Zeitgeist: Addendum
Encyclopedia
Zeitgeist: Addendum, is a 2008 documentary film
produced and directed by Peter Joseph, and a sequel to the 2007 film Zeitgeist: The Movie. Zeitgeist: Addendum is itself followed by the 2011 film Zeitgeist: Moving Forward
.
. The remainder of the film is narrated by Peter Joseph and divided into four parts, each prefaced by an on-screen quotation from a notable scholar: Krishnamurti, John Adams
, Bernard Lietaer
, and Thomas Paine
, respectively.
Part I
Part One states that money is the most corrosive societal tradition and explains the monetary system and its policies in the United States
through the fractional reserve banking system as illustrated in the book, "Modern Money Mechanics". In clarifying, Part One explains how money creation
as an exchange between the government and the central bank (Federal Reserve in the U.S.), creates a perpetual cycle of interest
and inflation
, summarizing that money and debt are necessarily correlated and increasing.
Part II
Part Two shares an interview with John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hitman, who explains his own role in the facilitatiion of subjugation of Latin American economies by multinational corporations, including the United States government's involvement in the overthrow and installation of various Latin American heads-of-state. Perkins asserts that the there are three steps required to conquer the target nation:
Part III
Part Three introduces Jacque Fresco
and The Venus Project
, and asserts a need to move away from the current socioeconomic paradigms. Fresco states that free market enterprise and capitalism do not promote efficiency, abundance nor human progress, but rather they instead encourage artificial creation of scarcity to maximize profits, encourage suboptimal technological development in order to maintain cyclical consumption, put the interest of people second to monetary gain, and engage in the production of pollution, as well as other forms of environmental degradation to lower operating costs.
Fresco states that capitalism perpetuates the conditions it claims to address, as problems are only solved if there is money to be made and if more money can be made by propagating the problem rather than solving it, the problem will be propagated.
Part IV
Part Four explores the idea that all major social problems are ultimately the result of wide-scale ignorance concerning the two concepts of emergence
and symbiosis
—an ignorance maintained by the political, monetary, and religious institutions. This fourth part maintains a cosmopolitan
attitude, and states that human societies are part of an interdependent universe. It suggests several means of social change
, largely via non-violent boycotting and educating, in order to oppose rigid social institutions.
The film concludes in a sequence depicting actors as members of the fast-paced modern world suddenly stopping in their everyday activities and letting go of various symbolic items of corporate, religious, and materialistic significance.
"Therefore we need to expose this financial failure for what it is, using this weakness to our advantage. Here are some suggestions [slightly paraphrased]:
1. Boycott Citibank, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America, the most powerful controllers in the corrupt Federal Reserve System. Expose the banking fraud. Move your money, credit cards or mortgages to other banks. If you own stock in them, sell it. If you work for them, quit. This gesture will express contempt for the powers behind the private banking cartel known as the Federal Reserve, and it will create awareness about the fraud of the banking system itself.
2. Boycott the news networks (CNN, ABC, NBC, Fox, etc.) and visit the emerging independent news agencies on the internet for your information. With four corporations owning all the news media outlets, objective information is impossible. The true beauty of the internet is that the establishment has been losing control because of this free flow of information. We must protect the internet at all times, as it is truly our savior right now.
3. Boycott the military. Don't ever allow yourself, your family, or anyone you know to join the military. This is an obsolete institution now used exclusively for maintaining an establishment that is no longer relevant. US soldiers work for US corporations, not the people. Propaganda forces us to believe that war is natural and the military is an honorable institution. Well, if war is natural, why are there eighteen suicides every day by veterans who have post-traumatic stress disorder? If our military men and women are so honored, why is it that twenty-five percent of the American homeless population are veterans?
4. Boycott the energy corporations. If you live in a detached house, get off the grid. Investigate every means of making your home self-sustainable with clean energy. Solar, wind and other renewable energies are now affordable consumer realities. Considering the never-ending rising cost of traditional energies, it will likely be a cheaper investment over time. If you drive, get the smallest car you can and consider using one of the many conversion technologies that can enable your car to be a hybrid, electric, or run on anything other than establishment fuels.
5. Reject the political system. The illusion of democracy is an insult to our intelligence. In a monetary system, there is no such thing as a true democracy, and there never was. We have two political parties owned by the same set of corporate lobbyists. They are placed in their positions by the corporations, with popularity artificially projected by their media. In a system of inherent corruption, the change of personnel every couple of years has very little relevance. Instead of pretending that the political game has any true meaning, focus your energy on how to transcend this failed system.
6. Create critical mass. Join the movement. Go to our website and help us create the largest mass movement for social change the world has ever seen. We must mobilize and educate everyone about the inherent corruption of our current world system, along with the only true sustainable solution declaring all the natural resources on the planet as common heritage to all people, while informing everyone as to the true state of technology, and how we can all be free if the world works together rather than fights.
"The choice lies with you. You can continue to be a slave to the financial system and watch the continuous wars, depression, and injustice across the globe, while placating yourself with vain entertainment and materialistic garbage. Or, you can focus your energy on true, meaningful, lasting, holistic change, which actually has the realistic ability to support and free all humans, with no one left behind."
reported that Peter Joseph describes the mission of his movement as "the application of the scientific method for social change”, and that his films Zeitgeist, the Movie
(2007) and Zeitgeist: Addendum (2008) have been watched by 50 million people around the world. They also noted that while the former was famous for its alleging that the attacks of September 11 were an inside job, the second film "was all but empty of such conspiratorial notions, directing its rhetoric and high production values toward posing a replacement for the evils of the banking system and a perilous economy of scarcity and debt."
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
produced and directed by Peter Joseph, and a sequel to the 2007 film Zeitgeist: The Movie. Zeitgeist: Addendum is itself followed by the 2011 film Zeitgeist: Moving Forward
Zeitgeist: Moving Forward
Zeitgeist: Moving Forward is the third installment in Peter Joseph's Zeitgeist film series. The movie was independently released in over 60 countries and in over 30 languages starting on January 15, 2011 with over 340 screenings worldwide...
.
Synopsis
The film begins and ends with excerpts from a speech by Jiddu KrishnamurtiJiddu Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti or J. Krishnamurti or , was a renowned writer and speaker on philosophical and spiritual subjects. His subject matter included: psychological revolution, the nature of the mind, meditation, human relationships, and bringing about positive change in society...
. The remainder of the film is narrated by Peter Joseph and divided into four parts, each prefaced by an on-screen quotation from a notable scholar: Krishnamurti, John Adams
John Adams
John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...
, Bernard Lietaer
Bernard Lietaer
Bernard Lietaer is an economist, author and professor. He studies monetary systems and promotes the idea that communities can benefit from creating their own local or complementary currency, which circulate parallel with national currencies.Bernard Lietaer, the author of "The Future of Money:...
, and Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine
Thomas "Tom" Paine was an English author, pamphleteer, radical, inventor, intellectual, revolutionary, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States...
, respectively.
Part I
Part One states that money is the most corrosive societal tradition and explains the monetary system and its policies in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
through the fractional reserve banking system as illustrated in the book, "Modern Money Mechanics". In clarifying, Part One explains how money creation
Money creation
In economics, money creation is the process by which the money supply of a country or a monetary region is increased due to some reason. There are two principal stages of money creation. First, the central bank introduces new money into the economy by purchasing financial assets or lending money...
as an exchange between the government and the central bank (Federal Reserve in the U.S.), creates a perpetual cycle of interest
Interest
Interest is a fee paid by a borrower of assets to the owner as a form of compensation for the use of the assets. It is most commonly the price paid for the use of borrowed money, or money earned by deposited funds....
and inflation
Inflation
In economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services. Consequently, inflation also reflects an erosion in the purchasing power of money – a...
, summarizing that money and debt are necessarily correlated and increasing.
Part II
Part Two shares an interview with John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hitman, who explains his own role in the facilitatiion of subjugation of Latin American economies by multinational corporations, including the United States government's involvement in the overthrow and installation of various Latin American heads-of-state. Perkins asserts that the there are three steps required to conquer the target nation:
- Arranging loans that will be impossible to repay,
- Using the International Monetary FundInternational Monetary FundThe International Monetary Fund is an organization of 187 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world...
(IMF) or World BankWorld BankThe World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans to developing countries for capital programmes.The World Bank's official goal is the reduction of poverty...
to force the host nation to renegotiate the debt through agreements that result in currency devaluation, resources being made available at a low cost, selling of public services to foreign corporations, support in foreign conflicts, etc. When these steps fail, the second measure taken is to overthrow the government, through assassinations, staged protests, and bribery. The history of GuatemalaGuatemalaGuatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...
, EcuadorEcuadorEcuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...
, PanamaPanamaPanama , officially the Republic of Panama , is the southernmost country of Central America. Situated on the isthmus connecting North and South America, it is bordered by Costa Rica to the northwest, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. The...
, VenezuelaVenezuelaVenezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
, and the Shah in IranIranIran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
, are used as asserted examples of economic subjugation. - As a last resort, the military is sent to topple regimes, and IraqIraqIraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
is shown as one of these cases.
Part III
Part Three introduces Jacque Fresco
Jacque Fresco
Jacque Fresco , is a self-educated structural designer, philosopher of science, concept artist, educator, and futurist. His interests span a wide range of disciplines including several in philosophy, science, and engineering...
and The Venus Project
The Venus Project
The Venus Project is an organization that advocates the futurist visions of the American Jacque Fresco, with the aim of improving society with a global sustainable social design that it calls a "resource-based economy"...
, and asserts a need to move away from the current socioeconomic paradigms. Fresco states that free market enterprise and capitalism do not promote efficiency, abundance nor human progress, but rather they instead encourage artificial creation of scarcity to maximize profits, encourage suboptimal technological development in order to maintain cyclical consumption, put the interest of people second to monetary gain, and engage in the production of pollution, as well as other forms of environmental degradation to lower operating costs.
Fresco states that capitalism perpetuates the conditions it claims to address, as problems are only solved if there is money to be made and if more money can be made by propagating the problem rather than solving it, the problem will be propagated.
Part IV
Part Four explores the idea that all major social problems are ultimately the result of wide-scale ignorance concerning the two concepts of emergence
Emergence
In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Emergence is central to the theories of integrative levels and of complex systems....
and symbiosis
Symbiosis
Symbiosis is close and often long-term interaction between different biological species. In 1877 Bennett used the word symbiosis to describe the mutualistic relationship in lichens...
—an ignorance maintained by the political, monetary, and religious institutions. This fourth part maintains a cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitanism
Cosmopolitanism is the ideology that all human ethnic groups belong to a single community based on a shared morality. This is contrasted with communitarian and particularistic theories, especially the ideas of patriotism and nationalism...
attitude, and states that human societies are part of an interdependent universe. It suggests several means of social change
Social change
Social change refers to an alteration in the social order of a society. It may refer to the notion of social progress or sociocultural evolution, the philosophical idea that society moves forward by dialectical or evolutionary means. It may refer to a paradigmatic change in the socio-economic...
, largely via non-violent boycotting and educating, in order to oppose rigid social institutions.
The film concludes in a sequence depicting actors as members of the fast-paced modern world suddenly stopping in their everyday activities and letting go of various symbolic items of corporate, religious, and materialistic significance.
"Therefore we need to expose this financial failure for what it is, using this weakness to our advantage. Here are some suggestions [slightly paraphrased]:
1. Boycott Citibank, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America, the most powerful controllers in the corrupt Federal Reserve System. Expose the banking fraud. Move your money, credit cards or mortgages to other banks. If you own stock in them, sell it. If you work for them, quit. This gesture will express contempt for the powers behind the private banking cartel known as the Federal Reserve, and it will create awareness about the fraud of the banking system itself.
2. Boycott the news networks (CNN, ABC, NBC, Fox, etc.) and visit the emerging independent news agencies on the internet for your information. With four corporations owning all the news media outlets, objective information is impossible. The true beauty of the internet is that the establishment has been losing control because of this free flow of information. We must protect the internet at all times, as it is truly our savior right now.
3. Boycott the military. Don't ever allow yourself, your family, or anyone you know to join the military. This is an obsolete institution now used exclusively for maintaining an establishment that is no longer relevant. US soldiers work for US corporations, not the people. Propaganda forces us to believe that war is natural and the military is an honorable institution. Well, if war is natural, why are there eighteen suicides every day by veterans who have post-traumatic stress disorder? If our military men and women are so honored, why is it that twenty-five percent of the American homeless population are veterans?
4. Boycott the energy corporations. If you live in a detached house, get off the grid. Investigate every means of making your home self-sustainable with clean energy. Solar, wind and other renewable energies are now affordable consumer realities. Considering the never-ending rising cost of traditional energies, it will likely be a cheaper investment over time. If you drive, get the smallest car you can and consider using one of the many conversion technologies that can enable your car to be a hybrid, electric, or run on anything other than establishment fuels.
5. Reject the political system. The illusion of democracy is an insult to our intelligence. In a monetary system, there is no such thing as a true democracy, and there never was. We have two political parties owned by the same set of corporate lobbyists. They are placed in their positions by the corporations, with popularity artificially projected by their media. In a system of inherent corruption, the change of personnel every couple of years has very little relevance. Instead of pretending that the political game has any true meaning, focus your energy on how to transcend this failed system.
6. Create critical mass. Join the movement. Go to our website and help us create the largest mass movement for social change the world has ever seen. We must mobilize and educate everyone about the inherent corruption of our current world system, along with the only true sustainable solution declaring all the natural resources on the planet as common heritage to all people, while informing everyone as to the true state of technology, and how we can all be free if the world works together rather than fights.
"The choice lies with you. You can continue to be a slave to the financial system and watch the continuous wars, depression, and injustice across the globe, while placating yourself with vain entertainment and materialistic garbage. Or, you can focus your energy on true, meaningful, lasting, holistic change, which actually has the realistic ability to support and free all humans, with no one left behind."
Reception
The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported that Peter Joseph describes the mission of his movement as "the application of the scientific method for social change”, and that his films Zeitgeist, the Movie
Zeitgeist, the Movie
Zeitgeist: The Movie is a 2007 documentary film by Peter Joseph. It asserts a number of conspiracy theory-based ideas, including the Christ myth theory, alternative theories for the parties responsible for the September 11 attacks in 2001 and that bankers manipulate the international monetary...
(2007) and Zeitgeist: Addendum (2008) have been watched by 50 million people around the world. They also noted that while the former was famous for its alleging that the attacks of September 11 were an inside job, the second film "was all but empty of such conspiratorial notions, directing its rhetoric and high production values toward posing a replacement for the evils of the banking system and a perilous economy of scarcity and debt."
See also
- Peter Joseph
- Zeitgeist: The Movie
- The Venus ProjectThe Venus ProjectThe Venus Project is an organization that advocates the futurist visions of the American Jacque Fresco, with the aim of improving society with a global sustainable social design that it calls a "resource-based economy"...
- Zeitgeist: Moving ForwardZeitgeist: Moving ForwardZeitgeist: Moving Forward is the third installment in Peter Joseph's Zeitgeist film series. The movie was independently released in over 60 countries and in over 30 languages starting on January 15, 2011 with over 340 screenings worldwide...
- E. A. Wallis BudgeE. A. Wallis BudgeSir Ernest Alfred Thompson Wallis Budge was an English Egyptologist, Orientalist, and philologist who worked for the British Museum and published numerous works on the ancient Near East.-Earlier life:...