I had an interesting morning. Someone sent me a link to a full-length anonymously made movie called Zeitgeist, about the great hoax that is the History of Western Civilization, which, according to the movie's makers, will soon culminate in the involuntary implanting of RFID chips and universal enslavement to the one world government.

I enjoyed this movie enormously, I have to say. On a number of levels.

And I'm not a big fan of conspiracy theories in general, usually on account of the theorists who promulgate them. If you've spent some time around drug addicts and the mentally ill, or have been one, or, alternatively, have ever been to college, you've heard your share of conspiracy rants.

They always leave me with a big "and? Turn up the Pink Floyd. I've got the munchies again. Let's order a pizza. Or you wanna just jerk each other off and call it a night?"

Things are what they are, whatever dirty little secrets lie behind them. I still have to put food on my plate, have a couple of beers every now and again, and get laid, and all the conspiracy theories in the world can't help me with any of those things. If you want to rant that I'm being kept by the powers that be in a "distracted, naive bubble," as this movie does, just do me one favor: say it, don't spray it. And, hey, at least I'm getting laid occasionally. You should try it. It's a great cardio workout.

The thing that conspiracists often don't seem to get about human nature is that just because we can't all get up in arms about the vast conspiracies proliferating all around us doesn't mean we're blind to or ignorant of them.

The physics of inertia and inaction are enormously complicated. It's not all ignorance and fear.

To fully understand why people in the first world are so complacent you need only visit a developing country. On some elemental level, Americans understand that as bad as things might be, we've still got it good. Folks with more to risk don't necessarily risk more.

I think most people also understand that the security of a social order, which is preferable to chaos and anarchy, comes at a price. And overturning that social order might come at a greater price. In our decadent culture of romanticized revolution we seldom have cause to recall la Terruer. But most people understand that exposing conspiracies would be inconvenient at best, and at worst give birth to modern-day Robespierres. Agitating for revolution is often a function of the boredom that comes with widespread prosperity.

But, again, even the agitators know there's a line they can't cross without risking their creature comforts. And so we have a lot of very comfortable outraged people pointing out the obvious and asking, "where's the outrage?"

I have friends who when you wind them up can sputter in rage all night about recent incursions on our civil liberties. And what do they, themselves, use these precious liberties for? They work their forty or fifty hours a week, piddle about on the internet for hours, downloading music and porn, watch TV, and play video games. Occasionally they leave the house for a drink or a bite to eat or to go to a movie, or a club. More or less like anybody else.

The liberties they worry about losing are like the Alaskan Wilderness or the Everglades. They may never use them themselves, but it comforts them to know they're out there.

"Where's the outrage!" is the call of those who wish that our civic life provided opportunities for Hollywood moments of courage, great oratory in the public square with swelling violins in the background, highflown speeches about freedom and solidarity. Instead, social justice is a daily slog. And no one really seems to care, they're so busy just muddling through.

No violins, no speeches, no Hollywood moments. Just scratching along in constant search of a little human dignity.

When it comes to revolution, they may talk a good game, but it would seriously cut into their free time and cramp their style big time if it ever really came to pass. It's like all those Fundamentalist praying for the Second Coming. Be careful what you wish for.

Mostly the purpose of conspiracy rants is to show the conspiracist as awake to and outraged by injustice in a world full of somnambulists. In the Land of the Blind the one-eyed man is king, right? But the rants sputter out eventually, and leave the conspiracist in a puddle of impotence, always unable to rouse the sleepwalkers into revolutionary action.

Zeitgeist is the movie version of a typical conspiracist rant, and ends, as they do, in that puddle of impotence.

It has some wonderful, fascinating moments along the way, though. The riff on religion—how the Bible is an "astrotheological literary hybrid"—is compelling, and brilliant in its way. I find the idea of pre-scientific modes of transmitting scientific truths interesting, myself, whether the movie's account is wholly credible or not.

There are also compelling arguments against the official version of 9-11 with credible alternative accounts by the likes of Steven E. Jones. (The movie uses all previously broadcast footage—there is no original footage, no original interviews—it is a tribute to cut-n-paste filmmaking.)

I will admit that no degree of down-dirtiness or skullduggery would surprise me when it comes to the current crop of power players and masters of the universe. And the proposition that 9-11 was an inside job doesn't seem a stretch to me, but whether it was or not, I would not support any of the evilness that has been orchestrated since, opportuned or justified by it.

It is enough for me to know that whether Cheney & Co. was directly responsible for 9-11 or not, they would like to have been. I don't think W. was in the loop. Though he may have boasted about his good fortune in striking " the trifecta," I think he was just a patsy. He's still fully culpable for everything that followed.

The segment on the World Banking Conspiracy skirts the issue of antisemitism which has always attended it. The brief history of the Fed and the question of the constitutionality of the income tax are titillating, and would reward further, more serious attention, I'm sure.

But when it comes to the Unified Conspiracy of Everything—the coming of the one world government—the movie collapses in shambles. This is not because such an entity is implausible, it's because the conspiracist can't come up with a good reason why it's such a bad idea.

On the one hand, he's banging on about how we're all one and everyone should unite. On the other he's ranting about the evils of a system that makes it possible. But then you realize he's gone off on his own spiritual journey, and like a disembodied ghost has left the logistics of social order for someone else to figure out. The question is, if spiritually we should be like bees in a hive, why shouldn't society, our political reality, reflect that?

I have a feeling your average conspiracist spends a lot of time alone in his room dreaming of the perfect world because he can't manage to live with the real one outside his door. He finds the simple logistics of living among others—the daily sacrifices and compromises, the simmering conflicts and occasional confrontations, the existence of other points of view and ways of doing things too trying. He can't negotiate in a world of others. His dream of world-wide spiritual union is totally narcissistic.

And his narcissism explains, in great part, his obsession with power and powerlessness. All conspiracy theories center on the secret of ultimate power. They go beyond the search for historical truth to the search for the secret of power.

And so it is that the last half hour of Zeitgeist sputters out, like a typical conspiracist rant. The alternative to the current tainted order that the movie makers offer up is summed up with a quote from Jimi Hendrix, eminent source of serious social theory that he is:


And then the whole thing wraps up with Bill Hicks' famous "it's just a ride" bit:

The world is like a ride at an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it, you think it's real, because that's how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and round and round and it has thrills and chills and it's very brightly colored and it's very loud. And it's fun, for a while.

Some people have been on the ride for a long time, and they begin to question: 'Is this real? Or is this just a ride?' And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and they say 'Hey! Don't worry, don't be afraid - ever - because... this is just a ride.' And we kill those people.

'Shut him up! We have a lot invested in this ride! Shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry; look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real.'

It's just a ride. But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that - ever notice that? - and we let the demons run amok. But it doesn't matter, because... it's just a ride, and we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort. No worry. No job. No savings and money. Just a choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your door, buy bigger guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one.

Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, into a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defense each year and, instead, spend it feeding, clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would do many times over - not one human being excluded - and we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever. In peace.

So. Hmm.

An hour and a half debunking all the myths of the Western tradition, and Jimi Hendrix and Bill Hicks are the alternative to civilization as we know it?

Um, I'll take Door Number Three, Monty.

Just consider the logistics of educating everyone in the world. Whose traditions do you educate them with? Whose history do you teach? Whose methods do you use to teach it? What languages do you propose to teach it with? How do you approach historical conflicts?  What role do you propose for science versus non-scientific paths to wisdom?

How do you deal with historically particular conceptions of community and family and personal identity? Of gender, race, and sexuality? Of beauty? Table manners? Bathroom etiquette? What do you do about the inherent, unavoidable inequalities of geography and natural resources? How do you conquer accidents of birth?

Say you could tame the personal ambitions and petty jealousies, outlaw acquisitiveness and purge our possessive natures, educate the will to power out of us all.  Flatten the hierarchies in everyday life, erase every minute difference that causes strife and pain and anger among us. How long do you suppose you could keep the "peace" when the boredom set in?

Bring on the bombs.

The fact of the matter is, conspiracy or no, society—and by that, I mean two or more people living together—is always in tension. Dreaming of a world without conflict reveals little more than an unwillingness or inability to negotiate conflict, which is inevitable.

What I liked about Zeitgeist is that it's such a perfect case study of the narcissistic world of the conspiracist, so completely obsessed with power and his own powerlessness that his dreamed-up utopia eradicates it entirely. But power is always a part of human relations because it's a part of human biology.

When developed in a healthy way and tempered with trust it's something that can be shared, and passed on for the good of the whole.

Having said that, it's true that those obsessed with hoarding power and using it to subjugate rather than liberate are about in the world implementing their evil schemes, as conspiracists claim. But looking for lies in the world can sometimes overwhelm the search for truth in our lives.

So, Bill Hicks is right, and if he'd been quoted in the first five minutes of Zeitgeist instead of the last, there would have been little need for anything like this movie to follow him.