# Is this Tea Party documentary real? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 21, 2009, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400 "2009-11-21T13:22:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/1 "2009-11-21T13:22:11Z")
[This is the trailer on Youtube.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2qil4Swcew) [FreedomWorks and Red State are sponsoring it,](http://www.tvworldwide.com/events/tea/091123/) so it isn’t satire. Or is The Onion punking FW and RS? Or is it that I’m so partisan that I cannot see the hard-hitting truth of this “documentary”. Yeah, I put the irony quotes around the word ‘documentary’. Someone tell me: Is this an extremely deadpan mockumentary or a movie that should be taken seriously? ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/2 "2009-11-21T13:33:08Z")
[Poe’s Law](http://rationalwiki.com/wiki/Poe's_Law) ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/3 "2009-11-21T14:07:51Z")
If Glen Beck attended a class called “Documentaries and Me”, **Tea Party** might be the result 😉 ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/4 "2009-11-21T14:26:09Z")
Well, to be fair, Congress was threatening to close the best Super Wal\*Mart in the Tri-State area, so they did have something to get worked up about. I like how they found the one black guy that I noticed in the whole crowd to show his side. Is he Steele’s cousin or something? To answer the OP, beyond the voice over I didn’t really see much that felt like it was fake. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/5 "2009-11-21T15:46:29Z")
It looks completely serious to me. The narration by the cut-rate, imitation [Don LaFontain](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_LaFontaine) doesn’t help, but yes, it is definitely real. I do think that the DVD is going to be bought and taken seriously by conservative true believers - and wild-eyed liberals laughing their fool heads off. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/6 "2009-11-21T16:07:15Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > [Poe’s Law](http://rationalwiki.com/wiki/Poe's_Law) Thanks for the link. In the same vein, [_SCTV_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_City_Television) once attempted to parody the then-popular TV show [_Laverne & Shirley_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laverne_%26_Shirley). They failed. No matter how broadly they played it, no matter how ridiculous they made it, the end result just looked like a typical episode of _Laverne & Shirley_. Poe’s Law needs a corollary that some things are, due to their very nature, immune from parody and satire. ---
**Author:** ![stolichnaya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bcef8e/32.png) [@stolichnaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stolichnaya)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2009, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-tea-party-documentary-real/518400/7 "2009-11-22T00:32:54Z")
I refuse to believe this is “real” in the sense that the makers believe anything they are saying, any more than the sellers of Barack Obama commemorative plates believe that they are somehow honoring the president. I think it’s a cash-in attempt, and will probably do OK as such. Someone figured they could make a doc on the cheap and sell a couple ten thousand copies.