We are once again entering an age of “virtuous” violence, where any atrocity—by racists, Jew haters, or Islamophobes, the right or the left—can be somehow justified. It is not a place any of us should want to live.
Where, then, do we go from here?
In a world where social media and AI hypercharge lies, who decides what’s considered truth? In a culture seemingly obsessed with dividing people by identity, how do we find commonality in our shared human experience?
I made this latest film for the same reason I’ve always done this work. Not only to make people laugh, but also to bring them face-to-face with the danger of fanaticism and conspiracy theories.
I’m not naive. One film won’t stamp out age-old prejudices or stop the extremism that’s fueling the slide from democracy to autocracy and mass violence. But, as satire has done since ancient times, it can help sound the alarm. It can remind people about the very real dangers of ludicrous lies—whether spread by a thin-skinned authoritarian or an extremist with an online following. With the U.S. midterm elections just weeks away, perhaps it encourages citizens to mobilize against these dangerous falsehoods—at the ballot box and beyond. Maybe it can even help shame more of our governments into finally making our Silicon Valley overlords—unelected billionaires who decide what billions of people see and believe—liable for the lies, conspiracies, and hate on their platforms that have already gotten people killed and will likely kill many more.