Inside Waco
Channel 4
I guess what we can all agree on is that a bunch of children being burnt alive was a bad thing. They didn’t ask to be there with these god-awful freaks – you don’t choose your parents after all. If you did then Apple Martin Paltrow would have opted for a less toxic pair of parents ( Rose and Fred West perhaps). So yes, barbecued infants – bad. And it can’t have been much more fun for the adults but at least they were 100% responsible for the unholy fuck up they had created in the name of Armageddon and selling out their humanity to a spiritual huckster.
"The adults were 100% responsible for the unholy fuck up they had created in the name of Armageddon and selling out their humanity to a spiritual huckster."
Inside Waco was a revealing look at the colossal Waco fuck up of 1993. Dramatic reconstruction and news footage from the time portrayed the events when a raid by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms on the Branch Davidian compound went badly wrong and a resulting siege made things about 10 times worse. The raid left four agents and six Davidians dead. A fire that ended the siege killed 80. By anyone’s standards, not a stellar chapter in the FBI‘s history.
“Koresh raped children of 12 and 13 with their parents’ consent and fathered children with them.”
Inside the compound, David Koresh was accepted as the second coming of Christ. He preached polygamy for himself and abstinence for everyone else. He raped children of 12 and 13 with their parents’ consent and fathered children with them. He accumulated an impressive arsenal of rifles and illegal automatic weapons. The sound of gunfire from the firing ranges was an ever-present feature of the compound and it was this that initially alerted the authorities to the potential dangers at Mount Carmel.
As ever, the problem with these programmes is that the frauds who followed Koresh were spoken to like they were normal human beings, victims of some horrible circumstance beyond their control. Surviving Branch Davidians effortlessly assume the moral high ground against the FBI which must come easily to people whose big moral statement in life is colluding with a paedophile. Yes, let’s dog the people who try to enforce democratically legislated law but let’s go easy on the people who pimp out their wives and children to the baby rapist.
"Branch Davidians effortlessly assume the moral high ground against the FBI which must come easily to people whose big moral statement in life is colluding with a paedophile."
There’s a big debate about which side first opened fire. I don’t know whether the FBI fired the first shot. I don’t care. There was a Book Of Revelation quoting paedophile armed to the gills surrounded by unquestioning stormtroopers – people who had already whored out their families. The FBI were entirely entitled to shoot at any one who was armed. Apocalyptic death cults aren’t big on the sanctity of life.
The best thing about it: Some pretty good re-enactments.
The worst thing about it: The implicit pat on the head for the bozos.
The verdict on Inside Waco: Widespread death with no lessons learned.
Marks out of 10: 7
