I always find it fascinating that these sorts of cults and indoctrinations only ever seem to happen during the last century, and in this day and age we don’t really get to see them anymore, which of course is a good thing…but you wonder why that might be.

The Waco siege, also known as the Waco massacre, was a siege that happened between law enforcement and a religious cult in 1993. The religious cult was headed by David Koresh, and he seemed to be the ring leader on making sure that his people stayed in the centre that he had them in and fight against the law enforcement until the bitter end.

Because this siege went on for so long the documentary drops you right into the heart of it when it is beginning, and so you wonder how this cult came to be before this horrific incident happened. Why was David Koresh so revered? Why was he able to indoctrinate so many of these people and make them follow his word? Even speaking to people in the documentary you can still see that they have remnants of their indoctrination within themselves and how they talk about what happened, because they do still come across as quite bias and as if what they were going through wasn’t as bad as people in a more normal society would think.

The siege lasted for 51 days where David Koresh’s people were fighting with guns against the law enforcement and many people were injured or killed in this time. Many of the children were allowed to leave the centre and the police were able to use these children as a way to coax out their mothers and possibly even their fathers letting them know that they miss them and need their parents with them, only for them to willingly leave the centre and then be immediately arrested.

Do I agree with a lot of the ways law enforcement went about getting these people out of this situation? No, I don’t. I think they went in guns blazing much like David and his cult members did too and from that moment on nothing could ever be deescalated, and watching the documentary and seeing first-hand accounts of what happened, especially at the end of the siege is absolutely horrific because you can’t imagine what those people went through.

In the final moments of the siege a fire breaks out in the centre that is still filled with many people including children and the fire spreads and engulfs the centre and all of those people inside die, and you know they’re dying for their faith and they’re dying because they believe that is the best outcome for them rather than going back to a world where they’ve been told they’ll never be accepted, or reach enlightenment. I can’t imagine in those final moments of despair knowing that you’ve made your choice and you are going to die, how terrifying that must have been.

While this documentary gives you a great insight into the siege and everything that happened there I think because the siege went on for so long you don’t really get to know too much about the rest of the cult, especially prior to the events, and as someone who has a fascination in religion I would love to know more about that because I have read up on the siege before and yet I still don’t know too much about how they even came to be who they were. So if you want a great insight into this moment in history then this documentary is fantastic at that because it has so many first-hand accounts and actual footage from the situation, but if you want to know more about the cult as a whole you’ll have to find that elsewhere.

What do you think of the Waco massacre?

Until next time.

Published by shonaharding

Media graduate with a passion for reviewing film and TV. View all posts by shonaharding