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The Zeitgeist Movement

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The Zeitgeist Movement
File:Zeitgeist Movement globe.jpgMovement logo
AbbreviationTZM or ZM
FormationAugust 18, 2008
TypeSocial movement
Region served Global
Key peoplePeter Joseph
Websitewww.thezeitgeistmovement.com

The Zeitgeist Movement is a Sustainability Advocacy Group and recognized as one of the largest grassroots social movements in the world currently working in over 1000 Regional Chapters across 70 countries. The intermediate goal is to obtain a global movement, unifying the people, regardless of country, religion or race, with a common value identification that we all invariably share, pertaining to our survival and sustainability.

The transitional goal is to implement an economic model that follows a truly scientific train of thought with respect to the technical factors that allow for human propensity, public health and environmental responsibility over generational time. This new model, which is based upon Strategic Resource Management and Natural Law as the logical starting point for all decisions and processes, is often referred to as a "Resource-Based Economic Model."

Philosophy and history

The Zeitgeist Movement's origin was a reaction to Peter Joseph's Zeitgeist Film Series. It featured structural engineer, Jacque Fresco of The Venus Project (TVP), in Zeitgeist: Addendum and Zeitgeist: Moving Forward and proposed a "Resource Based Economic Model" as a possible solution to Earth's cultural and ecological problems,

The basic structure of the movement consists of chapters teams, public events, media expressions and charity operations. Their activism is explicitly based on non-violent methods of communication. While the term “Activism” is correct by its exact meaning, The Zeitgeist Movement’s awareness work should not be misconstrued as relating to culturally common, traditional “activist protest” actions such as we have seen historically. Rather, TZM expresses itself through targeted, rational educational projects that work not to impose, dictate or blindly persuade – but to set in motion a train of thought that is logically self-realizing when the causal considerations of “sustainability” and “public health” are referenced from a scientific perspective.

Zeitgeist movement members say the current socioeconomic system is structurally corrupt and needs to be replaced with a system based on efficient and careful resource use through the technological potential of sustainable development. The movement believes humanity can employ renewable energy and computerized automatic systems on a global scale to provide free food and other necessities. It believes machines would perform almost all of the resource allocation and labor, and humans would oversee the computers and supervise the machines.

Zeitgeist Day (Z-Day)

The movement holds an annual event, Z-Day, in March. It was first held in 2009 in New York City. The 2010 event also took place in New York, with "337 sympathetic events occurring in over 70 countries worldwide." London and Vancouver hosted the 2011 and 2012 main events respectively.

Criticism of the Zeitgeist movement

The Huffington Post, The New York Times, The Palm Beach Post, Globes, TheMarker, VC Reporter, RT TV and Reason magazine criticized various aspects of the Zeitgeist movement, specifically: (a) utopianism, (b) reduced work incentives in their proposed economy, (c) practical difficulties in a transition to that economy, and (d) subscribing to 9/11 conspiracy theories in Zeitgeist: The Movie. Peter Joseph responded to the criticism by saying that practical difficulties could be overcome and that Zeitgeist does not believe in utopia but advocates updating society's notions of economics and politics continuously, re-aligning them with new scientific and technical discoveries, while keeping workers motivated. According to Mr. Joseph there is no direct association between the conspiracy theories in the first Zeitgeist documentary and the movement.

An article in the Journal of Contemporary Religion described the movement as an example of a "conspirituality", a synthesis of New Age spirituality and conspiracy theory, asserting that Zeitgeist: The Movie claims that "organised religion is about social control and that 9/11 was an inside job." The movement said that the article paints an "incorrect, misleading, offensive and defaming picture of the movement", and that the conspiracy narratives in the first movie are unrelated to the movement.

In Tablet magazine, journalist Michelle Goldberg criticized Zeitgeist: The Movie as being "steeped in far-right, isolationist, and covertly anti-Semitic conspiracy theories", and called the Zeitgeist movement "the world's first Internet-based cult, with members who parrot the party line with cheerful, rote fidelity." Zeitgeist said the accusations were "erroneous, pejorative, derogatory and intended to silence the movement's message", and that the movement does not blame international bankers, corporate leaders or politicians as individuals, but rather the global socioeconomic system that supports their values.

See also

References

  1. ^ Quotations and citations in this Misplaced Pages article are based on the translation from Hebrew to English of The Filmmaker Who Helped Recruit Millions for the Global Protests of the Bottom 99%, original Hebrew article by Asher Schechter, TheMarker (Israel), January 19, 2012.
  2. ^ "They've Seen the Future and Dislike the Present". New York Times. 2009-03-16.
  3. ^ Quotations and citations in this Misplaced Pages article are based on the translation from Hebrew to English of Imagine, original Hebrew article by Tzaela Kotler, Globes (Israel), March 18, 2010.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference huffpost was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. "Zeitgeist Day 2012 - Vogue Theatre in Vancouver, BC". voguetheatre.com.
  6. A dream worth having, Rhonda Swan, The Palm Beach Post, April 30, 2009
  7. New world re-order: The Zeitgeist Movement spreads to Ventura County, Shane Cohn, VC Reporter (California), May 12, 2011
  8. Zeitgeist Solutions: New World Re-Order, RT, Sept. 14, 2011
  9. Zeitgeist Solutions: Money, Debt and RBE, RT, Dec. 2, 2011
  10. http://spectator.org/archives/2011/01/17/jared-loughners-zeitgeist-obse Retrieval June-07-12
  11. ^ Understanding The Zeitgeist Movement Critics, The Zeitgeist Movement, July 15, 2012
  12. Ward, Charlotte; Voas, David (2011). "The Emergence of Conspirituality". Journal of Contemporary Religion. 26 (1): 109. Retrieved June 16, 2012.
  13. http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/57732/brave-new-world Retrieved June 9, 2012

External links

Works by Peter Joseph
Films
See also
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