.
The very least one could argue that this says about Fresco is that he has inclines towards the fanciful. Included in this notion of the resource-based economy is the jettison of private property in exchange for what Joseph refers to as ‘strategic access’ which is tantamount to communal property; democracy, which Joseph states is an illusion, in exchange for a technocracy whereby the ruling class would comprise of technical experts in control of their relevant domains; and eventually labour.
Joseph states that we are already technologically capable of the mechanisation of most jobs executed by human labour and that, due to the nature of the resource based economy, we can look forward to a world where we do not need to work, where houses are built in a single day and we can enjoy a 95 per-cent reduction in crime.
While the quixotic ideas of Joseph may still appear perturbing, they are vanilla compared with the frightening conspiracy theories that have been perpetuated by the Zeitgeist movement in the past. The very term ‘conspiracy-theory’ would have Joseph’s followers pulverising their molars, embittered that their ideas are being shrugged off as grassy knoll theories.
But their semantic dispute cannot purchase legitimacy for the absurd and odious notion propagated in Zeitgeist: The Movie that not Al Qaeda but the Bush Administration had orchestrated the internationally seismic events of 9/11 to justify the invasion of the Middle East – all under the guise of a war on terror in order to accomplice economic gain. This idea is of course completely without substantiation and the attempt to absolve the true murderers of three-thousand people has been subject to much ridicule. Although he refuses an all out retraction it should come as no surprise that, with the systematic dismantling of such claims, Joseph has moved away from them and ideas such as these are absent from ‘Moving Forward’.
Joseph paints a grim and accurate picture of the perils of continued defilement of the environment and excessive consumption of natural resources. However, Joseph piggybacks this global threat with the notion that we should map out every single resource on the globe (which, of course, every effort to do so is already being made), abandon concepts of private property and then have the state distribute resources where they are needed. At one point in the film Joseph adopts mock indignation at how people could possibly brand his doctrine communism or socialism.
The lady clearly doth protest too much: whatever your stance on these two ideologies it should be clear that in fact Joseph’s Zeitgeist Movement is ideologically extremely close to both and a denial of this is unsupportable. Joseph attempts to discriminate between them by claiming that communism, like capitalism, assumes that natural resources are not finite. Not only would this claim hardly distinguish the movement from communism but it is not true. Communism and capitalism and every other economic doctrine assume the scarcity and value of some resources over others.
Similarly, Joseph preempts the ball-busting naysayers when he begrudges the label of ‘utopianism’. However, a clip of Jacques Fresco (from 1974) at one point in the movie states that in a resources based economy, “it would take ten years to transform the surface of the 
Earth into a second Garden of Eden”.
Earth into a second Garden of Eden”.
At the end of the film, Joseph indulges himself with a dramatisation of the day when everybody realises he is right in perhaps the ultimate vindication. The anchor-woman announces that amongst the massive protests, “shockingly there has been no violence” and we see a board room full of three-piece cage wearing oligarchs stubbing out their cigars in despair.
Joseph claims that he can create a world without poverty, a world essentially without crime and a world without labour in which we are entirely free to pursue our destiny (Joseph has previously stated that employment is ‘forced slavery’). Whatever way you cut it – this is utopianism. Joseph completely disregards the quintessentially human properties of self-interest, desire for freedom and competitiveness in his concoction of the ideological equivalent of the delusional phenomenon Dr. Ben Goldacre describes in his book, ‘Bad Science’ as – ‘pill solves complex social problem’. It seems that in his state of denial Joseph has provided us with a rather neat summary of the Zeitgeist movement.
This utopianism is more harmful than mere wish thinking. The concept of utopia and its pursuit has been devastating throughout history. It follows almost by definition that it is near impossible to find an instance of great evil without there being an underlying paradisiacal motive. If you believe that there is a way to attain heaven on Earth for the whole of mankind then almost anything is justified in its pursuit. It is not hyperbolic to bring up at this point Stalinism, Maoism, almost all other despotisms and genocides of the twentieth-century and more recently – Jihad.
Despite my insistence that this is not hyperbole you may still feel that alluding to the greatest evils of the past century is sensationalist but, while I do not for a second suggest that we need be as concerned about the Zeitgeist movement as we do about these examples, these are the logical consequences of utopian thought. Joseph preaches that we will be delivered if we follow him and if we do not then we are destined for apocalyptic repercussions: war, poverty, starvation and the disintegration of civilization.
Amongst the detritus there are some issues we must take seriously. Environmental concern, disgust for corporate greed and the justice of property distribution are matters of incredible importance but these are far from new societal concerns and Peter Joseph’s cult has nothing to offer us with regard to their resolution.
Link to Samuel Gilonis’ further rejoinder
Damn Everything But The Circus! A Response To Peter Joseph
Last night (or perhaps during his daytime) the beloved leader and patriarch of the Zeitgeist Movement condescended to respond to my recent article, ‘The Cult of Zeitgeist’, in what was a rather disappointingly insipid response entitled ‘Enjoying “The Circus” – Meet Samuel Gilonis’. Joseph first takes issues with my labeling of TZM as a ‘cult’. While I may concede a certain lack of originality – The fact that calling TZM a cult has become old hat does not speak entirely against me – The word was not chose merely to slur or to strawman Peter’s thoughts; observing Zeitgeist and the Venus Project and watching their films you should not fail to see the quasi-religious structure. We have an impending apocalypse lest we change our sinful ways, we are promised utopia if we do change them, we have a wise old man and a young prophet (a father, a son – we are just one short of a trinity!), we have the dismantlement of previous religions and, perhaps most importantly, the requisite of faith. The Venus Project/TZM operates with the faith that there will be a day of reckoning whereby all of the globes peoples rise up as one. It requires faith to believe that we are all actually so good, and the noxious, corrupting power of monetary miasma is so great, that if we exorcise money from our society we will see a 95% reduction in crime (as claimed in Zeitgeist: Moving Forward).
It may appear inimical to not wanting to appear cultish that Peter’s followers have descended from all corners of globe to criticise my article like flies on an extremely well written and factually accurate shit (for lack of a more succinct or self-aggrandising simile). They have attacked it with every jot of the fury of a Scientologist exercising the ‘Suppressive Person Doctrine’ or the Islamist attacking a Danish cartoon. They have also, however, completely ignored the much more flattering article regarding their cause written by my colleague Fouad Al-Noor, Peter’s resident vicar on Wessex Scene. It was a member of TZM that brought up Scientology but I am now reluctant to relinquish such a fitting analogy for their behaviour; it speaks volumes to me that these people (Peter included), armed with their rather anodyne critiques, care vastly more about suppressing thought contrary to their own than they do discussing their ideas with those who endorse them. While I commend Peter for addressing criticism he could have easily ignored; his infantile cherry picking, his pitiful reasoning and his cowardly evasion of the more important issues are all beneath our disdain.
This leads me onto Peter’s next point which is that I called Fresco a racist:
The first highlight is the implication that Jacque Fresco is a Racist [sic][prima facie]. He doesn’t say this outright, of course, for even Samual [sic]is smart enough to know what “libel” is – but what would propaganda be without subtly? 
[sic] The trick with these writers is the broad picture they choose to paint as they diligently avoid all areas, [sic] which are actually relevant.
[sic] The trick with these writers is the broad picture they choose to paint as they diligently avoid all areas, [sic] which are actually relevant.
We must ignore Peter’s peculiar grasp of grammar, his inability to spell and the cringing use of a winking emoticon to look at true issue: Peter, through his nauseating appeal to defamatory laws, has made his position on the freedom speech abundantly clear here, as have the asinine calls of his followers for me to be charged with slander (learn the difference between libel and slander – then bring it on). I have not skirted around libel laws to say what I said as I shall now demonstrate:
Jacque Fresco is a deluded and devious mummy who is almost certainly lying about his involvement with the KKK and White Citizen’s Council.
I hope that has made my position on Peter’s comrade clear enough. The real reason for my qualification of what I wrote in that article, as is quite clear, is that Fresco’s possible racism is not particularly relevant to the ideas of TZM but I think many would agree that the confused and fanciful justification for his actions which is indicative of Fresco’s over-active imagination — is relevant. Having said that, I am not entirely sure that it isirrelevant that Fresco was a member of the KKK and the WCC – if, as any mammal with a semblance of rational and independent thought is able to see, Fresco is a bullshit merchant; he should be denounced as one (note I do not call for him to be charged with slander or any other such absurd measures, all I require is his ignominy).
Peter now moves onto democracy. He claims that democracy has become an illusion and a ‘complete failure’. This is true to some extent and nowhere more so than in the US. Professor Noam Chomsky has observed amongst others that the gap between US policy and US public opinion has never been as pronounced as it is today. Peter follows this with the absolute non-sequitur that we should therefore abandon democracy! Why should we not attempt to improve our democracy instead? Democracy, with all of its flaws, is the only true justice.
We seek a medium that provides the ability for each human to interface with “government” – effectively becoming the government itself. This can be done.
The fact that Peter states that they are ‘seeking a medium’ suggests that in fact – this cannot be done. The promise of the eventual abolition of the state is also further proof that the ‘Movement’ is a shameless plagiarism of Marx (rather than the shameless plagiarism of Plato’s Republic that many of Joseph’s flock must think that TZM is when they call it a technocracy).
Now for my favourite part of Peter’s response: Peter claims that the conspiracy theories that he has propagated are in no way linked to the Zeitgeist Movement. This could only hold water if he had not espoused them in a documentary called ZEITGEIST: THE MOVIE.
I am fascinated to hear that he hasn’t moved away from his paranoid and masochistic delusions – In researching the article I happen to know that he is aware of the http://conspiracyscience.com/ website which does a good job in debunking his piffle. He could also look into any one of a thousand other sources which examine every claim he makes regarding 9/11 – and why they are false! The fact is that these conspiracy theories are very much a part of TZM as Peter needs to exculpate the true terrorists in order to breed paranoid vitriol against the status quo. While this may seem a purely American concern these issues are relevant to the UK as well, although perhaps not on the same scale: 24 per cent of British Muslims believe that the British Government was involved in the 7/7 bombings according to a 2007 poll of 500 Muslims by GFK NOP.
Zeitgeist as described by Peter in this response is a rather inane mixture of platitude and sanctimony. We can implement technology to eliminate scarcity – SHOULD read – ‘We should aim to implement technology to reduce scarcity as much as possible’. This is obviously already in practice! Under what Joseph sneeringly calls; cannibalised from Adam Smith, the ‘Invisible Hand’; the mechanisation of labour is transparently already a momentous force as observed in his own films when he discusses how labour has moved from industry to the service trade. This is a direct consequence of consumer-capitalism! As are the countless forms of technology Joseph claims would be implemented by TZM – all were pioneered and will be implemented under a free enterprise, democratic society.
He also claims that we should locate and work out a way to economise all of the resources on the planet. Of course! And every effort to locate them is already being made. Why not simply advocate being more conservative with global resources? This has absolutely nothing to do with the monetary system and there is no need for an upheaval of every aspect of society but Peter Joseph insists that there is because, as we can see from the masturbatory dramatisation in ZMF of the day he is ‘proved right’, he harbours an obsession for this revolution and the rapture that will come with it for him.
Joseph continues to fatuously deny the fraternity between his ideas and Marxist ones and then in mock indignation asks, what do I even mean by Utopianism!? As I have stated in a response to Fouad; I begrudge nobody their meliorism but Joseph goes further. He does not simply claim that we should try to improve some certain areas; he does not even lay out a single specific manifesto of how any of this would truly be put into practice. He does however make extremely specific claims of results such as a 95% crime reduction, an end to poverty and an end to war if we implemented the Zeitgeist Movement’s ideas. He makes promises of a world so wholly perfect if we follow his instruction that, as I wrote in my article, we should be concerned about the effect that these vacuous promises will have on those who truly believe them.
Joseph finishes his rebuttal with, “We need “learners” and “thinkers” and to be such is to not “follow” anyone or take anything at face value.” This is a sentiment I could not agree with more. Scepticism is of the upmost import and I urge all to watch the Zeitgeist Movies (although they are tediously long), read/watch Peter Joseph on 9/11, read the inane ramblings of Fresco but do so with a sceptical mind and an independence of thought. If you do so you will see TZM and The Venus Project for what they are: a tapestry of platitudes, conspiracy theories and hollow promises. I leave you with the belief that Capitalism, personal liberty and property rights are the only truly revolutionary ideology comrades!
Samuel Gilonis
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Damn everything but the circus!
…damn everything that is grim, dull,
motionless, unrisking, inward turning,
damn everything that won’t get into the
circle, that won’t enjoy, that won’t throw
its heart into the tension, surprise, fear
and delight of the circus, the round
world, the full existence…
motionless, unrisking, inward turning,
damn everything that won’t get into the
circle, that won’t enjoy, that won’t throw
its heart into the tension, surprise, fear
and delight of the circus, the round
world, the full existence…
E.E. Cummings