Watch how CBS used to cover the story behind ‘Sound of Freedom’

The anti-child-sex-trafficking movie Sound of Freedom continues to do respectable business, considering its low budget and lower degree of promotion:

Jason Aldean has the top song in the country.

Sound of Freedom just hit $100 million.

When the left tries to cancel conservatives, they do a better job promoting conservatism than conservatives do. pic.twitter.com/V4NPNtMqFh
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) July 20, 2023

I won’t say that the movie's success is despite the freakout in the media because in all frankness, I think they are helping the movie more than harming it.

Still, as you might recall, the movie is based on real events. And because it really happened, it turns out that this is not the first time the media has talked about what happened. Thus someone dug up this clip from CBS News discussing the underlying story that Sound of Freedom dramatizes:

In 2014 CBS did a segment applauding Sound of Freedom ’s Tim Ballard’s work against child trafficking.

Almost 10 years later the same media is calling the film inspired by his work, “paranoid” “Qanon conspiracy Why? pic.twitter.com/I8Onud4sQ3
— Melissa Tate (@TheRightMelissa) July 9, 2023

I have seen some suggestion that we as a society have just gotten to the point that if conservatives like something, leftists will almost reflexively try to put it down. But if that is the case, then these people really need to stop and reassess. Seriously, I wonder how many people are out there who didn’t believe in Qanon before this controversy who are now are thinking ‘maybe there is something to this, after all’ just based on the bad behavior of the media?

For instance, this guy’s views seem have at least been reinforced by the media freakout:

Wow, somethings really not right about all this eh… If you had to write a script for the mainstream media which made them look suspicious as hell, I’m not sure you could write anything better than their reaction to this film. It’s simply incredible.
— Toms Metaverse (@TomsMetaverse) July 10, 2023

Moving on to other reactions:

QAnon didn’t even exist when he made this movie. They are either clueless or intentionally trying to get people to not watch the movie.

I’d say, it’s clearly the latter.
— Lord Travis Wright (@teedubya) July 9, 2023

I went to Sound of Freedom tonight. I left my wife and kids at home because I wasn’t sure what I would be watching and honestly wasn’t sure I could sit through it. It was such a well done movie that rips at your heart and soul. I still don’t think my wife should go but if she…
— NumisBit🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@Btully41Tully) July 10, 2023

The full text reads:

I went to Sound of Freedom tonight. I left my wife and kids at home because I wasn’t sure what I would be watching and honestly wasn’t sure I could sit through it. It was such a well done movie that rips at your heart and soul. I still don’t think my wife should go but if she wants to, I’ll take her.
I spread the word to all my friends and family about it as soon as I left the theater. Wow, that was powerful

That’s the other reason why the movie probably isn’t doing as well as it could: The subject matter is ugly. Not everyone wants to be exposed to that, even if the movie almost certainly avoids the nastiest stuff. I mean, it is PG-13, after all, so it can't get too graphic.

Watching Sound of Freedom makes you cry. It’s heartbreaking seeing this movie, knowing this innocent child gets abducted and sold into sex trading parents don’t know where their kids are. It is an eye-opener for every person, and this is true!
— 🇺🇸GodBlessAmerica🇺🇸 (@Gr3y5430) July 10, 2023

I’m a Christian, but wasn’t always. I just saw SoF and was WAITING for the overtly religious or Qanon crap, so that I could go, “yep, there it is. I get why people are mad. Why can’t Christians just make good movies and not get all preachy and maybe we can win one or two of them…
— Mel (@YoMelToo) July 10, 2023

The full text:

I’m a Christian, but wasn’t always. I just saw SoF and was WAITING for the overtly religious or Qanon crap, so that I could go, ‘yep, there it is. I get why people are mad. Why can’t Christians just make good movies and not get all preachy and maybe we can win one or two of them over.’ But it didn’t happen.
It’s just a good, well made, well acted movie, with a number of faces you’ll recognize. There wasn’t even anything ‘weird’ in the ‘special message’ at the end (which is where I thought it would DEFINITELY come)! The fact that so many people/organizations are denouncing the film is just beyond me.

2014-Media reported & applauded Sound of Freedom’s Tim Ballard’s work against child trafficking…

Today that same media is calling it a Qanon conspiracy?

Why did media change in 10 yrs?
What compromised them? https://t.co/h0TZwB7FHz
— PATRIOT 4 TRUMP❤️❤️❤️ (@kat2020maga) July 23, 2023

Since the Democrats want to make child trafficking a political issue, then let’s make it an election issue.

Every voter in your district needs to know that Democrats think buying and selling children for their bodies is a conspiracy theory. #Election2024 https://t.co/lRKpKj0ClU
— Sloan Rachmuth (@SloanRachmuth) July 16, 2023

As I mentioned the other day, the term 'conspiracy theory' should not be a pejorative. In the law, a conspiracy is nothing more than two or more people agreeing to do a crime and rather than being a rare unicorn unseen in the wild, there are thousands of people in prison for it right now.

It is not a crazy conspiracy theory to say the following:

1) if something is illegal, there will almost always be a black market for it;

2) if there is a black market for something, organized crime will almost always be involved; and

3) organized crime almost always seeks protection from public officials, with varying levels of success.

That’s not a crazy conspiracy theory, that is just how the world actually works—and not just on child sex trafficking but literally anything that is banned.

And for the record, I only feel reasonably confident that the movie is definitely touching on the first two points. After all, I haven't seen it, although I am overdue to do so.

2014 when we still had people that reported real news. Sound of freedom is NOT a conspiracy theory https://t.co/TTYjxJeBkP
— Sunny girl (@sunnygirl5000) July 10, 2023

Putting aside my pet peeve ... pretty much.