By now, most of us have seen or at least heard of the movie “Idiocracy,” which centers around two ordinary people being frozen and waking up 500 years in the future, only to realize that instead of evolving as a society, ma
nkind has become substantially dumber as a whole. Of course, we’d like to think that would never happen in a million years, let alone 500. By and large, it does seem extremely unlikely, yet some of the film’s notions of where we’re to end up are already on the fast track to becoming reality. What follows are ten shining examples of human devolution.
Legitimate Businesses Peddling Smut
In the film, major corporations such as Starbucks, H&R Block, and yes, even Google if you look close enough, offer up adult services to accompany their regular services. Of course, in real life, Google has always been against porn, nudity and even foul language, but with the onset of their new product, Glass, they are having a hard time stopping it. Glass is essentially a cell phone you wear on your face, and while they don’t want it used for pornography, they sort of forgot that there were no restrictions when it came to users shooting their own with the product. Hence, Google porn.
Ads EVERYWHERE
This one was a fairly obvious dig on society as it already was when the movie came out, but it’s gotten way worse since. You virtually can’t go anywhere without being bombarded by advertisements, and it’s only going to continue to get worse and more prevalent as technology advances. Think about it, when was the last time you watched a YouTube video, surfed the Internet in general, or even watched television for more than five minutes without some product being pushed in your face? Heck, even phon
e apps are loaded with them if you aren’t specifically paying them not to.
Profanity in Advertising
In “Idiocracy,” there are quite a few advertisements and even company names themselves that use profanity to hawk their products (“ButtFuckers” being the standout). Carl’s Jr.’s slogan in the film is “Fuck You! I’m Eating!,” and then there’s this guy (pictured left). While we’re not quite there yet in terms of just blatantly cussing at people to sell stuff, if you listen to the radio on any sort of regular basis, you’ve probably heard ads for Frank’s Red Hot touting “I put that **** on everything.” And even more recently, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has taken it to the next level, inching us ever closer to the film’s dystopian vision.
EXTRA BIG ASS FRIES
In the film, customers can order the size “Big Ass” for fries, tacos and other unhealthy foods. In real life, in general terms, society is getting fatter, and the fact that fast food companies continue to up the size of their unhealthy products while selling them at low, low prices isn’t helping the matter. Have you recently o
rdered a small soda at, say, Taco Bell or even Subway and thought to yourself, “Small seemed smaller when I was a kid”? Well that shouldn’t be. And if that’s not a convincing enough argument for you, we understand. But try telling us products like these that you can find at your local gas station aren’t basically plagiarized straight from the film.
Garbage Avalanches
In the film, it is the “Great Garbage Avalanche of 2505” that frees our protagonists from their cryogenic sleep. This prediction that trash will eventually pile up to unmanageable amounts has started to come true in many parts of the world. Particularly, Guatemala is known for their regular landfill landslides, especially during rainy seasons. Sadly, this is the cause of many deaths per year there to those who make their living as trash miners.
The Human Language
Ugh, don’t even get us started on how the human language is gradually getting butchered to the point where it definitely won’t be 500 years before we’re talking as ignorantly as the characters in “Idiocracy.” Honestly, Mike Judge probably took it pretty easy on us with this one. With the advancement of texting, and then MySpace/Facebook, and now Twitter, where you are only allowed to use a certain amount of characters to complete a thought, the way we speak and communicate with each other is being dumbed down with each passing year. These types of developments (if they should even be called that) are certainly nothing to LOL about.
Also: If Famous Movies Used Internet Slang
Remote Shutdown
During a scene in the film, our main characters are on the run from the law when suddenly their car is shut down remotely by the police. While starting your car remotely isn’t exactly new technology, authorities and loan companies being able to shut delinquents’ automobiles down is something that didn’t become common practice until after the “Idiocracy” release. While this could be seen as an evolution of sorts for society, glass-half-empty types could argue that such a technology wouldn’t even be necessary if so many of us weren’t such deadbeats in the first place.
Advanced GPS
In the very same scene mentioned in the previous slide, one of the futuristic dumb characters has a GPS in his car that literally talks to him and guides him everywhere he needs to go. Sound familiar? While GPS was around when “Idiocracy” came out, it has gotten much more advanced since then, resembling the movie’s version more and more as time goes by. Just ten years ago, most people found their way around with products such as Thomas Guides. Ask most people these days, and they likely wont even know what you are talking about.
Ow My Balls!
It wasn’t exactly biting social commentary for the show “Ow My Balls!” to be one of the more popular programs of the future. Shows like “America’s Funniest Home Videos” and “Wipeout” are immensely popular even now, and consist of a lot of the same type of material. People getting hurt is funny to us, and a cheap and easy laugh. There is even a #1 iPhone app by the same name. Of course, if you’re still skeptical, this video should be all the convincing you need.
ASS
We are, of course, referring to the #1 movie in the country 500 years from now according to “Idiocracy.” In the film, “ASS” is literally just a shot of a man’s butt against a black background farting for 90 minutes straight. While it’s a bit of a stretch (but not really), convince us that such a film is that much different than this music video from Chilean synthpop band, “Astro,” that is currently passing for entertainment. Seriously, we’re literally fart sounds away from this one being 100% reality.
