defending us from enemies, even imaginary ones

Right wing conspiracy theorists are really, really, really invested in a New World Order plot they believe is outlined in a document called Agenda 21...





When not crying and shilling for gold coins as some sort of super-currency which will be the only thing between certain death and survival in an economic collapse, Glenn Beck decided to write a book forecasting our dark future under the U.N.-led New World Order. Ok, not so much write a book as buy the rights to put his name on a conspiracy potboiler in which humanity has been all but decimated to protect the environment. People are imprisoned in featureless dwellings, kids are taken away form them in birth, they’re fed the equivalent of food pellets, and basically live a life that’s better described as an existence. It’s like peering into the brain of the black helicopter crowd, digging up every single nightmare they’ve ever had and making a crude Jackson Pollock painting out of them. Despite being treated as fiction, it’s very clearly supposed to be a warning about the impact of Agenda 21 when it’s implemented and used to rule the world.

Yes, here we go again with the hysterical fear of a toothless U.N. policy paper which, as noted a few times already, is just a list of suggestions that actually promotes free market capitalism and poses the issue of sustainability as an economic concern for healthy international trade. Yes, it calls for better human rights enforcement, women’s rights, and other liberal development ideas, but it’s mechanism for making sure its guidelines are implemented is to ask really nicely if some of the world’s nations would be so kind to try to implement them. This is why the Agenda 21 and black helicopter cloud insist on looking for moles in the government to stealthily force the U.S. to comply with the document. There’s no way that the U.N. can force anyone to follow it, no taxes it could levy, no military it could deploy, and no amount of money it can use as a bribe. But to find someone willing to take Agenda 21 as the blueprint for global governance is difficult at best.

If there are no consequences for not following along, you have to construct elaborate theories and layer upon layer upon layer of paranoia and backwards leaps of logic to create a cabal of sinister New World Order servants who want to destroy their nations from inside out and do the sorts of things that appear nowhere in the document that’s supposed to be their manifesto. But at the end of the day all they have is a long list of fears and allegations that have no basis in the real world and are backed up with out of context quotes, outright lies, and the ramblings of very popular talk show hosts who see a New World Order plot in everything from the mildew in their showers to a blizzard in January. Their fans, terrified of governments and chained by their own constantly fed and reinforced fears, have locked themselves in echo chambers in which they’re planning for life after the U.N.-led apocalypse, reciting the same mantras until you can hear the hoarseness in their voice through their comments on news sites.

Calls for urban planners to consider their cities’ environmental footprints as they design cities of the future — something already done by those asking for parks, playgrounds, and lakes that will welcome manageable wildlife — are taken as an Illuminati mandate for genocide and seizures of any private property that doesn’t fall within a secret spec sheet. Statements about the need for governments to root our corruption that hobbles economic development and hurts billions, very much the sort of stuff that most people often agree with as a good idea, become warnings to the world’s governments to follow the U.N.’s script or be dismantled by their secret agents. Really, when you take such a bristling attitude to toothless, vague, well-meaning suggestions and insist on twisting them into explicit threats by malevolent forces, you’re just looking for reasons to fear someone or to get angry, much like your counterparts on the far left. All so Glenn Beck can sell you some gold and Alex Jones can sell you another book or “survival kit…”