The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear is a BBC television documentary series by Adam Curtis. It mainly consists of archive footage, with Curtis narrating. The film compares the rise of the neoconservative movement in the U.S. and the radical Islamist movement. It argues that radical Islamism is a myth, or noble lie, perpetuated by leaders of many countries.
About The Power of Nightmares in brief
The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear is a BBC television documentary series by Adam Curtis. It mainly consists of archive footage, with Curtis narrating. The series was originally broadcast in the United Kingdom in 2004. It has subsequently been aired in multiple countries and shown at various film festivals, including the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. The film compares the rise of the neoconservative movement in the U.S. and the radical Islamist movement, drawing comparisons between their origins, and remarking on similarities between the two groups. It argues that radical Islamism as a massive, sinister organisation, specifically in the form of al-Qaeda, is a myth, or noble lie, perpetuated by leaders of many countries. Curtis argues that the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapsing anyway. In their triumph, the Islamists believe they have created ‘pure’ Islamic states in Egypt and Algeria. The Islamists then try to scare the people into rising up against their leaders by using terrorism. In America, neoconservative aspirations to destroy the United States’ military power are eviscerated by the Islamists. In the end, the entire populations of the countries are thoroughly contaminated by western values, and they begin to turn on each other, believing that members of other terrorist groups are not true Muslims. The Power of nightmares was praised by film critics in Britain and the United. States. Its message and content have also been the subject of various critiques and criticisms from conservatives and progressives.
The first part of the series explains the origins of Islamism and neoconservatism. It shows Egyptian civil servant Sayyid Qutb, depicted as the founder of modern Islamist thinking, then becoming disgusted at what he judged as the corruption of morals and virtues in western society through individualism. The second part shows Islamist factions, rapidly falling under the more radical influence of Ayman al-Zawahiri and his rich Saudi acolyte Osama bin Laden, join the Reagan administration to combat the Soviet Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. They continued to believe that a vanguard was necessary to rise up and overthrow the corrupt regime and replace it with a ‘pure’ Islamist state. However, they believe that the Islamists have been affected by jahilliyah and thus may be legitimate targets of violence if they refuse to join his cause. The third part shows the Islamists trying to create ‘pure” Islamic states, but they are blocked by the government of Algeria and Egypt, who use fear as a way to hang on to power. The fourth part shows how the Islamists try to create a ‘ pure’ Islamic state in Egypt, but the people are terrified by the violence, and the Algerian government exploits that fear to hang onto power. It ends with the Islamists declaring the entire population of the country to be thoroughly contaminated, and declaring that they are not ‘true’ Muslims. The film has been shown at numerous film festivals and has been praised by critics in both the UK and the US.
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