I live in a part of my home state that is known to be borderline religiously-oriented because it is sandwiched between a larger and more eclectic city area and a small, highly God-fearing town. My hometown isn't as blatantly theistic as some other nearby towns, and we don't have a church on every corner or anything, but it is there. You don't see the average person from my town being an extreme religious zealot, and you don't even necessarily see us out spreading the gospel wherever we go like we think our religion's shit doesn't stink (except at some churches...), but there are certainly a few of us that do. All in all, we're religious mostly, but not SUPER religious. We're like that kid that shows up to Church whenever he feels like it's necessary, or doesn't go to church but still studies the Bible - religious, but not that heavily so. We don't even have a specifically Christian/Catholic school system in our town; that's the next town over.
Being in a town that does have a bit of a religious side, and having grown up seeing more than a few churches in my life (There's about three or four different ones for different sects of Judeochristianity within a mile of my house alone), I've learned to be very religiously open-minded. I have Catholic friends, I've had Jewish friends, I have Christian and Muslim friends, I have Atheist friends. I have friends that are very religious, and I have friends that have faith, but are not heavily religious. I am perfectly okay with politely discussing religion with others even if they don't agree with me, so long as they do not try to convert me or condemn my non-theistic world view. I don't shove my lack of a particular religion down anyone's throat, and I've even said "God Bless" to a few of those who are highly religious even though I don't personally believe I will ever be able to prove there is or is not a God. It's about respect and understanding theism of all types, something I feel everyone should have a little understanding about. After all, what is faith about save for exploring what you believe is the answer to what does and does not exist? And of course, you can be Agnostic or Atheistic while still having faith - there are plenty of Buddhist sects that do not believe in a higher power, but still believe in some faith-based things such as the concept of Karma and Nirvanha. It does exist and is a thing even if it's not personally something I believe in 100%. I do believe that Christ's message of acceptance is just as valid as the Buddha's message of learning from suffering while causing nobody else suffering, I believe that the Wiccan message of communing with and caring for Gaia, the original Mother Earth, is just as valid as the belief that God put us humans here to care for our world. I am happy in the knowledge that I am as good and moral a person as I can be, at least most of the time, and if that's not following the message of morality that almost all major religions put down, I don't know what it. I may not know if there's a higher power or not, but there is one thing that I know for certain is real - I only have one life, and if I can use it to do good and to educate others and myself about what the world is, with all its pleasures and dangers, then that is the best I can hope to be.
So, when I heard there was a group out there called The 99 putting on a big show, I became intrigued. I had heard good things about it from freinds in high school about how scary and life-changing it was when it came to town during my sophomore year, and after doing a little research, I learned that The 99 is a walkthrough, interactive theater experience that gets its name from the CDC statistic that every day, 99 young men and women in America aged 12-25 years old die from preventable causes stemming from poor decisions. According to the press release and the group itself, it's basically a haunted house for the real monstrosities and tragedies teenagers can face. Drunk driving, drugs, alcohol, teen pregnancies and the complications that arise from them, suicide, texting while driving... all these and more are leading causes of teen mortality and morbidity, and these things are what The 99 supposedly shows the consequences of in gory, disturbing detail. It's billed as an eye-opener for teens and young adults about how their poor, ill thought out choices can have devastating and deadly consequences on their lives and the lives of their friends and family. The 99 uses secrecy and word of mouth to generate buzz about it, and those intrigued by the big reddish tent that appears overnight in the parking lots of movie theaters, shopping malls, and other teen hangout spots like some less carnival-centered, modernized version of Something Wicked This Way Comes can go to The 99's website to learn more about the show.
Now, I have never been to this show, mostly because I already know what could happen if I'm stupid enough to down a kegger and then drive home, but I have heard from other people and various news articles that there is a religious component involved. According to these accounts, The 99 has 13 rooms in the tent, with the first room being a waiting area where a volunteer dressed as the Grim Reaper awaits to guide your small group of 20 people through the attraction. In five of the rooms, you will see the five leading causes of death for young adults and teenagers - a teen who never made it to prom because of a car accident tells you how she died, a crazed meth addict screams "Where are my drugs?!" in your face as you squirm uncomfortably, a troubled teen commits suicide with a gunshot. The scenes are gripping, realistic, and raw, evoking the Scared Straight program used by some school districts to teach about the dangers of drunk driving and texting while driving by using students from your year group to demonstrate the loss and senseless tragedy these poor decisions cause.
The idea is that you never really understand how awful and horrific a nightmare losing someone to drugs or suicide or a car accident can be until you experience it, as my little brother unfortunately did when a girl he knew from Geometry class decided to go to a college student party, get drunk, and hitch a ride with her drunk Senior friend. The car was going over 100 mph before it hit the sharp turn, couldn't make the turn, and slammed into a tree. The vehicle wasn't even recognizable as a car, and neither were what was left of the mangled victims. The Senior friend would have graduated in three weeks. I remember my brother telling me how weird it felt having a kid he knew, even barely, there one day and gone the next; how silent the classroom was. It evoked my own "Woah, wait, what? OMG..." feelings when a classmate of mine committed suicide in my Junior year. He was only 17. It's still kind of a spooky feeling now, as he used to bully me in middle school and then seemed to grow up, then slowly fade off into the aether. Programs like Scared Straight and the first half of The 99 perfectly capture this, and make these types of tragedy feel very, very real and very, very close to home. I know that between the experience I had and the experience my brother had, I have become much more thankful for my own life and much more careful about drinking before I have to drive somewhere. In fact, I wish more schools would adopt programs like these, because they are important - what makes a teen listen more? Words? Those go over their head. But an experience, now that is what hits home better. I know. I was a teenager once.
And where that feeling starts is where the commendable aspect of The 99 ends.
I'm serious. After these crushing, raw, and very real scenes, the tone of The 99 stops being realistic and starts being preachy. One of the very next rooms after the final real-life vignette (about teen suicide) is Hell. No, I'm not kidding. There is a room with a Fire and Brimstone Hell in The 99, complete with Satan on a pedistal and demon-women screeching in cages and eternal damnation and everything. The room after that depicts the crucifixion and death of Christ, in detail. Extreme detail. Like literally, there are non-believers stoning Christ and bloody nail wounds in his hands and feet real. When did I pay to go see the world's most gruesome version of Jesus Christ, Superstar? And the room after this one is a chapel where a priest discusses how real all the events of the Bible are and how everything in the Bible is 100% true, and then leads everyone in a prayer... despite the fact that there may be non-Christians in the crowd that would be uncomfortable praying. Even worse, the Priest asks a loaded question of the group in the form of asking how many people want to accept Christ as their personal saviour. Of course everyone's going to raise their hand, because to NOT do so would make you feel awkward and subject you to the scorn of 19 other people who are raising their hand. And what if you already have accepted Christ as your personal saviour? Do you raise your hand, or do you sit quietly, content with the knowledge that you already believe in all of what came before despite the scorn others may give you? What if you don't believe Christ is the son of God? What if you're Muslim, or Jewish, or God forbid (pun somewhat intended) Atheist?
Then finally, your group is lead into a small room, where there are Evangelical Christian counselors ready to ask you how you felt about the production and if you are ready to accept Christ. You can refuse, of course, but nobody's going to do that - a good chunk of people are going to feel obliged to do it, because they paid to get into the show. So, you sit with your counselor, he asks you heavy-handed questions about what you think would happen after death, and your mind, primed with gore and disturbing imagery like dead teenagers through car windshields and a guy suffering on a cross, for God's sake (pun not intended that time; no, really), answers with the obvious, honest answer - "I don't know." Who on earth is going to be ready to discuss life, death, and life after death when they're still jarred from a screaming druggie several rooms back? Are you really thinking about Heaven and Hell five minutes after you've gone through scenes from a horror film? Chances are, no. And of course, the counselor will wonder how on earth you could have literally gone through Hell without accepting Christ, and believe you are without God, and therefore pray for you condiscendingly. If you answer with your own religious beliefs, they'll say it's wrong and pray for you condiscendingly. It's only if you answer with the good, Evangelical Christian answer (because as we all know, Evangelism is the ONLY acceptable form of Christianity that a deity that knows every possible interpretation of His Word could possibly accept) that the counselor will let you go on your way.
Now, I accept the Evangelical gospel message at the end of The 99. I may not believe it, but it's alright for it to be there. There's nothing wrong with inserting it as filler if you really feel it's that important, and obviously the people in charge of The 99 feel it is. My disappointment with The 99 isn't about the Christian message at the end. My disappointment with The 99 stems from one thing, and one thing only.
Nowhere on the site, in the press release, on the tickets, or anywhere else does the group behind The 99 ever state there is a Christian message attached to the show. Nowhere. Seriously, scroll up to the link and go look at the site for yourself. Maybe you think it's on the tickets? Nope, not there, just some dude with a red R-for-Restricted (or "R for Reality", as The 99 so egregiously claims) logo in his eye. There is absolutely no indication that The 99 is an Evangelical Christian production until you get to the big red tent and are told to sign a waiver that states there is a "brief gospel message" at the end of the show. Bullshit, it's a brief message. For proof, let's look at the breakdown of the rooms in The 99. In the whole production, there seems to be about 13 rooms. Assuming that's true, then out of those 13 rooms:
- One is presumably a loading room
- One is presumably an introductory room
- Two are presumably to introduce you to the characters and how they got into their respective scenarios
- Five pertain to the five most common causes of death in teens and young adults, one room per fatality, with scattered hints the show has a religious message such as a traffic sign that says "Buckle up, someone [presumably Satan] is waiting for you" in the rooms
- One is literally Hell
- One shows the crucifixion of Christ, which has nothing to do with what can kill young adults, unless you're implying that belief in Christ is a leading cause of death
- One is a chapel where like it or not, you're lead in a prayer session regardless of if that is your belief system or not
- One is a room full of counselors that condiscendingly "pray you will find God" even if you already HAVE found God and just have found Him in a different way than these Evangelists want you to find Him
Look, The 99. I appreciate what you are trying to do here. It's good to educate teens about poor decision-making. But to then accuse them of going to Hell for making a poor decison? That seems terribly against what a loving deity would do, a deity that knows human beings are flawed creatures given the power to make their own, sometimes very stupid, choices. God shouldn't be something a person fears in my opinion; He should be something that a person loves with all their heart and soul. You don't call a being that punshes your human mistakes with torture for eternity a loving father, you call that being a tyrant - but your God is just that, and is a deity, and I guess being a deity makes it all okay (?). See, that is my biggest issue with many of the teachings of Evangelist Christianity: the idea that God cannot and does not change His views and remains a young (for a god), immature Old Testament god rather than taking what He learned from being incarnated as Christ and using it to understand why humans, which He created according to the Bible, make poor, "sinful" choices. If God truly exists and he truly did walk amongst us mortals in human form as Jesus Christ, then why can't God change his beliefs like human beings do? Seems to me that is what a truly wise being would do when He realizes there is something he had not previously considered about the complex creatures that are human beings. Does that mean we should never change our views either, since we're supposedly made in God's image and should follow in His foosteps? I don't personally believe your religion is fact because I have no proof that it is either fact or fiction, I can't possibly make that determination without taking a huge grain of salt and making an enormous assumption. There is not enough info there for me to answer that question in any way, shape, or form. I can't know any of that because I am not God, and if there really is a God, surely He knows better than I about whether all this is real or not. Will I say that your views are false? No. Am I annoyed you are presenting your views as truth? Slightly, but that is my personal opinion.
Once again, my problem with The 99 isn't that you have a religious message. My problem with The 99 is that you fail to tell anyone there is a religious message until they get to the front of the line and have to sign a waiver, and that to me feels like a skeevy tactic to hook people into coming to the show. In sales, this type of technique is called Foot-In-The-Door, and the idea is that if you interest people enough by keeping your true motives a secret, people will be more likely to listen to you and see what all the hubub is about. So what if there's a catch? So what if we don't know it's a sales ploy? It's not a fib perse, but it is lying by omission, and lying is not a very Christian thing to do. What you are doing, The 99, is getting people hyped by keeping the show a secret, then when they have already spent the time and effort to get there, and are about to spend the money too, and have a ticket and everything, you show them a waiver that says, "Oh by the way, this is a religious thing." The customer isn't gonna turn around and leave then even if they're mad you didn't say a word, because your foot is already in their door - "So what if there's a short gospel message and I'm Jewish?" they ask themselves. "I already spent the gas, money, time, and effort to get here and I have a ticket, so what's the point in leaving now? Besides, they said the gospel part was short; surely it can't be more than maybe five minutes of the show's 45-minute experience time." And yet your "short gospel message" is 1/3 of the show, and 1/3 of 45 is 15 minutes, not counting wait time. If the show runs a bit long after the wait time, approaching about an hour, that's right around 20 minutes give or take a few, which is slightly less than a half-hour of "short gospel message". Sorry, but 15-20 minutes is when a message stops being short and starts being a lecture. That is why I will not be paying to see your show, and I will be instructing my siblings not to pay to see your show, and why I will be sharing your show with all of my atheist and agnostic friends who will come and laugh at how underhanded and hypocritical your tactics are when you all but shame the attendee into thinking that if they don't accept "Good Christian Values" like yours, they're going to Hell. That is why I am disappointed with The 99, because they took a very important message that was easily made accessable to all faiths by keeping it secular and tagged on an extra 15-20 minutes of religious content that had nothing to do with the show, thus making it about God when it didn't need to be made about God.
The 99 should not be a show about accepting or not accepting God. That belongs in the current Christian tradition of the Hell House, an alternative to the haunted house that springs up around Halloween and goes on to show the visitor what Good Christians don't do if they don't want to end up in some layer of the Inferno. The 99 should be a show about the idea that, hey, people my age actually die from making poor decisions, and said people have to think about their choices and whether or not they're actually smart, because doing so can save their life. Not only that, but it could save others' lives. Sorry if this offends, but you just don't need God to spread that message, especially when 20% of Americans do not identify as Christians at all, and only 26.3% of those that do are Evangelical Christians in the first place. Out of the 80% of Americans that identify as Christians, you are the minority, not the majority. That's right - there are just as many of us heathans who "need Christ" as there are of you, and far more if you count the non-Evangelical Christians and Catholics. There was no reason to make The 99 an excuse to preach, and furthermore, there's no need to hand out tickets to The 99 or comics that are basically modernized Jack Chick tracts at the end of your more secularly-oriented school presentation, "Arrive Alive". Yes, the people behind The 99 are the same people that you've probably seen at a high school assembly if you're of a certain age. How do I know the comics are like Jack Chick tracts? Because my friend picked up one, and I read it, and it reads exactly like one. It's even endorsed by the loathable Mr. Chick, an individual so closed-minded in his religious beliefs that it's almost tragically hysterical. I like to read them and laugh at how blind they are, how unaccepting, how blatantly ignorant. I also like to troll people who hand them out to me by standing in front of them, smiling gently, tearing the tract in a very specific way, and then slowly playing Loves-Me-Loves-Me-Not with the pieces. Okay, that's not true - nobody in or around my neighborhood actually hands those tracts out on Halloween; all the devout Evangelicals in my neighborhood have long gone to bed before then, but that's mostly because they're all ancient and can't stay up past five-o-clock anyway. But still, there's no reason to hand out religious pamphlets at the school. In fact, you're better off handing out nothing at all, and that way nobody gets offended. You wanna convert? Do it outside of school grounds. I wouldn't bring my homework to a church lecture, so don't bring your pamphlets about how great Evangelism is and how evil every other religion is to public schools. Religious schools, fine. But not public schools.
Speaking of schools, I don't like that you have The 99 set up near schools and distributed tickets to The 99 to schools for them to give to their students without explaining the show's religious nature. That seems underhanded to me, because it looks like you are trying to sneak religion into a public institute that even the Founding Fathers thought should remain secular unless it is specifically a religiously-founded school. What ever happened to the separation of church and state? It just doesn't set right with me. I don't preach my lack of belief at school. I don't even talk about it unless someone asks first. Therefore, I find it really annoying, a little iffy, and more than a little asinine to set up a religious show near a school without telling anyone on the tickets you hand out that the show is religious. You shouldn't be distributing them there period. You know the show is religious; those students don't. It is your choice to distribute them to schools, and therefore it's your moral responsibility to tell the truth about the show, not to lie by omission by saying nothing about its religious content.
So yes, The 99, I do appreciate what you're trying to do, and I do understand. I feel what you're doing is very good, although I wish you would either lessen the amount of religious content in the show (since the show's message doesn't really have anything to do with God) or give attendees the option to skip it entirely. But I am highly disappointed that you think you need to use underhanded tactics to sneak religion down peoples' throats, like you're trying to shove a bitter-tasting cough syrup into a whiny infant's mouth. If you came out and said that your show had a religious component before people arrived and you were honest about it, I would have a much higher opinion of The 99. But as it is now, all I see is a bunch of liars by omission so ashamed of their faith that they think the only way they can get people to convert is by using gore to do it and priming them with Christ imagery. And that's the way a coward spreads his message, not a real, honest Christian.