O.K., let’s file this one under…
THE CONSPIRACY OF THE NUMBERS GAME
I like numbers.
I especially like numbers like a million, and I’d like them even more if this sort of number might someday appear on my monthly bank statement preceded by a dollar sign.
Unfortunately, the reality of that happening to this lowly documentary camera person, is probably just a pipe dream at this point.
Since, for the moment, these larger numbers are probably out of the question -- unless of course I hit all 6 numbers of the New York State Lottery -- we should concern ourselves with much smaller numbers, like the number “3”.
According to the document Thomas Jefferson jotted down in 1776, there are 3 basic freedoms: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. Conspiracy theorists are convinced that nefarious others are trying to constantly take from us these very freedoms.
The first of these – life -- is the subject of Jeff’s latest conspiracy theory. And it relates to life in large numbers, in the millions, maybe even tens of millions or hundreds of millions.
As crowded of the streets of the East Village are on Friday and Saturday nights – with thousands, even tens of thousands of people partying hard - I never ever dream of all the people just going away, leaving me alone to prowl the streets in an “I am Legend” situation.
After all, who would I blog to?
I don’t even ever wish that Jeff would just get taken away by reptilian aliens… or by Black Helicopters… or by agents of HARP... or disappear in any other conspiratorial fantasy in which he believes, despite what regular readers of this blog might think.
The apartment Jeff and I share is Number 9 Second Avenue in New York City (yes we live at number 9). The building has about 40 apartments, occupied by people packed into 600 square feet. Our apartment building is crowded with Village Bohemians, Slackers, and New York University students (also ex-New York University students, like Jeff and myself). It’s crowded, but I love the city in which I live. Where else can you get dinner at 5 o’clock in the morning on Tuesday?
Jeff and I are good tenants. We keep our noise level to a respectable level. We conserve water.
We have never once peed out the window, even on the most tequila-laden night.
We recycle. Beer cans and Jose Cuervo bottles in one container, take out menus in another.
Because of the need to recycle, there are so many garbage pails in the lobby, it creates both an eyesore and an obstacle course of sorts.
For instance, on the way back from a pizza run last night, Jeff almost tripped over one of the garbage pail lids and mumbled about something called “Sustainable Development”.
Of course, I can never resist a challenge.
So here’s how it went down:
Me: What’s Sustainable Development?
Jeff: The Green Agenda.
Me: Conspiracy Theories are now color-coded?
Jeff: And naïve debunkers’ websites are numbered, as are all our days.
So, here’s how the conspiracy theory shapes up:
According to Jeff, “Sustainable Development” and “The Green Agenda” are based on the idea that an international ruling body has centralized global control over all human activity. This living body seeks to control what you eat, what you drink, and how much energy you use.
The code name for all of this is Agenda 21. A new world order for Century 21.
So now 21 is a scary number. It used to just be a time where you’d be able to drink, vote, and smoke.
Much like in the world of Logan’s Run, or in that of Solyent Green, under the agenda of Agenda 21, it isn’t just control over food and fuel that’s coming, but over birth, life, and death itself. Much of the human race will be systematically euthanized, and after that the right to one’s life, or the right to have children, will no longer be part of Jefferson’s original legacy.
With this secret agenda already underway, in just a few decades, the world’s population is to be brought a full 99 per cent per cent lower than it is today.
According to Jeff, 178 nations have signed on to Agenda 21, which is defined as a comprehensive plan of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by organizations of the United Nations and its member Governments.
Al Gore, who is kind of an unofficial Green Czar, who was very nearly elected President in the year 2000, and who is supposedly one of the architects of Agenda 21, and has made the following statement regarding population control:
“One of the things we could do about it is to change the technologies, to put out less of this pollution, to stabilize the population, and one of the principle ways of doing that is to empower and educate girls and women.
You have to have ubiquitous availability of fertility management so women can choose how many children have, the spacing of the children.
You have to lift child survival rates so that parents feel comfortable having small families and most important - you have to educate girls and empower women.
And that’s the most powerful leveraging factor, and when that happens, then the population begins to stabilize and societies begin to make better choices and more balanced choices.”
There certainly are people out there talking about how population control is a smart idea, enough to make Jeff, and the rest of us a little scared.
For instance, a Professor of Biology at the University of Texas, Eric R. Pianka, writes of the wisdom of human population control.
This is verbatim from his article “What Nobody Wants To Hear”:
First, and foremost, we must get out of denial and recognize that Earth simply cannot support many billions of people…
… Human populations must be greatly diminished, and as quickly as possible to limit further environmental damage.
Corporate leaders have also weighed in. The founder of CNN, Ted Turner was quoted as saying, “A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal.”
Ideal for who? Certainly not his ratings.
This is not as easy to dismiss than some of Jeff’s other conspiracy theories. There certainly is enough precedent in history of planned mass murder by government leaders, done in secret.
One need look no further than the Final Solution to know that Governments sometimes don’t have the best interest of a large group of the population.
However, let’s look at the actions of our own Government and compare it against this 21st Century Agenda:
If the New World Order wants to keep us from being fruitful and multiplying, then why not give out free contraception in every bar?
And if our leaders want us to hurry up and die, then why place the additional stress on the United States budget, which would be inevitably be taxed to the max (pun intended) with the low cost health care now being extended to even the poorest among us.
I know all the talk of death panels that’s been linked with implementing universal health care, but look at what a stink got raised by even the slightest rumors of killing off Grandma in the guise of human efficiency and cost benefit analysis.
But would it actually be possible to start killing people off without a latter day Charlton Heston or Kevin McCarthy blowing the whistle on the tactics of the secret police on every street corner of every small town and city from Boston to Denver?
And wouldn’t there be a new Constitutional Amendment allowing easy abortions even more quickly than one could once have said "repeal Row v. Wade"?
Over the span of human history, large segments of the population have been wiped out by plagues, wars, and starvation. Yet life expectancy continues to be on the rise. Shouldn't it be heading the other way if people were being exterminated?
Watch the Sunday Morning talk shows. Our Government seems much more concerned about raising the retirement age then in putting us in early graves.
Could it be that all the talk of recycling and conservation is to preserve the future for all of us? Why is it necessary to put a bad spin on good behavior?
I for one would hate for being kind to the environments to giving rise to bogeymen, or take on such a negative connotation that we throw our trash in the street, take up large sections of land with garbage dumps, and stop searching for renewable energy.
Jeff I think this one falls in my column. Beers are on you. Maybe a whole 12 pack. And 2 shots of tequila. We’ll keep the numbers small and the footprint tiny.
As such, I promise to recycle the cans.
I expect to be here long into the future, which is a good reason to be extra kind to the environment.
Emails are always welcome. Even by snail mail. On recyclable paper, of course.
