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WW: It's called the Cherokee Restaurant. I had
the best burger I've had in months and the people there were like a family.
Last night I threw out the first pitch at the Drillers' game and the people
who work there-- it's like a family, the way they relate to each other.
They razz each other. They help each other. And it's the same thing with
the guys who put this show on. It's like working with real people. I don't
feel like I'm dealing with a big corporation. I don't have to look around
and watch my back all the time. I don't have to constantly count out when
I buy things or trade things with them. I don't feel like they are trying
to take advantage of me at all, and all the people that I've encountered
here have been really, really nice. I will be honest with you. I was really
nervous. In this "with us or against us" world, a lot of people
have decided that I'm "against us" and I was a little scared
to come to the Midwest of the United States where I thought for sure that
I would be where people were…
EW: It's not that bad…
WW: I've been to places where it is. But coming here, everybody
has been warm and friendly and "How can I help you?" and "Are
you having a nice day?" and "What can I get for you?" and
it's just been wonderful. I've really enjoyed myself. Look. I've been
here for 24 hours.
EW: Sure, sure.
WW: So, keep that in perspective.
EW: Now, I know on your website you're very open about your political
views. Have there been any negative responses?
WW: Oh yeah.
EW: Really?
WW: Sure. A guy threatened me. He said, "You won't be safe
in Tulsa, OK."
EW: No shit?
WW: Yeah. That's why I've been surrounded by cops the whole time
I've been here.
EW: Oh my god man, I'm sorry.
WW: Yeah.
EW: And that just came up recently, just before you guys left?
WW: Yeah, a couple of months ago.
Anne Wheaton (AW): And he just told me this, when I dropped him
off this afternoon. I didn't know about it, before then.
EW: That's crazy though. Was he responding to a particular
post, or was it just a general threat out of nowhere?
WW: My position is, that the Bush Administration has lied to everyone.
I think the military is a good, important thing, and that people within
the military should not question their orders, that they should do what
they're told to do. That's the way an army works. I think that the Bush
Administration has been responsible for countless unnecessary deaths because
they're full of shit. They lied to us. That's all. And there are people
that believe the lies. For whatever reason-- I don't know why. But they
believe the lies. Unfortunately, John Ashcroft, and George Bush, and Dick
Cheney, and Karl Rowe, and Paul Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle, and Donald
Rumsfeld: They're fascists. And the things that they are doing are right
out of the Nazi playbook.
The thing is, I'm not saying, "Oh,
they're Nazis." That's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying they want
to herd us on to trains and burn us to death. But what they're doing is
they make loyalty to the state the same things as loyalty to your family,
the same thing as loyalty to the leader…
EW: …and to God.
WW. I mean you can go and read what Göring and Goebbels said. And
it's like it could have been written by one of Bush's speechwriters. It's
terrifying to me. Then I get all these e-mails saying, "Well you
loved that blowjob-getting Bill Clinton!" No, as a matter of fact
I didn't. As a matter of fact, I thought that he could have been a fantastic
President, but he did more harm to the things I care about than the first
fucking George Bush did.
EW: But he did it with such style.
WW: And he smiled and he made you feel good.
EW: Exactly. He was so good about convincing you that he was a
great guy.
WW: Then there are all these people that say, "Why do you
hate America so much?" I don't.
EW: Right. You wouldn't care about all these issues, if you hated
this country.
WW: Now, if some asshole cop decided that they were going to say,
"I'm pretty sure this guy's a terrorist sympathizer." Then you're
in jail and nobody can do anything. You don't have access to an attorney
and you don't get an opportunity to question your accuser. And these are
things that people just have to be aware of. It seems to me that the leaders
in the Democratic and Republican Parties, all they care about is winning
and having power…
EW: And perpetuating that power.
WW: …and it is a fucking oligarchy. It is not about power for the
people. The Democrats are not about protecting people. They're not about
protecting welfare. They're not about making sure people get health care.
They could give a shit! They're all from the same fucking team, these
people. You know? That's like if you took everybody in this building and
you gave all the decision making power to like four people… and we all
had to do what they said. That's what the Democrats and the Republicans
are trying to perpetuate. We have a two-party political system that benefits
the rich at the expense of the poor. The middle class is completely going
away and we're totally fucked because of it. And people just don't get
it. They're like, "We're going to cut taxes." No, idiot. And
right now, American soldiers are getting killed in Iraq. They shouldn't
have been there in the first place. Our reasons for being there were based
entirely on lies. THE WORLD KNEW IT!
EW: But we had to guarantee our low gas prices…
WW: These are people. These are guys that could be our brothers.
It could be our neighbors or our friends. It could be us 10 years ago.
These guys are 18-22 years old. They're in there because they believe
they need to serve their country. What they're doing in Iraq isn't serving
our country. That's bullshit! They're not protecting Americans. They're
not liberating those people. They're securing oil fields for Haliburton.
Global Crossing was just given a multi-billion dollar contract over there.
The amount of money that they're spending over there could feed and clothe
and house every single person in America! FUCK YOU, George Bush! TAKE
CARE OF AMERICANS!
(applause from around the table.)
EW: I know for a fact that not all of our troops buy into the lie.
I have a friend that is an Apache technician that's over there right now.
He doesn't support this war. Many of the people he works with don't support
it. But this is their job, and this is what they're told to do. So even
people within the military, while I'm sure there are many that don't question
it, but there are a lot that aren't duped by it. That's got to be incredibly
demoralizing for our soldiers to be over there laying down their lives
for a cause that is complete bullshit, and they can't do anything about
it.
WW: It's got to be like those people in Vietnam, when they were
over there fighting a war they couldn't win… for what? And everybody at
the top knew that that war was un-winnable and there were people dying
all the time. The only thing that prevents American casualties on that
scale now is that the technology is better. Thank God that the technology
is better and that our guys are better protected than they were. Occasionally
I hear some military guy say something like, "Well, all this started
on Sept. 11." Obviously it didn't. All the liberals are like, "See,
they're bad!" No, no, no, I'm sorry. You don't take one person and
have them speak for the entire armed forces. The most depressing thing
in the world to me is that 78% of Americans believe that Iraq was behind
the collapse of the WTC.
EW: I read that report. That was amazing.
WW: That is staggering to me. I cannot believe that, that people
think that. Then I hear that more than half of the people don't care that
they lied about it. George Bush was saying, "We knew that had weapons
and we'll find them on day 2." Now he's completely gone around to
saying that they might have been working on a program maybe, we think…
EW: 10 years ago…
WW: We found a washer. That is completely different. And where
the fuck are the Democrats in Congress who are supposed to be stopping
him? Think about 8 years of Bill Clinton. He could not take a step without
there being a Congressional Investigation about it. George Bush lied!
People are dying right now and will continue to die for decades because
of his lies and no one is saying a thing about it. And when some people
finally have the courage to stand up and say, "We need to look at
this evidence." These documents from Nigeria, that everyone knows
are false. And the way that things were overstated and the way that people
lied and then finally somebody has the courage to stand up and say that
and the fucking Republicans say, "Oh, they're playing politics."
No they're not. They're doing their job: checks and balances. It's in
the constitution that John Ashcroft likes to tap dance on.
EW: I've got to ask you. How do you wake people up? How do you
make them care? Being able to identify these problems is one thing… what
about solutions?
WW: Do you know how you make people care? You make people care
by preventing them from going to Wal-Mart. Because that's all that Americans
care about. All they care about is: "Do I have more junk food? Do
I have more clothes? Do I have more toys?" And that kind of stuff…
EW: More stuff to fill the holes inside them.
WW: Yeah, there's a lot to be said about that. The way that capitalism
has exploded and instead of spending time with their families, instead
of going to museums and enriching themselves, people watch American-fucking-Idol
on TV. You know? I don't think people are going to care. We had an opportunity
as a nation on Sept. 12, 2001, to completely change the way we live our
lives. Not to say that what happened is OK. Because it's not OK. And those
people that say we deserved it, make me sick… Because nobody deserves
that. It just doesn't work like that. But we did have an opportunity as
a nation to stop and go, "Why did this happen? How did this happen?"
And instead, they were just like, "We can't look at ourselves. We
can't be introspective at all."
EW: It was more like, "They hurt us, we have to kill them
more!"
WW: Yeah. I was reading at Moveon.org or Commondreams.org and someone
was saying that we have now killed more Iraqi's than people that died
at the WTC. Are we even now? Can we stop now? I don't know how to make
people care, because I don't think that they do? Especially with the way
that the media is so controlled by so few people and this myth of a liberal
media is just a joke. It is complete bullshit. If there were a liberal
media, assholes like Scarborough and Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and Rush
Limbaugh and that Mike Savage piece of shit, they would not be able to
stand in front of a microphone. They would not get three people together
to listen to them. They're ridiculous! It's an absolute joke. The media
is owned by companies that should not own media and they exist to perpetuate
the system whereby poor and working class people are exploited so rich
people can get richer. There was a headline on CNN today, I mean if it
makes it CNN then it means that they weren't able to completely cover
it up. There was a headline today that the richest people are getting
richer and all these people are suffering. All these people are losing
their jobs. All these people are struggling while the same people get
richer, richer, and richer. This is the sort of thing that leads to a
revolution.
EW: But people are so apathetic. Do you really think that's even
possible now? I think we've been so conditioned to accept things. I mean
is seems like all people care about is keeping up with American Idol on
TV, and keeping gas prices cheap, and losing themselves in reality TV
shows. People don't live in the real world any more. They live in their
fucking TV's.
WW: I think that sooner or later… What happens is, its like you're
reaching critical mass and either the system collapses in on itself or
it changes. I think we're reaching a place… It is like what preceded the
Great Depression. You know? Republicans make me sick. The prosperity under
Clinton worked because his economic team was so good. It's wrong to give
a President too much blame or too much credit. It just doesn't work like
that. Those guys don't even sign their own names. To give that kind of
credit to him is wrong, but his economic team and his philosophy, the
philosophy of that team was: raise taxes on these people. Because they
have made their money at the expense of the poor and working class and
take some of that money, you know, a couple of thousand dollars to a billionaire
is nothing… and invest it in the country. Roosevelt had the right idea.
Take that stuff and invest it into the country. Germany and United States
were having the same depression at the same time. You had Hitler taking
care of things, empowering the state and empowering business in one system
and then you had Roosevelt empowering the people and putting people to
work in another system and who won? There is a degree of hypocrisy, since
I work in the media and I work in this thing: I sign autographs for people
and I sell books to people, and that sort of thing.
EW: I've got to ask, we were talking about media control and I'd
hate to cut short what has been a great political conversation, but you've
had such a success with your book, in terms of being able to completely
circumvent mainstream media. Tell me about this. How did you start Monolith
Press, what made you decide to do that?
WW: Well that is what the Internet is supposed to be and that's
why AOL Time Warner is so terrified of it. That's why the FCC and the
RIAA and the MPAA are trying so hard to destroy what the Internet is.
When people are able to communicate with each other freely and directly
you have incredible power. This is what happened with the printing press.
Suddenly the Church of England couldn't control what everybody read and
what everybody thought. People were able to communicate with each other.
The American Revolution happened because of a little pamphlet called Common
Sense that was sent out because people were able to communicate with
each other. One of the things that really excites me about the Internet
is the ability for content to matter. A big publishing company can't take
a piece of shit and promote the hell out of it, hype the hell out of it,
get people excited about it, and then shove it down people's throats.
If it doesn't work and people don't like it, it fails. People ask me about
website stuff all the time, and I tell them it doesn't matter how flashy
and animated and MIDI embedded your website is. If there's not something
interesting there, people aren't going to come back. I am so grateful
that people come and read my website. I am so lucky that people like to
read what I like to write, because I've been able to produce content that
people have decided is worthwhile, that affects them in some sort of way.
I saw this possibility to use the Internet as a means of distribution
when I was writing Just a Geek, which is what Dancing Barefoot
is taken out of and I decided that I did not want to experience as
an author what I had experienced as an actor which is: working my ass
off to create something that I think is artistically meaningful; that
is important to me, that means something to me, and then taking it to
someone and saying, "Hi, do you think this worth people's time?"
I didn't want to do that. I thought that I would have an opportunity to
take something, make it really good, and then take it to the audience
and let the audience decide. And look, we sold over a thousand in less
than a month…
EW: … and with no advertising.
WW: But I was really, really excited and I wanted to use that.
And as a matter of fact, that is the core founding principle of Monolith
Press. The fundamental principal behind it is that quality, not quantity,
determines what we put out. We want to give unconventional people an opportunity
to share their art with the world.
EW: So you're looking at publishing other people?
WW: We're not taking stuff right now, because we have three employees
and you're talking to two of them. And we're all part timers right now.
I've been so overwhelmed by the actual nuts and bolts of doing business,
and fulfilling orders and shipping and all that I haven't had any time
to write. You know? I'm a writer; I'm not a businessman. I want to keep
writing.
EW: This was something I was going to ask you about. The website
is amazing.
WW: Thanks.
EW: In anticipation of this interview, I actually went through
and read through the archives from start to finish. That was a trip, man.
Having the rollercoaster ride of the last 2 to 2 ½ year period compressed
into 4 or 5 hours of reading was insane. Some of the material is incredibly
touching and heartbreaking, and it's incredibly revealing. It struck me
again and again how honest you were being.
WW: I am a bad, bad, bad liar.
EW: Really?
WW: Well, I'm a really good poker player. I can lie like that.
But when it comes time to…
AW: My thirteen year-old son can read his poker face.
WW: Stop that…
(laughing)
EW: What was it like trying to find your voice on the
website?
WW: I didn't even realize I was trying to find it when I was doing
it. I just wrote stuff that meant something to me. Its like there were
these two people inside of me: There's me: Wil and then there's "TV's
Wil Wheaton" I hate that guy! It was kind of like these two people
fighting to be in charge, in an almost schizophrenic kind of way. I had
spent my entire life playing characters for other people, even when I
wasn't on the set, like being what other people wanted me to be. I've
always gone back and forth. I don't know if I want to be an actor. I don't
like Hollywood and it's really hard for me. I have a great skill set as
an actor, but its really hard for me to get people to give me permission
to use that skill set. I discovered as I was writing that it was more
artistically fulfilling to me. It was more meaningful to me. My mom pointed
out to me that when I was writing, everything went my way. Everything
happened really easily and effortlessly. When I was trying to get work
as an actor it was so hard and fruitless. Right around the time I wrote
The Trade, which would have been in June of 2002, the story about
the land speeder. When I wrote that, I published it and e-mailed it to
everyone I knew. I was like, "I wrote this thing and it's good, and
I like it." Then I had a style. I am the hardest audience in the
world. I hate everything. Everything annoys me. I don't like being talked
down to by writers or filmmakers. I don't like it when people do stupid
shortcuts and take the easy way out. I don't like stuff that is mass-produced.
It just bugs me. If I'm going to put the time into something, I want it
to be rewarding. I was saying that today. Science-Fiction fans are smart.
Give us something that respects our intelligence. Why do you think we
watch 2001 over and over and over and Blade Runner a million
times. Why do we go and sit through the Blade Runner director's
cut? Why did we watch Lord of the Rings on DVD at 3 ½ hours and
want more? Because they respected our intelligence. That's what I try
and do. I write stuff the way that I would talk to people and I write
stuff that I like to read. Around the time I wrote The Trade I
was like, "Oh… I'm a writer now." And I totally lost interest
in acting. I just wasn't interested in that anymore, at all. I've been
really, really lucky.
EW: That's great. It's wonderful to see that success.
WW: Thank you.
EW: Especially after going through the website archives, from beginning
to end and seeing where you are now… its just fantastic. It's great that
you share that.
WW: I get e-mails like that. People e-mail me and tell me, "I've
been reading your website since you first started it and I'm so happy."
It's like you finally did it. After all the struggling and all the failures.
(To Be Continued in Part II: The Wrath of
Trek)
Get
your WheatON at www.wilwheaton.net
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