A woman who disrupted a town hall set up by New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Thursday night turns out to be a part of a far-right conservative group known for these kinds of tactics. Rep. Ocasio-Cortez held a town hall meeting in Corona, New York. During the town hall a young woman stood up and began speaking anxiously about climate change, becoming more and more agitated, as she nihilistically rambled about how “we got to start eating babies.” She took off her jacket to reveal a T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase “Save the planet. Eat the children.” Video of this interaction was sent around the internets and conservatives everywhere pointed to it as proof that Rep. Ocasio-Cortez and her supporters were unstable, unrealistic, and to use our current president’s description, “wack job(s).”
That led to this exchange.
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez had initially tried to plead for compassion for the woman, like any decent human being might when confronted with someone who seems to be very obviously in crisis both mentally and emotionally.
Now, the Washington Post reports that a Twitter account handled by the “LaRouche PAC—which was founded by conspiracy theorist Lyndon H. LaRouche Jr.” took credit for the woman’s actions. You see, according to the Post, LaRouche Jr.’s death didn’t bring an end to his fringe conspiracy theories or the small but intense cult around him. When LaRouche died in February of this year, one description of LaRouche’s acolytes under him, sticks out.
Mr. LaRouche was said to exert strong control over the personal lives of his disciples. In interviews over the years, many former members likened him to a cult leader who was obsessed with their sexual desires and challenged their mental toughness.
Cult much? The “LaRouchians” have continued forward, and today they’ve made a splash, proving that while there isn’t much evidence for mythical “radical-left” Trump and others proclaim, there is a ton of evidence pointing to an unhinged far right. Having a woman interrupt an event to use our climate change crisis to mock their political adversaries with statements like, “Even if we would bomb Russia, we still have too many people, too much pollution, so we have to get rid of the babies. Just stopping having babies is not enough, we need to eat the babies,” is nihilistic, unbalanced, and humorless.
It’s interesting that the far right, with Trump and Republicans in tow, seem to always be guilty of the exact charges they dish out: conspiratorial, nihilism, corruption, lawlessness, and an unwillingness to be held accountable for their actions that may ultimately destroy our country’s democracy.
