There are many of us around the world that do really want peace, to dig deeper than left versus right, look farther than the deliberate puppet show that is World Politics, and contend that at the present time and for millennia now, our population has been controlled by one powerfully coordinated corporate, governmental entity. We that adhere to this logic generally turn to the internet for alternative news and discussion, but strangely enough, in the capitol of Bush red Texas, there exists a little basement bookshop which supports these very same convictions… in the flesh! Well, in the brick and mortar, anyway.
Brave New Books is in Austin, Texas, the decidedly “weird” capitol city. As many a bumper sticker says, “Keep Austin Weird,” which is in stark contrast to the rest of the supposedly non-weird, Iraqi war supportin’ Republican state. According to Brave New Books co-owner Harlan Dietrich, “Austin is a freedom loving community, but the controlling faction is Democrat with a big D.” Brave New Books categorically does not follow suit. So just how did this shop take seed and come to fruition in such a traditional left or right environment like Texas?
The city is home to anti-New World Order radio personality Alex Jones. Dietrich himself thought of Jones as a bit of a “nutter,” listening to his radio show whilst growing up, but all that changed after 9/11. “I saw him predict it. That was mind boggling.” So Dietrich, along with others, began to lend a closer ear to the so called fringe conspiracy “theories,” and started to tune out from mainstream news and politics.
Soon after, Dietrich went to a 9/11 Truth convention in Chicago and struck up a friendship with future co-owner Steven Connor. “We wanted to do something that would sustain itself and dedicate ourselves to these issues,” and so the two opened Brave New Books 20 months ago, which sells everything from David Icke books, to exposés of the Clinton and Bush administrations, to various T-shirts, one picturing the twin towers with the statement “TRUTH IS THE FIRST VICTIM OF WAR,” and another “ONE NATION UNDER CHEMTRAILS.”
Brave New Books is using their physical location as a meeting point for activism and education. BNB employee and University of Texas student John uses the bookshop as a meeting point for the student group The Project For the New American Citizen. They discuss key issues like 9/11, mass media manipulation, the military industrial complex, the North American Union, the Federal Reserve, and health deception. The group plays on the name of the neo con think tank, The Project for the New American Century. It has spread to other universities including Texas State, University of Iowa, and others, but founding member John “stopped keeping track because I didn’t want to centralize it.” The bookshop hosts a slew of other groups and events including Vote Rescue, a group that advocates the return to hand counted electoral ballots, and Freedom School introduces newbies to the cover ups in The 9/11 Commission and other important ideas single every Monday night.
All and all, it is a sort of underground (literally below street level) club house for truth seekers, free thinkers, and renegades. There is no left or right, but rather ideas that can not possibly follow the linear political paradigm impressed upon us. I should hope more of this articulated dissent will appear in physical locations, because it makes for good conversation to wander through the aisles of a place with a poster of Barack Obama’s enlarged face encased by the words “Establishment Demagogue.”
go to www.bravenewbookstore.com for their online catalog and community. |