Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows from The Venus Project - thevenusproject.com Around the world many people are trying to fix social problems and alleviate poverty. However, one project presents a bold new direction for humanity, confronting all of these problems by planning and implementing a total redesign of our culture. The Venus Project, headed by futurist Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows have designed a Resource Based Economy, free of the issues that they feel are caused by the monetary system. Backed by proven technical strategies and tested designs, rather than just theoretical plans, their vision for the future uses technology and resources in highly effective ways to benefit humanity rather than enslaving it. The release of Zeitgeist Addendum and activism by The Zeitgeist Movement introduced their work to a wider audience and thus led to international speaking tours across the world including a series of lectures in the UK. Today we meet with Jacque and Roxanne to find out more about the history and progression of their work and learn how their ideas can help us all to create a new and better future. Hi guys, welcome to London, thank you so much for finding the time to talk to us. As we know, you've been very busy and you... quite a lot in here. So, we'd love you to tell us why come to London specially... We know it's to talk about the Venus Project, but how far is your message getting out there around the world? We won't know that until we get some feedback... ...from some of the friends and the broadcast industry. -Okay. How's it been going since you've been in London? -It's been wonderful. There's a very active group in London, the Zeitgeist Movement UK, that's been terrific, set up a lecture for us for about 740 people... ...and it went quite well, we think. Now, there is quite... a lot of people do know what the Venus Project is, cause it has started to spread around the world, but for those people who are just waking up to those words... ...could you just give us a summary of what it's all about what you're trying to achieve? Well the Venus Project is a presentation of an idea or a series of ideas... ...to help make the world a better place for all people. That means than in order to do that you have to change the way you do things. The Venus Project calls for declaring all the Earth's resources as the common heritage of all the world's people. We think if we don't do that, we'll always have wars, territorial disputes, depression, economic hardship... I think that's the only way of solving most of those problems. How long have you actually worked on the Venus Project? -Well I've worked on it ever since the Depression. -That's a long time ago... -In 1929... ...in America. -That's a very very long time... -Yes, it is. -...with one project. -Well, there's a lot of problems... -Can you share what those problems are? Yeah, how you do get to different countries, with different values, different ways of thinking? How can you bring the world together with so many different concepts of right, wrong, good and bad? That was the major problem... of what to do. Now the Venus Project is... ...is a fantastic idea for the future, cause I have seen... I've seen your lectures and I've seen things on the Internet where you describe things and graphics of how it would be. I think the main question on people's lips are how do we get from the state where we are at the moment, because... the globe... we're all separated by lots of different ways, cultures... There's wars going on, and... I think most people of the planet are peace living people... ...but we do have people in power... and... ... I think we can put names to them... the Illuminati just come to mind... These people behind the scenes who keep things rolling in a state of war, conquest, people living in poverty, so certain ruling elite can keep that power base. How does one go from where we are now, to this fantastic place where... ...we could all come together and live... live as one humanity in a place like Venus Project, in cities like them? -Right now, what we're trying to do is introduce this new social direction, where we feel it would... it would surpass the need for war, crime, bigotry, prejudice, hunger... ...and we don't feel you can superimpose that or you can just pronounce it and that will happen. We feel that this system, the monetary system that we have all over the world, is crashing and it doesn't work for many people... ...so we really have to wait for the evolutionary transition where that happens before people start to look for something else. There are many people that are aware that this system doesn't work... ...and they're beginning to look into the Venus Project. There are lots of activists that complain about the system, are kind of watchdogs, but they don't pose an alternative as to what to do. -And the Venus Project does that... -Yes, it does. So we're trying to get the word out in any way that we can, in film... people like you help a lot... ...who do interviews, and... then at certain times perhaps we can do a first... a major motion picture... Zeitgeist Addendum helped tremendously... ...and then we'd like to build the first city, to show how it would work. -Yes. That's the first step, isn't it? How do we get to the first city? Does that still have to come in a monetary based system? Or does the whole system have to fall down and crash, like it seems to be at the moment? It seems like we are hanging on with the banking system by the skin of our teeth. Do you think it would be a good thing if the whole thing collapsed like a pack of cards, and then we can start from scratch, or do you think we need... ...to build one of these cities while we still can do it within a monetary system? How do you think it's best, that it would work? -Well, I think that the system is crashing... -Yes. ...and they gave the money in America... I talk about America because that's where we're from. -In America, they gave the money to the people that created the problem in the first place. -Yes. -They gave the banks that money. -Yes, they did. So, it's not going to work, cause it doesn't solve problems. If you bail out the motor car companies, if they don't have a blueprint for a better car, cheap and lighter than Japanese cars, they're not going to succeed. And if people don't have the money because they've been laid off, how are they gonna buy the cars? So, politicians never made any contribution to society. They don't know how to solve problems, they don't know how to prevent cars from hitting each other. -They don't know, they're businessmen and lawyers. -Exactly. And if you have any problems out there, they're always technical. Do you see a crash coming, do you think it will all collapse? -And then if it gets to that point... -Yes. - ...that is when we can start something like the Venus Project? -Yes. -Do you see this happening in the next few months or in years? -Within a year. -Within a year? -Yeah. And do you have any inside information? (giggles) Well we have riots that are going to ocurr when the pensions run out, when the government doesn't have enough money to feed those people displaced. Although they extended... extended relief, they can't keep extending relief... ...and they're gonna have mass riots. Then the government will move more towards what we call fascism. Fascism is the last out for the collapse of the money system. They will [re-round] black people and minorities to stay in the house, don't come out after the 9 o'clock. That's the... that's a transitional period. That's gonna be very painful, there's nothing we can do about it. Is this... is this what you see happening if the money system crashes? Do you see this happening... -Well, many different things... -...that there will be like a kind of martial law taking over? Many different things can happen, they can either install a military dictatorship... ...or go to war, knock out countries that are making nuclear weapons. I don't know what they'll do, I have no idea. Whether we'll see the Venus Project, I don't know. It depends on what people do... if they do nothing, nothing will happen. -In the past, they used to do wars to prop up the economy, but this last war the United States had... ...it was the first war where they had a debt during time of war. So, it didn't work. And whatever they're trying to do we feel will not work. And that's why we'd like to get this information out there, so people have a direction to work towards. And if it happens before the crash, if we can build the city... ...that will be very helpful. If not, it's harder after there's military dictatorship already in place, because the military is the only thing that's organized that the United States has... ...and that's what they'll call upon in times of crisis.