Oklahoma City is a one hundred-and-two-minute documentary that aired on PBS as part of the American Experience series. Mom and I decided to watch it because Netflix notified us that it would pull the film before the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. It does not exactly sound like ideal viewing material in the midst of a global pandemic, but it actually was because most people with a soul are more sensitive to death.
I was in college at the time of the bombing and was aware that it happened, but when I saw that news coverage was using monikers such as “Oklabomb” to describe the tragedy, I walked away from the footage in disgust and vowed to revisit it someday when enough time had passed so coverage would be less cavalier. I probably put Oklahoma City in my queue to keep that promise. It also does not take much to attract me to documentaries.
Oklahoma City begins with audio footage of the actual bombing and the immediate human reaction aftermath of the bombing before being divided into three sections: The Spark, The Flame and The Inferno. Each section is divided by revisiting the human impact of the bombing on individuals, rescuers and survivors. The Spark examines the North Idaho region as a hotbed for white supremacist group such as the Aryan Nation, separatists and isolationists. Throughout the film, while the talking heads bend themselves into pretzels to actually avoid calling anyone racist, the one thing that everyone can agree on is that all these people were specifically anti-federal government and pro-gun. There is a brief summary of Ruby Ridge and Randy Weaver, which I found helpful as someone who has only heard them referenced, but never heard about the actual story. Once again, the talking heads fall all over themselves to explain that Weaver just coincidentally lived near white supremacists, then socialized with them because they were neighbors and the poor thing was entrapped by the government to saw off shotguns as one does to make money; thus attracting ATF’s attention and leading to the death of his armed fourteen year old son and wife. If you think that is sad, I have a ton of stories that will make you weep about black people carrying guns or unarmed in open carry states who got shot by the police. No? OK. You are right. Not relevant, moving on.
The Flame focuses on Waco and David Koresh, which I actually was familiar with, and is germane to Oklahoma City because Waco, while not related to white supremacist groups, attracted anti-government, pro gun, militia people such as Timothy McVeigh who felt a kinship to the Branch Davidians because of the way that they were treated by the federal government. April 19, 1993 was the last explosive day of the Waco siege, which is why McVeigh decided to destroy the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building that day two years later. I wonder why people did not react so explosively to the government’s bombing of an entire neighborhood on Mother’s Day? See Let the Fire Burn.
Oklahoma City’s last section, The Inferno, focuses on McVeigh’s plans to bomb. This section frustrated me because it had contradictory moments. It uses audio of McVeigh saying that he made someone help him build the bomb “under duress.” Who? I am assuming that it was Terry Nichols or Michael Fortier, but it felt as if the documentary got sloppy, was entirely too empathetic and actually just plain wrong for rushing through the logistics of the greatest domestic terrorist act until now. Once again, I am struck by talking heads in documentaries such as this one and OJ: Made in America going through great pains to empathize that someone is not racist, specifically McVeigh and Mark Furman. This documentary says that McVeigh was not a member of a militia or white supremacist group. OK, but newsflash, you do not actually have to literally become a member of an explicitly racist organization to be racist. I actually think that for purposes of this specific tragedy, the documentary did not actually have to examine whether or not McVeigh was racist, but felt the need to do so anyway. So if the film opens that door, then they better be prepared to back it up with some facts. How do you prove a negative?
Based on Oklahoma City’s evidence, McVeigh read the same boos as the Aryan Nation and modelled his plans after that book (no, I will not explicitly reference the book because I do not believe in giving any shine to anything like that). The one black person, Helena Garrett, in the entire documentary specifically noted that McVeigh tried to intimidate her when she took the stand. While he was not a member, he ran in the same circles as these white supremacist groups and hung out with them. McVeigh was a fan of John Wilkes Booth. Only one talking head, Leonard Zeskind, was brave enough to make these connections, but why did the documentary not do a simple Google search, which would have unearthed even more information. He got reprimanded by the military for buying a “white Power” t-shirt at a KKK protest. As a sergeant, he was a nightmare to black servicemen underneath him and used racial slurs. Um, WHAT DOES IT TAKE!?!
Oklahoma City spends absolutely zero time on the fact that McVeigh was possibly an early example of incel, an involuntary celibate who was unable to have relationships with women and women coworkers rejected his advances. Hmmmmm, if only there was a way to tell that McVeigh was a danger before the bombing: obsessed with guns, racist or at least a racist ally, and unable to socialize with women.
We are currently watching another act of domestic terrorism unfold before our eyes and fail to recognize the signs as Presidon’t foments unrest during a global pandemic and encourages protestors to march in their respective states to stop measures to prevent the death of Americans to an impersonal, deadly virus that benefits from white supremacist structures and sympathies. These alleged protestors are like McVeigh-apathetic to the death of fellow Americans and claiming to hate big government and love freedom while simultaneously cheering big government when it puts its foot on brown and black people then those people should follow the law, a law which apparently should not apply to them. Today, they carry Presidon’t signs, who, welp, is a part of big government, or in McVeigh’s own words, happily march off to war at the behest of the federal government and decapitate brown people with canon fire, but suddenly get disaffected when they no longer get to enjoy the privilege of power.
If the media were really liberal and biased, I would not have to watch a mostly dispassionate summary of the creation a domestic terrorist that then goes to great pains to defend his character instead of hold it up as a warning of who not to be so we could stop the next great tragedy, the next domestic terrorist act, which will be the early reopening of public spaces for nonessential activities during a global pandemic. Oklahoma City is a solid documentary that ultimately fails to condemn the Venn diagram shared by misguided big government, white supremacists and domestic terrorists, the callous disregard of life unless it is their own.