If you followed my show Staying Home during lockdown, you probably watched some of my interviews with scientist and whistleblower, Rebekah Jones. Those interviews kicked off a three-year journey following her twisting, complicated Whistleblower journey. I want to share more of the backstory on Rebekah and my director's note about the film. We're 16 days from the end of a Kickstarter campaign to finish this dizzying story and I am asking you to please pledge on Kickstarter to help us complete this film!

BACKSTORY:

The facts are incontrovertible:  Policies that pushed America to "reopen" its economy during the height of the covid pandemic in 2020 increased covid infections at a crucial moment when we could have controlled the disease. Those policies made America the epicenter of the pandemic and hundreds of thousands of people died.  The "reopen" policies were led by Ron Desantis in Florida and other prominent conservatives including Donald Trump.  Rebekah Jones spoke out, and said that these policies were based on lies, that there was no valid science to support these policies.  She warned us that people would die needlessly.

Famed Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg had this to say:  "I recognized Rebekah Jones, someone who realized lives were being lost wrongly, and that she was being asked, as for others to falsify the circumstances for the political purposes of the Governor of Florida, at that point, she took it upon herself to tell the truth." We know what happened as a result.  We have normalized 1.2 million covid deaths.  That didn't have to happen.  We need to assess the policies that got us here.  That is unquestionable.

However, Rebekah Jones is a deeply controversial figure.  She is brazen, she is brash, she is bold and she ruffles alot of feathers.  In this process, in terms of the smear campaigns against Rebekah, there have been times when it has been difficult to figure out what is true.  Her enemies and detractors are some of the most powerful people in the country.  And Rebekah herself is far from perfect, she has a pugnacious, wildly checkered past.  But should we focus on character or policy?  On science or personality? What makes the media love and hate Rebekah so much.  This film goes deeply into that conundrum.  We promise that you will not be able to predict where it ends up or how deep the rabbit hole goes.

We have tried in vain to get the mainstream to support this film.  When we pitched it, we funders and distributors actually said the quiet part out loud. "It's too political." They told us.  That's why we have to come to you.  We have no other recourse.  With all the controversy and all the noise, we believe that this film needs to be made.

I believe that the film could create a huge impact, just as all my other films have. It is a necessary examination of the truth and who we believe it from. This story must be heard as we fight against fascism for our democracy. Are you in?

::PLEDGE ON KICKSTARTER::

* All donations (beyond the value of any reward received) are tax deductible through our 501(c)3, Sweet Jane Productions Inc. a non profit organization based in Brooklyn, NY.

REBEKAH'S NICKNAME IS "TROUBLE"

“Viruses are natural, pandemics are man-made” Rebekah Jones tells me.  “There shouldn’t be any political messaging for a virus.  You need scientists running the show.”

The sheriff in the small Mississippi town where she grew up nicknamed her that, “Aw Trouble, is that you again!”

I always want to be around people who are big, big trouble.  And who know that you have to be tough as nails to endure what that trouble brings.  Those are the people who change the world.  They save lives, they fight for justice, they speak out when others are silent, they stick their necks out and they ride the storm that the world hurls at them time and time again. I always want to be in the center of that maelstrom.

That’s why I have always valued my friendship with Rebekah, since I met her over ten years ago.  I get her.  Albert Maysles once told me “The whole process is a friendship, you get to know and then everyone gets to know.”  That’s the most valuable advice I have ever had as a documentarian.  Become friends with trouble, with the controversy, with the drama of life, with the spark that catches the ethos on fire, with the truth.

Rebekah refused to manipulate the data.  Refusals are powerful.

When you refuse power, when you throw truth it its face, it will try to crush you with everything it has got.  I understand this deep in my bones.  I was public enemy number one for the oil and gas industry for a decade.  They threw everything they could at me.  Smear, misinformation, death threats, lies, labeling me a terrorist, a communist, a liar.  I was the victim of arson, of ostracizing, of surveillance, physical intimidation, PSYOPS campaigns, arrest, stalking, of public and private attacks on a daily basis.  Rebekah has faced all of that and worse, sexism, misogyny, threats of rape and degradation, spurious and unsubstantiated smear campaigns that label her a whore, a porn star, a cyberstalker, a psycho.

The smear and misinformation machine that continues to take aim at Rebekah is not only the most nefarious force in our country, in our democracy, but it is also the man-made element of the covid pandemic.  Viral misinformation has become viral misinformation.

There is only one way out of the culture wars that the likes of Desantis have brought us- science and truth.  But huge numbers of people, who have been steeped in misinformation and smears for years may stop us from regaining our sanity as a society.  The misinformation has become the disease.

Do you believe her?  If you google her, will you be able to separate the truth from the smear?  The right wing propaganda from the science?  The ad-hominem character attacks from the verifiable data?

She’s human and real and flawed and vulnerable and unafraid. She’s determined.

Whether you believe everything she says or not you've to see that she's fighitng the fascists who would love to run the country. The anti-LGBTQ, anti-science, book banning, bigoted authoritarians like Ron Desantis and Matt Gaetz hate her and she has continued to stand up to them. And this world needs heroes who will fight fascists, no matter how flawed they are. And it needs films about what happens to the people who speak out and won't ever stop.  "They only win if I shut up" says Rebekah.

Let’s go make some trouble.

::PLEDGE ON KICKSTARTER::

Will you help us? Can you donate $10, $25, $50, $100?

We only have 16 more days to raise $49,000 to finish the film! If we don't hit our goal, we don't get anything, so please pledge today and spread the word!

love + revolution,

Josh Fox