"The belief in the Big Other as an invisible power structure is the most succinct definition of paranoia" - Slavoj Zizek
We've seen these horror documentaries before. They all claim that a "secret cabal" is slowly conspiring to reduce human rights and enslave the world. They attempt to create a mono-myth, linking various conspiracies and hidden agendas into a single all-encompassing myth. A myth that explains the purpose and point and future of everything.
"Zeitgeist", which plays on the paranoia of the internet generation, itself implies that "evil politicians" and mysterious world leaders are secretly conspiring to oppress the human race. But the truth is, such leaders are themselves servants to invisible systems, and politicians aren't evil so much as they're products of a social system that is conducive of corruption.
"Zeitgeist's" first act is essentially a short lecture on religion. It's overly sensationalistic, but the documentary's point is generally true: religions evolve over time, our current religions borrow heavily from past myths, and religion is itself simultaneously a tool for control, an elaborate shared psychosis, a social support network and a means for placating various existential anxieties.
"Zeitgeist's" second act is it's weakest. Here we get an elaborate critique of the "official 9/11 narrative", the film-makers analysing and debunking various aspects of the 2001, September 11th terrorist attacks. The jury's still out on all this.
"Zeitgeist's" third act is perhaps its most important. Here the film-makers critique various aspects of money creation, banking cartels and debt based currency. These points are all correct, of course, but amount to a fairly superficial critique of capitalism. The truth's worse, and far more shocking - capitalism is itself a shared psychosis - albeit in a prosaic way. One's far better off reading books by thermoeconomists, steady-state advocates and any neo-Marxist radically aligned against neoclassical economists.
In a more general, philosophical sense, "Zeitgeist" is false to imply that there is some conscious, scheming "order" out to get you. There is no order. These "evil conspirators" - which is not to say that shady figures don't commit conspiratorial crimes; they do, they're just don't quite know what they're doing - are every bit slaves to unconscious drives and physical currents. The actual entity doing the controlling does not exist. There is no Big Other, no master plan or entity in possession of secret knowledge.
"Zeitgeist" goes on to say that human beings will "accept this new order" because Americans are dumb, "mindless slaves" addicted to "pleasure seeking activities". Essentially this echoes Marx's ideas that a comfortable populace will never challenge its rulers for fear of rocking the boat and losing the few amenities it has. There's much truth in that (and also the opposite; as capitalism sucks more wealth up the pyramid, people have less and become more violent). And yet, according to sociological investigations, people are increasingly finding less and less pleasure in recreational activities. This growing indifference towards intense pleasure contrasts with the official view that our society is bent on instant gratification. Lacan and Marcuse foresaw this decades ago, when they essentially stated that subjects who dedicate their lives to pleasure would increasingly become so involved in preparatory activities that the joy of the official goal of their efforts fades away. We see this today, with millions obsessed with prolonging youth/beauty/pleasure, yet obviously living in permanent anxiety and under the shadow of ultimate failure.
Today the command "Enjoy!", the motto of capitalism, is a much more effective way to hinder man's access to enjoyment than out-right prohibition, which maintains a space for transgression. The lesson is that the selfish "care of the Self," and not a "repressive group of conspirators", is the ultimate enemy of intense pleasure experiences. Man's dream Utopia, where he whimsically takes part in every conceivable, masturbatory pleasure, will increasingly morph into a kind of apathetic Antonioni-like boredom. The direct intervention of pain (weird sado-masochistic sexual practises etc) or the escalations of perversions, now seem the only remaining paths to intensity.
Thus, the fact that "The Big Other" doesn't exist, has two consequences. Firstly, the failure of symbolic fiction causes man to cling more and more to imaginary Simulacra (films, computers etc), and secondly, it triggers the need for violence of the body (ie Cronenberg).
Bizarrely, we see these themes of repression, sexuality, knowledge and utopia in the Bible. In Genesis, Adam and Eve tended to the Garden (society), obediently doing their duty and obeying the orders of God (bureaucracy). They were naked, repressed and stupid, but they had food and water and enough kinky Biblical entertainment to keep them busy. Along came Satan, the story's actual hero. He taught them the truth: that it is wise to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. And so Adam and Eve taste the fruit, gain wisdom, develop a moral sense, learn of their nakedness and challenge God. In the real world, society is perhaps evolving backwards toward this Eden State. Man doesn't want to eat from the Tree of knowledge, but wants his own isolated utopia, with the right balance of abundance, myopia and external Law. What's more, he wants all his troubles, decisions and fears to be taken care of by a paternalistic God, where God represents bureaucracy and the symbolic Order. The irony is, our current social models cannot support this (it will take 6-10 planet earths worth of resources just to provide a middle class life for everyone currently on the planet). This creates little Satan's out of us all, everyone waiting in the wings, perhaps to be awakened and sent clawing at God.
5/10 - Scepticism is good, but this is mostly a sensationalist horror movie.
