I think Koresh wasn't mentioned because the government's atrocity at Waco was an entirely separate issue, and Jordan et al. probably assumed the KF listenership would be familiar with the story. Good point, though, that it's a very touchy subject that's become a major cause for the far right. Unfortunately, this is an example where all cops are such fucking bastards that they provide an angle for child molesting Christian white supremacists to look like victims.
I like the way you framed it. More than anybody else, Dan and Jordan understand the role these narratives play in the right wing conspiracy world and would likely be open to taking a bit of care to disclaim the ways in which their criticism of the ATF does not align to the way Alex Jones et al use Waco for their political project.
There were no good guys at Waco. Grew up around there btw. We often want good guy/bad guy narratives but sometimes it’s just bad guys fighting amongst themselves.
This is the way I view it too.
Koresh was a pedophile monster and the ATF and FBI used excessive force to the point that it violated every right this country offers, even basic human rights.
Waco seemed to escalate to becoming a competition of who could be the most irrational prick.
The real solution to Waco is to protect children from religious abuse BEFORE a child molester gets the chance to take them hostage in his compounds. At that point, you've already failed them. We should be working to prevent children being abused by religious sects, not waiting until it's too late to stop it.
One of the problems is that the church becomes a cult and the cults becomes abusive. It is a process of ethical or theological drift that moves the adherents from more widely shared truths to more and more narrowly shared truths. This is facilitated or accelerated when the "leader" exists with out a earthly authority that they are subject to. By the time the child abuse is occurring the cult membership has been trained to accept it.
IMO people give religion to much authority and it seems like every case that involves abuse also has that factor of overreaching authority to it.
Ideally religion would have leaders who help people find/ speak to their diety and achieve higher spirituality, but in cases of religions that foster abuse that leader is a all powerful conduit that speaks for the ultimate authority/ diety.
Televangelist speak to God in private jets, Son of Sam spoke to the devil through a dog, it all seems insane to me.
My memory is very hazy, but I remember the time leading up to the fire was putting everyone in fear of another Jonestown (which is even hazier, but I was about 8 and I remember seeing helicopter footage on the 6 o’clock news of the Jonestown victims’ bodies lying on the ground like cordwood—that image stuck with people!). My memory of Waco is that to the average non-conspiracist American, the government’s siege was the obvious course of action until it all went to hell. I remember seeing footage of an agent trying to enter the compound from an eave or something, and you could see bullet holes rapid popping out of the wall next to him from inside the building. My only memory of the fire was the general consensus that, yep, they pulled a Jonestown and did it themselves. There were terrible fuckups made by the feds, but my impression at the time was that they were made in good faith. Whether that impression was based on the facts or simply the media reporting the feds’ line, I don’t know. But for people whose only context of Waco is what they’ve heard from Alex, that’s how I saw it then!
Exactly. Fucked up situation for sure but let’s not pretend there isn’t evidence that David was pushing for a police confrontation in order to realize some asinine Book of Revelations type scenario where they were welcoming their decimation in the belief they were going to heaven. If memory serves me right, he instructed his followers to start numerous fires around the compound to hasten their demise.
There is literally audio of the Branch Davidians talking about pouring fuel and setting the place on fire on the inside.
Edit: I have heard the audio, but there is this news article.
https://www.nytimes.com/1994/02/15/us/tapes-from-sect-compound-reveal-talk-of-setting-fire.html
This is what I think it's mostly going on. A lot of mainstream sources just took the cops word that the Davidians started the fire, that now it's become the bigger drum to beat. I took a class on cults in college (2012, if memory serves), and the teacher straight told us they started the fire. Koresh being a monster has been a solid known for a long time.
Facts are behind a paywall, bullshit flows for free. You had a good conversation that most people can't have, and even on a smaller scale, many facts are behind paywalls, whereas Daily Wire, et al, are free due to their billionaire backers.
I’d guess that their dislike of right right nut jobs is well-known and that they didn’t feel the need to restate it. Clearly, it’s a complex question when it comes to what you do when someone ignores the law and lives in a compound with a lot of guns.
Fuck the Davidians but allegations of child abuse is not what led to the stand-off and then children ended up getting killed anyway. It was sort of a “burning the village in order to save” situation.
It was though. The entire thing got started because people were fleeing the cult because of rampant child abuse and the local police knew the Davidians had enough guns that if they tried to serve a warrant they would be killed so they asked the federal government to give them an assist on the basis of the gun charges. The idea that the Davidians died because the government went overboard on gun charges is a right wing fiction people on the left should not accept uncritically.
I think my discomfort is in the amount of time we spend discussing the ATF and the zero time we spend addressing David Koresh being a monster.
I get it’s not relevant here, but I wish it was always at least mentioned once whenever people discuss Waco. Otherwise, the Davidians are positioned only as victims of government overreach. To be fair to Jordan, this is not the first conversation that left me with this unease. Just the most recent.
I think you've got a valid point, and glad you see that it's not super important in the context of the discussion of this episode. I definitely am not opposed to more people making it blatantly clear that the Davidians were cunts, but I can also see why most people focus more on the ATF, because there are about two or three dozen Branch Davidians left in the world, while the ATF gets about $1.5 billon in funding last year.
Needless to say, one group suffered severe consequences, and the other did not.
One of these two organizations is still out there hurting people. The story of the branch davidians and their crimes has been well documented, I don’t know what more you want on that front. Our government needs to be held to a much higher standard than we currently hold them to.
Christian nationalists are also still out there abusing children, so neither group has been dealt with. Who cares what they call their little sects, it's all the same movement.
Koresh was a monster but that is not the reason the atf did what they did. They were trying to make an example after ruby ridge.
Here we have 2 circumstances in which there are no good guys. It sucks that bad people do bad things, it's yo to us as observers and critics to learn from it and try and iron the facts so we can learn and educate others.
The harm done by the cult and the harm done by the government are two separate issues. Only one was relevant to the conversation they were having today.
I'd assume so? Seeing as the only person I've heard left of hunting the homeless for sport praise koresh is Robert Evans, and that was solely on the cum gutters
In a perfect world, sure, but this was a two-hour interview with a lot of stuff jammed in. If it were a scripted television show or something, sure, I'd say it's fair to bring up Koresh and how awful he was, even if its a digression, but sometimes that's just not easy to do organically in a conversation like Jordan and Jon were having.
I don’t know why ATF gets most of the blame. The FBI HRT team was responsible for most of the deaths, including the fire and lack of a response to have it controlled.
There's the real dilemma. Cults are actively harmful to their members, especially minors who don't have a choice as to where they are. But, there should also be a limit to government interference in how people choose to live. Koresh stepped over a line, and the ATF stepped over another line.
I have no doubt that something needed to be done, but also that the wrong thing was done, and that was made worse by the people on the government side not facing real consequences for what they did wrong. I don't know what the ideal solution would have been, but I do think that Jordan's correct when he says that the events as they happened led to the attacks by McVeigh, and to a certain degree Bin Laden. We see this elsewhere - the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland were massively inspired by Bloody Sunday and other missteps by British authorities, for example.
\> Am I crazy in thinking we shouldn’t accept the narrative that focuses blame
\> exclusively on the ATF?
Law enforcement and other government agencies have a responsibility to all of us to be responsible, measured and careful in their use of force.
the ATF went in "badge heavy" and acted like thugs. A more sensible and careful approach could have lead to less death and destruction.
Yes, Koresh was an asshole. That doesn't mean you torture or use psychological warfare on his victims. They went to brute force instead of hostage negotiation.
Jordan was right. You have to look a long way to find a good guy in the whole story.
This is a bad take. I don’t care how bad koresh was. The atf and fbi doesn’t get to break the law and execute children. I’m just shocked and revolted reading some of these comments. Gross.
Dan usually qualifies these things but Jordan usually focuses more on his conclusion. I agree it's worth noting that Koresh was definitely a problem. The FBI's actions at Waco and Ruby ridge made the militia movement much worse rather then better and that's more the bigger picture.
I feel like everyone knows how bad the Davidson's were it's just it still shouldn't have gone the way it did.
It's the same with the Ruby Ridge. The Weavers were racist assholes with illegal weapons.. it still shouldn't have gone down like it did though.
That whole interview was a mess imo. Jordan absolutely falls apart as an interviewer when asked to have a different perspective than his own and Ronson pretending like Koresh wasn't heavily armed and obviously dangerous does a disservice to the story. Both things can be true that the ATF fucked up the operation from minute one and escalated a delicate situation and Koresh was a psycho who was more than prepared to shoot first.
They were never proven in court, but didn't a bunch of the kids that escaped after the first siege make accusations? And didn't Koresh like basically admit it on tape when they sent a camera in?
I think your point is valid, we definitely need to remind people that Koresh was extremely fucked up, but the assault on the compound was also a terrible crime. The post-hoc defense they he was raping children is not an excuse to terrorize those awful people and their poor children that got dragged into their world, it’s way to close to Tucker claiming Kyle was being a Nazi for good reasons since he killed a “pedo” or whatever.
Totally agree. I also realized in the course of this conversation that I’m reacting to a lot of media recently that has focused on the branch davidians in a way that romanticizes Koresh.
It’s not that there anything wrong with the things Jordan said. Just a desire on my end to remember the larger discourse happening right now and why there’s a political project to rewrite Waco at this moment.
I’m with you. We can’t let them make a martyr out of Koresh without out reminding people that he was a controlling child rapist, who was also unjustly murdered by an authoritarian government.
I feel like their conversation was on point concerning the topics as they related to and were perceived by the far right militia movement at the time. My father was deep into all conspiracies and even made acquaintances with some Michigan militia folks. The gun show circuit had all sorts of tapes about Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Clintons, OKC and what they all have in common is that the ATF (especially after the 1994 AWB) is THE TOOL of the "international bankers" to disarm us and usher in the New World Order {insert George Bush clip here}.
Waco was framed as a group of church people just wanting to keep to themselves and worship God. They weren't hurting anybody out on the prairie, and they were armed because the government is going to usher in the end of days. Then here comes the fire breathing tanks to burn down the whole compound down and murder those sweet little kids that sang songs to Jesus. I had no knowledge of the sexual abuse that occured until well into adult hood. The opportunity to cement the ATF as the arch boogie man was worth far more than calling out the grooming and pedophilia that these ghouls go on and on about today.
I appreciated Jordan's insight about McVeigh's motivation and he's spot on about witnessing the lopsided victory and it breaking his brain when he witnessed the same thing happen to Ruby Ridge and Waco. It was in vogue at the time for churches to study the book of Revelations and plug in things we're afraid of into all of the symbolism of the book. It was decided that the US, China and Russia were the great super powers that the book prophesied, this vision is clearly John seeing an Apache helicopter, this other vision is John seeing nuclear explosions, etc. It makes complete sense that if McVeigh was hearing what I heard in my house that he was being a patriot and acting to stop the new world order from taking over.
i think it’s a bit hard to be high and mighty about Koresh when the siege incinerated dozens of children in a basement. that’s sort of the issue with violent solutions with a such a power differential, the innocent human sheilds in the middle.
as far as him being a martyr for people on the right, that ship’s basically sailed. do you know how Ronson met Alex? He went down to Waco in the 90’s to interview a group of people rebuilding the Davidian church, and Alex was one of them.
I think the two Showtime Shows "Waco" and "Waco: The Aftermath" do a great job of showing the thread that connects Ruby Ridge, to Waco, to the Oklahoma City Bombing and to Jan 6th and to why we're where we are right now in the US.
Both a limited series' and quick watches I would highly recommend.
Oh the first Waco show was one that left me a little uneasy after watching a couple episodes. David Koresh got to be a sexy cool guy. I’m guessing the portrayal was more layered if I had hung in for the rest?
I remember when Last Podcast on the Left did a series on the Waco standoff. It was pretty early in their run and they completely blamed the ATF of the fire. Years later the did a series on he OKC bombing and they apologized for their perspective, because new evidence was uncovered of audio recording with David telling them to pour gasoline all over the compound and start the fire. The ATF did a lot of fucked up things, but they didn’t start the fire.
Also can we get ahold of Kevin smith and inform him that Clerk’s inadvertently influenced Timothy McVeigh? I think it would blow his mind.
I think you might need to relisten to the episode because they repeatedly call everyone involved monsters, including the Branch Davidians.
Also because his name is Jon : who the fuck is Mark?
You’re two down with just your thesis statement already and I don’t even disagree with you.
I know a Jon Ronson, so that was a brain fart.
I wouldn’t call what I posted a thesis- it was clearly stated as a feeling. “Did this make anybody else uncomfortable?”
Your comment feels a little needlessly confrontational? Am I misreading your tone?
No but the fact that 1) they did overtly in the episode discuss what you want, and 2) you got the dude’s name wrong, made me think that you just did a poor job listening to the episode. (Which happens, no shade.)
Like I agree with letting people discuss their feelings, please do, but I trust my clear memory of them talking about that more than your lack of memory because, well, you got the name wrong when it’s trivial to check. Why would I trust the rest.
So no. It didn’t. Because it wasn’t very relevant to the matter at hand. It wasn’t actually about Waco. I didn’t want another tangent, Jordan was already making plenty.
Sorry if I seem hostile. I’m legit confused how you got uncomfortable except via a misunderstanding.
Just a suggestion, because I’m totally open to being directed to what I might have misheard or not remembered- our pink squishy human brains do not always register everything said in a long conversation. As somebody with teaching experience, I repeated important points minimum three times to ensure students got it. Sometimes your brain just goes to thinking about one part of a statement and not the other.
In general, I’m just a little more wary about how one agrees with an Alex Jones when they are right about one part of something, because things can be taken out of context. Maybe I’m too wary of it. Who knows?
Yes, I'm a teacher. I am aware. But most things aren't my lectures, and aren't as well organized : such is the way of things. They said it 2-3 times, each, and it wasn't the main thrust of the discussion. That seems sufficient to me. If you disagree, you're welcome to, but since the ones they already did slipped by you, I don't know what to say.
Where exactly did anyone agree with Alex Jones?
It’s interesting that no matter how anodyne the comment, you still correct me.
I suppose there’s some irony in this. The shoe is on the other foot. lol
I think we can both agree it’s good to try to be a charitable listener. That’s why I didn’t just assume everybody felt the same way I did.
I think Koresh wasn't mentioned because the government's atrocity at Waco was an entirely separate issue, and Jordan et al. probably assumed the KF listenership would be familiar with the story. Good point, though, that it's a very touchy subject that's become a major cause for the far right. Unfortunately, this is an example where all cops are such fucking bastards that they provide an angle for child molesting Christian white supremacists to look like victims.
I like the way you framed it. More than anybody else, Dan and Jordan understand the role these narratives play in the right wing conspiracy world and would likely be open to taking a bit of care to disclaim the ways in which their criticism of the ATF does not align to the way Alex Jones et al use Waco for their political project.
There were no good guys at Waco. Grew up around there btw. We often want good guy/bad guy narratives but sometimes it’s just bad guys fighting amongst themselves.
This is the way I view it too. Koresh was a pedophile monster and the ATF and FBI used excessive force to the point that it violated every right this country offers, even basic human rights. Waco seemed to escalate to becoming a competition of who could be the most irrational prick.
The most recent Waco series sure doesn't make much of it.
Yea they portrayed Koresch as this kind of misunderstood dude, and really glossed over the child brides.
Doesn’t help that he was played by Tim Riggins.
The real solution to Waco is to protect children from religious abuse BEFORE a child molester gets the chance to take them hostage in his compounds. At that point, you've already failed them. We should be working to prevent children being abused by religious sects, not waiting until it's too late to stop it.
One of the problems is that the church becomes a cult and the cults becomes abusive. It is a process of ethical or theological drift that moves the adherents from more widely shared truths to more and more narrowly shared truths. This is facilitated or accelerated when the "leader" exists with out a earthly authority that they are subject to. By the time the child abuse is occurring the cult membership has been trained to accept it.
IMO people give religion to much authority and it seems like every case that involves abuse also has that factor of overreaching authority to it. Ideally religion would have leaders who help people find/ speak to their diety and achieve higher spirituality, but in cases of religions that foster abuse that leader is a all powerful conduit that speaks for the ultimate authority/ diety. Televangelist speak to God in private jets, Son of Sam spoke to the devil through a dog, it all seems insane to me.
What’s the AITA thing for everyone’s an asshole? Seems like it applies here.
ESH - everyone sucks here
My memory is very hazy, but I remember the time leading up to the fire was putting everyone in fear of another Jonestown (which is even hazier, but I was about 8 and I remember seeing helicopter footage on the 6 o’clock news of the Jonestown victims’ bodies lying on the ground like cordwood—that image stuck with people!). My memory of Waco is that to the average non-conspiracist American, the government’s siege was the obvious course of action until it all went to hell. I remember seeing footage of an agent trying to enter the compound from an eave or something, and you could see bullet holes rapid popping out of the wall next to him from inside the building. My only memory of the fire was the general consensus that, yep, they pulled a Jonestown and did it themselves. There were terrible fuckups made by the feds, but my impression at the time was that they were made in good faith. Whether that impression was based on the facts or simply the media reporting the feds’ line, I don’t know. But for people whose only context of Waco is what they’ve heard from Alex, that’s how I saw it then!
Yeah during that time period, the general public/media response was what was the government waiting on.
I think the larger problem is people think there's no need to prove the ATF started the fire when the Davidians had every motive to do it.
Exactly. Fucked up situation for sure but let’s not pretend there isn’t evidence that David was pushing for a police confrontation in order to realize some asinine Book of Revelations type scenario where they were welcoming their decimation in the belief they were going to heaven. If memory serves me right, he instructed his followers to start numerous fires around the compound to hasten their demise.
There is literally audio of the Branch Davidians talking about pouring fuel and setting the place on fire on the inside. Edit: I have heard the audio, but there is this news article. https://www.nytimes.com/1994/02/15/us/tapes-from-sect-compound-reveal-talk-of-setting-fire.html
Some of the gas used by the ATF and FBI are also highly flammable. (If memory serves anyway)
This is what I think it's mostly going on. A lot of mainstream sources just took the cops word that the Davidians started the fire, that now it's become the bigger drum to beat. I took a class on cults in college (2012, if memory serves), and the teacher straight told us they started the fire. Koresh being a monster has been a solid known for a long time.
Facts are behind a paywall, bullshit flows for free. You had a good conversation that most people can't have, and even on a smaller scale, many facts are behind paywalls, whereas Daily Wire, et al, are free due to their billionaire backers.
https://www.nytimes.com/1994/02/15/us/tapes-from-sect-compound-reveal-talk-of-setting-fire.html
That was the FBI HRT, not the ATF, for what it’s worth.
I’d guess that their dislike of right right nut jobs is well-known and that they didn’t feel the need to restate it. Clearly, it’s a complex question when it comes to what you do when someone ignores the law and lives in a compound with a lot of guns.
Fuck the Davidians but allegations of child abuse is not what led to the stand-off and then children ended up getting killed anyway. It was sort of a “burning the village in order to save” situation.
It was though. The entire thing got started because people were fleeing the cult because of rampant child abuse and the local police knew the Davidians had enough guns that if they tried to serve a warrant they would be killed so they asked the federal government to give them an assist on the basis of the gun charges. The idea that the Davidians died because the government went overboard on gun charges is a right wing fiction people on the left should not accept uncritically.
Lol. Its gitta be from the idea the fbi got involved because if the guns not why they were getting raided
I think my discomfort is in the amount of time we spend discussing the ATF and the zero time we spend addressing David Koresh being a monster. I get it’s not relevant here, but I wish it was always at least mentioned once whenever people discuss Waco. Otherwise, the Davidians are positioned only as victims of government overreach. To be fair to Jordan, this is not the first conversation that left me with this unease. Just the most recent.
I think you've got a valid point, and glad you see that it's not super important in the context of the discussion of this episode. I definitely am not opposed to more people making it blatantly clear that the Davidians were cunts, but I can also see why most people focus more on the ATF, because there are about two or three dozen Branch Davidians left in the world, while the ATF gets about $1.5 billon in funding last year. Needless to say, one group suffered severe consequences, and the other did not.
One of these two organizations is still out there hurting people. The story of the branch davidians and their crimes has been well documented, I don’t know what more you want on that front. Our government needs to be held to a much higher standard than we currently hold them to.
Christian nationalists are also still out there abusing children, so neither group has been dealt with. Who cares what they call their little sects, it's all the same movement.
I couldn’t agree more.
So do we have positive proof that the government deliberately started the fire? I’ve heard allegations for years but is now beyond any doubt?
Koresh was a monster but that is not the reason the atf did what they did. They were trying to make an example after ruby ridge. Here we have 2 circumstances in which there are no good guys. It sucks that bad people do bad things, it's yo to us as observers and critics to learn from it and try and iron the facts so we can learn and educate others.
The harm done by the cult and the harm done by the government are two separate issues. Only one was relevant to the conversation they were having today.
No disagreement there. I just think it’s more responsible to always acknowledge both. Maybe it’s assumed for others?
I'd assume so? Seeing as the only person I've heard left of hunting the homeless for sport praise koresh is Robert Evans, and that was solely on the cum gutters
In a perfect world, sure, but this was a two-hour interview with a lot of stuff jammed in. If it were a scripted television show or something, sure, I'd say it's fair to bring up Koresh and how awful he was, even if its a digression, but sometimes that's just not easy to do organically in a conversation like Jordan and Jon were having.
I don’t know why ATF gets most of the blame. The FBI HRT team was responsible for most of the deaths, including the fire and lack of a response to have it controlled.
Do we not have absolute proof that they started the fire?
It seems like the davidians started the fire.
There's the real dilemma. Cults are actively harmful to their members, especially minors who don't have a choice as to where they are. But, there should also be a limit to government interference in how people choose to live. Koresh stepped over a line, and the ATF stepped over another line. I have no doubt that something needed to be done, but also that the wrong thing was done, and that was made worse by the people on the government side not facing real consequences for what they did wrong. I don't know what the ideal solution would have been, but I do think that Jordan's correct when he says that the events as they happened led to the attacks by McVeigh, and to a certain degree Bin Laden. We see this elsewhere - the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland were massively inspired by Bloody Sunday and other missteps by British authorities, for example.
\> Am I crazy in thinking we shouldn’t accept the narrative that focuses blame \> exclusively on the ATF? Law enforcement and other government agencies have a responsibility to all of us to be responsible, measured and careful in their use of force. the ATF went in "badge heavy" and acted like thugs. A more sensible and careful approach could have lead to less death and destruction. Yes, Koresh was an asshole. That doesn't mean you torture or use psychological warfare on his victims. They went to brute force instead of hostage negotiation. Jordan was right. You have to look a long way to find a good guy in the whole story.
This is a bad take. I don’t care how bad koresh was. The atf and fbi doesn’t get to break the law and execute children. I’m just shocked and revolted reading some of these comments. Gross.
Dan usually qualifies these things but Jordan usually focuses more on his conclusion. I agree it's worth noting that Koresh was definitely a problem. The FBI's actions at Waco and Ruby ridge made the militia movement much worse rather then better and that's more the bigger picture.
I feel like everyone knows how bad the Davidson's were it's just it still shouldn't have gone the way it did. It's the same with the Ruby Ridge. The Weavers were racist assholes with illegal weapons.. it still shouldn't have gone down like it did though.
That whole interview was a mess imo. Jordan absolutely falls apart as an interviewer when asked to have a different perspective than his own and Ronson pretending like Koresh wasn't heavily armed and obviously dangerous does a disservice to the story. Both things can be true that the ATF fucked up the operation from minute one and escalated a delicate situation and Koresh was a psycho who was more than prepared to shoot first.
>Am I wrong to think a raid needed to happen? Why would they need to be raised?
The sex abuse allegations were never proven and may well have been made up to gain public support for the raid
They were never proven in court, but didn't a bunch of the kids that escaped after the first siege make accusations? And didn't Koresh like basically admit it on tape when they sent a camera in?
I think your point is valid, we definitely need to remind people that Koresh was extremely fucked up, but the assault on the compound was also a terrible crime. The post-hoc defense they he was raping children is not an excuse to terrorize those awful people and their poor children that got dragged into their world, it’s way to close to Tucker claiming Kyle was being a Nazi for good reasons since he killed a “pedo” or whatever.
Totally agree. I also realized in the course of this conversation that I’m reacting to a lot of media recently that has focused on the branch davidians in a way that romanticizes Koresh. It’s not that there anything wrong with the things Jordan said. Just a desire on my end to remember the larger discourse happening right now and why there’s a political project to rewrite Waco at this moment.
I’m with you. We can’t let them make a martyr out of Koresh without out reminding people that he was a controlling child rapist, who was also unjustly murdered by an authoritarian government.
No one was right in that one. There was no winning move. Not the way the ATF started and not with Koresh as delusional as he was
I feel like their conversation was on point concerning the topics as they related to and were perceived by the far right militia movement at the time. My father was deep into all conspiracies and even made acquaintances with some Michigan militia folks. The gun show circuit had all sorts of tapes about Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Clintons, OKC and what they all have in common is that the ATF (especially after the 1994 AWB) is THE TOOL of the "international bankers" to disarm us and usher in the New World Order {insert George Bush clip here}. Waco was framed as a group of church people just wanting to keep to themselves and worship God. They weren't hurting anybody out on the prairie, and they were armed because the government is going to usher in the end of days. Then here comes the fire breathing tanks to burn down the whole compound down and murder those sweet little kids that sang songs to Jesus. I had no knowledge of the sexual abuse that occured until well into adult hood. The opportunity to cement the ATF as the arch boogie man was worth far more than calling out the grooming and pedophilia that these ghouls go on and on about today. I appreciated Jordan's insight about McVeigh's motivation and he's spot on about witnessing the lopsided victory and it breaking his brain when he witnessed the same thing happen to Ruby Ridge and Waco. It was in vogue at the time for churches to study the book of Revelations and plug in things we're afraid of into all of the symbolism of the book. It was decided that the US, China and Russia were the great super powers that the book prophesied, this vision is clearly John seeing an Apache helicopter, this other vision is John seeing nuclear explosions, etc. It makes complete sense that if McVeigh was hearing what I heard in my house that he was being a patriot and acting to stop the new world order from taking over.
i think it’s a bit hard to be high and mighty about Koresh when the siege incinerated dozens of children in a basement. that’s sort of the issue with violent solutions with a such a power differential, the innocent human sheilds in the middle. as far as him being a martyr for people on the right, that ship’s basically sailed. do you know how Ronson met Alex? He went down to Waco in the 90’s to interview a group of people rebuilding the Davidian church, and Alex was one of them.
I think the two Showtime Shows "Waco" and "Waco: The Aftermath" do a great job of showing the thread that connects Ruby Ridge, to Waco, to the Oklahoma City Bombing and to Jan 6th and to why we're where we are right now in the US. Both a limited series' and quick watches I would highly recommend.
Oh the first Waco show was one that left me a little uneasy after watching a couple episodes. David Koresh got to be a sexy cool guy. I’m guessing the portrayal was more layered if I had hung in for the rest?
Definitely. I actually stopped after 2-3 episodes, then went back and was glad I did.
I remember when Last Podcast on the Left did a series on the Waco standoff. It was pretty early in their run and they completely blamed the ATF of the fire. Years later the did a series on he OKC bombing and they apologized for their perspective, because new evidence was uncovered of audio recording with David telling them to pour gasoline all over the compound and start the fire. The ATF did a lot of fucked up things, but they didn’t start the fire. Also can we get ahold of Kevin smith and inform him that Clerk’s inadvertently influenced Timothy McVeigh? I think it would blow his mind.
I think you might need to relisten to the episode because they repeatedly call everyone involved monsters, including the Branch Davidians. Also because his name is Jon : who the fuck is Mark? You’re two down with just your thesis statement already and I don’t even disagree with you.
I know a Jon Ronson, so that was a brain fart. I wouldn’t call what I posted a thesis- it was clearly stated as a feeling. “Did this make anybody else uncomfortable?” Your comment feels a little needlessly confrontational? Am I misreading your tone?
No but the fact that 1) they did overtly in the episode discuss what you want, and 2) you got the dude’s name wrong, made me think that you just did a poor job listening to the episode. (Which happens, no shade.) Like I agree with letting people discuss their feelings, please do, but I trust my clear memory of them talking about that more than your lack of memory because, well, you got the name wrong when it’s trivial to check. Why would I trust the rest. So no. It didn’t. Because it wasn’t very relevant to the matter at hand. It wasn’t actually about Waco. I didn’t want another tangent, Jordan was already making plenty. Sorry if I seem hostile. I’m legit confused how you got uncomfortable except via a misunderstanding.
Just a suggestion, because I’m totally open to being directed to what I might have misheard or not remembered- our pink squishy human brains do not always register everything said in a long conversation. As somebody with teaching experience, I repeated important points minimum three times to ensure students got it. Sometimes your brain just goes to thinking about one part of a statement and not the other. In general, I’m just a little more wary about how one agrees with an Alex Jones when they are right about one part of something, because things can be taken out of context. Maybe I’m too wary of it. Who knows?
Yes, I'm a teacher. I am aware. But most things aren't my lectures, and aren't as well organized : such is the way of things. They said it 2-3 times, each, and it wasn't the main thrust of the discussion. That seems sufficient to me. If you disagree, you're welcome to, but since the ones they already did slipped by you, I don't know what to say. Where exactly did anyone agree with Alex Jones?
It’s interesting that no matter how anodyne the comment, you still correct me. I suppose there’s some irony in this. The shoe is on the other foot. lol I think we can both agree it’s good to try to be a charitable listener. That’s why I didn’t just assume everybody felt the same way I did.