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People are not more stupid than before. They are just more ignorant, bigoted, lazy, and scared. And this is not an accidental outcome.
Nooo! It’s because stupid people have too much sex and smart people don’t breed enough! Probably part of the gay agenda! /s
Pleeeeaase don’t think about the fact that this movie is kind of basically supporting pushing eugenics… It’s totally a political commentary about how bad Republicans are, and definitely not actually propagating hardcore Randian Libertarian ideals in its insistence that certain types of people are just inherently, genetically, more suited to rule over others.
It isn’t supporting any sort of selective breeding program at all, in fact it’s the exact opposite: it’s saying that all people should be raising kids to avoid a situation where the culture nosedives to the lowest common denominator. The supporting characters start coming around towards the end of the movie because they are not inherently stupid, just brainwashed.
Just because it doesn’t support an explicit breeding program, doesn’t mean it can’t dabble in negative eugenics.
For someone that says he isn’t pro-eugenics, Mike Judge certainly made a very pro-eugenics movie. It’s simply undeniable, whatever his intentions.
A common criticism of Idiocracy is that it’s most appreciated by some of the people it purports to mock, faux intellectuals. I don’t think it’s a coincidence how many of its most fervent online supporters lack the intellectual honesty to admit such an obvious fact.
A common criticism of Idiocracy is that it’s most appreciated by some of the people it purports to mock, faux intellectuals.
Given how much on the movie is spent dunking on stupid people (i.e. stand-ins for republicans), I don’t think that’s surprising at all.
It does have one anti-capitalist theme (the megacorp buying the FDA), so, I don’t know, if it’s exactly Randian, per se.
I mean, the movie doesn’t actually know what it’s trying to be. It’s a dystopia where everyone is too stupid to function, but a megacorp has zero difficulty arranging the infrastructure and logistics needed to water crops with sports drinks, while also engaging in massive regulatory capture to make this happen. It’s a world where intelligence has disappeared but they somehow have super advanced scifi tech everywhere that hasn’t broken down even though logically no one should have a clue how to maintain it. Oh, and despite being apparently the worst possible future, as soon as someone comparitively smart shows up they immediately put him in charge of the country instead of, say, handing it over to said megacorp.
Idiocracy is an incoherent mess masquerading as satire, while it’s only cogent point is “I hate anyone who has ever shopped at Walmart.”
As a counter to you comment: Quiet you. No one cares what the anti fun police think.
Each one of these things is it’s own commentary, that is all. Judge obviously wasn’t doing cohesive world building; he was just squeezing together all the commentary he has on why people are hypocritical idiots. All the way down the the eugenics bit.
Since that’s where the conversation started, let’s go to eugenics first. I would wager the writer has expienced the ‘cautious successful people with no kids’ trope a million times in real life and in his very successful career. He made it his own when he contrasted it with the Jerry Springer types; which was very culturally dominant at that time. Yes, we look at it today and only see the problematic eugenics message; but I imagine the writers regret when he sees the most intelligent, affectionate, people he knows never being able to do what the dummy’s on Springer find all to easy.
The writers world is one on the brink of collapse. All because technology was so advance it was self sustaining, at least for a time. The excess it provided made society’s need for education, social structure, and governance evaporate. The time leading up to when Not Sure showed up could have been a cultural revolution of art and space exploration but instead was plagued with reality TV, fart humor, and fast food. All things that were dominating the culture when the writer wrote the script. Taken to the most extreme, focus on making more Gatorade then could ever be consumed would be in line with societies priorities at the time.
Finally, Not Sure becoming president was a simple, funny, way to advance the story. It would be unkind for the author to make all this commentary without giving the audience a polite instruction that could help circumvent our tragic future. That comment being, just feed the plants water. Meaning stop with the idiocy. You don’t have to listen to the, “smartest man in the world” because Not Sure was just an ordinary 20th century guy and even he knew that plants need water.
I’ve always found it funny how I’ve seen folks from both ideological sides point to this film as a satire of what’s wrong with the other. It’s a simple satire, but that’s what makes it effective.
Judge is master at this type of commentary. Beavis and butthead was making fun of how stupid the MTV audience was. The same audience that adopted and Beavis and Butthead just as fast as it was incepted.
King of the hill is the ultimate “Steven Colbert is a sincere conservative show.” In king of the hill Hank is a nieve Texan that buys into every bullshit “American exceptionalism” type idealogy there is. He then humanizes him and shows how every single time Hank is returning to “American values” he’s just being nieve and if he were born anywhere else he would be just as liberal as he is a “conservative.”
You are indeed proving you point here 😂
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People are definitely not more bigoted and ignorant. They just feel it’s now safer to express their bigotry.
Possible.
They just feel it’s now safer to express their bigotry.
Which has a memetic effect on the population. The more bigotry ideas are expressed, the more new people feel that those ideas have value. Andrew Tate is an example of a super spreader.
Between the lead fuel, plastics, and possibly other issues not yet proven to be an issue like food colorings and preservatives, we may actually be dumber today than 150 years ago.
We just have access to more platforms to share our opinions and people have access to more sources of information to reinforce their bad opinions.
During the Spanish flu people were fighting against preventive measures, the anti Vax movement existed in the late 1800s (example for those who read French https://www.ledevoir.com/societe/634164/la-grogne-contre-les-vaccins-et-les-mesures-sanitaires-des-le-xixe-siecle ), there’s always been people supporting fascists and so on…
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Doctors used to refuse to wash their hands before performing surgery.
You vastly underestimate the amount of smoke (both pollution and intentional) and lead and toxic dyes and alcohol and cocaine and heroin that people consumed 150 years ago. Not to mention the rampant disease.
That didn’t effect nearly the entire population as leaded gasoline.
When you realize that Idiocracy is way better than where we’re headed.
They had to make the future people somewhat likable and sympathetic for a comedy movie. In reality, they’d be much more short tempered, racist, sexist, and violent.
Than neofeudalism/technofeudalism? Sure.
We are now in the Handmaid’s Tale
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I’d much prefer Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho as president tbf
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If there was a movies circlejerk community on lemmy, this would be the top of all time post.
on the internet*.
And then you have people jumping in saying IDIOCRACY EUGENICS only to eventually get curbstomped again despite arguing against one of the most tongue-in-cheek movies ever made…
The anti-circle jerk has finally come back around though so that’s nice.
only to eventually get curbstomped again
No circlejerking going on here, no siree!
The pseudoscience behind it is straight from eugenics.
Despite that, its depiction of an ignorant society unaware of the technology supporting it was incredibly prophetic. If we ignore the “dumb people reproducing” bit, we can see it as a warning about how an uneducated society is detrimental for everyone.
I mean, we have flat earthers, for fuck’s sake.
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Eugenics (by some definitions) doesn’t even have to be unethical if you turn left off of “state-enforced sterilization highway” and on to “provide the opportunity to let people optimise their children’s genome street”. It is basically transhumanism at that point. Probably still some problems there, but at least its not coercive, and its also already possible today. Equality of access to polygenetic screening I say!
I don’t like idiocracy bc irl the opposition is not actually stupid, they know exactly what they are doing. Also the eugenics is not fantastic
Welcome to Costco, I love you.
As far as I understand this, this isn’t something like an actual degree, it’s something like a diploma, you get if you finish what we in europe call a technical/specialized high school (the 3 year, not the 4 year one (where you can seek higher education)).
You’re exactly right. It’s just a timely coincidence, given a bit of creative leeway on my part.
Idiogracy is propaganda for eugenics.
Edit: woah, I guess I overestimated some people’s media literacy. Here’s a video explaining what I’m talking about
Everyone always jumps to eugenics to explain Idiocracy, but I don’t ever remember hearing genetics mentioned in the movie. The movie merely states that dumb adults raise dumb children. I don’t know about you, but I see that everyday. This doesn’t need to be explained by genetics. Children mimic the ways the adults in their lives act to model themselves on as they mature. You can counter this with things like public education or community involvement, but if the parents are involved and interact with their child, they’re going to mimic them. If you know a smart person who was raised by dumb people, chances are the parents weren’t really involved with the kid as they grew up.
This isn’t even a obscure fact. What do you think those Jesus Camps are for? Why do you think rich people send their kids to elite schools?
It’s eugenistic because the movie argues idiot parents have idiot children while smart parents have smart children. For every example you can find of this being true you can find another of it being false.
eugenistic because the movie argues idiot parents have idiot children while smart parents have smart children.
This still comes down to a nature vs nurture argument, and the movie tends to fall back on things like education being the primary issue.
Idiots raising idiots isn’t necessarily an argument based in eugenics. Parents who never learned are not going to be able to teach their children. If there isn’t something like a decent public education system, then what chance do the children of idiots really have?
the movie tends to fall back on things like education being the primary issue.
Are we talking about the same movie?
The movie’s “happy ending” is literally that the “smartest person” becomes the boss of all the stupid people. I think y’all don’t really know too much about eugenics.
Yes, everyone knows about this scene. This still isn’t claiming that intellect is a genetic trait that can only be inherited. It’s claiming that intellect is no longer a valued societal trait that people find necessary to procreate.
I think the problem with your interpretation is it is focusing on biological evolution, when in reality the satire is based on societal evolution. Idiocracy is only set like 500 years in the future, not exactly enough time to see humans biologically adapt in any significant way.
I don’t know what I can say. The movie literally focuses on the biology. It’s literally in the text and you claim otherwise.
Edit: I noticed that my timestamp didn’t work. It’s pretty open at 1m58s
At 1m58sec they are talking about medical advancements…not genetics. Again, I think you are jumping to conclusions. Medical advancements that allow people to procreate at a faster rate is not biology, it’s sociology.
It kinda seems you are dismissing the possibility of nurture attributing to the equation at all, which in and of itself is a eugenics based argument.
Does the movie touch on an “intelligence gene” that’s passed down?
I don’t believe it does, in which case, is it eugenics if no genes are involved?
I thought the movie was more nuanced than that—the “smart parents” of Idiocracy did not have smart children—they had zero children. The smart couple in fact were the ones doing “self-eugenics” to their own detriment.
Eugenics or not, evolution favors the population that produces the fittest offspring for the environment–not the smartest.
So the movie isn’t eugenic because it showed people doing eugenics wrong?
It’s more “tragedy of the commons” eugenics than “evil corporate-governmental-white supremacy” eugenics.
And yet the movie ends on a hopeful note. I’m not entirely sure they were committed to the genetic explanation.
This movie came out when social media was in its infancy. Just replace eugenics with manipulation from social media and we’re headed down the same highway of doom! Toot toot
I don’t think the movie wqs intended as eugenic propaganda, but sure looks like it. Also all the memes and jokes about our future being this movie sure as heck don’t seem to care about the ending.
Stupid, ignorant people raise stupid, ignorant children.
The movie never adresses systemic failures in the educational system. It literally starts with “stupid people fuck too much”.
Yeah, because it’s an 85 minute long comedy. The people who think it’s about eugenics are reading more into it than is there.
It’s the literal premise at the beginning. That’s like claiming that the people who claim the Empire is evil read too much into Star Wars.
It’s a funny film about “what if stupid people ruled the world” with a 2 minute sequence at the beginning to get the audience up to speed, during which Judge manages to poke fun at both rednecks and middle class wasps.
If it was some polemic against modern society and how purging the undesirable from society through eugenics, don’t you think it would be a bit more obvious?
Did you read my whole comment? Smart kids come from dumb parents when the parent isn’t involved as much in the child’s upbringing. The movie is simplify the concept because it’s a movie, not a lecture.
Ok, but what you are saying translates to if the parents are not smart enough they should better not be involved in their own children’s upbringing for their sake. That’s an awful take.
It’s not an awful take, it’s reality. Being dumb is not genetic and this has nothing to do with eugenics.
Also, they didn’t say parents don’t need to be involved at all. I think the idea is that the children get exposed to other people and ways of thinking and not JUST the things their parents decide for them. Otherwise it’ll be indoctrination -better or worse- but the kids won’t think for themselves.
For example, I think homeschooling is especially awful because parents just can’t teach all the things that being in a classroom will. I don’t know why it is legal in the USA, they should just have separate classes for kids with special needs imo, like in Europe.
I see where you come from and I agree - things like homeschooling should not be legal. A society should absolutely be involved in raising children and help to fulfill everyone’s potential.
I think the idea is that the children get exposed to other people and ways of thinking and not JUST the things their parents decide for them. Otherwise it’ll be indoctrination -better or worse- but the kids won’t think for themselves.
Well said, but in that case it doesn’t matter whether your parents are smart or dumb. You should always be exposed to other people and encouraged to get out of your small oyster. Especially in a social sense; I live in Germany and after 4th grade we get separated in different high schools (for low, middle, and high achievers). I can tell you that we as teenagers very often start living in our bubble where we only meet people with somewhat of the same education. I am very grateful to have kept my best friend from elementary because she exposes me to her friends who are from a very different social class than me. Their lives, problem solving approaches, and ways of thinking are so vastly different from what I am used to that I always feel like a fish out of the water.
But to be clear:
Smart kids come from dumb parents when the parent isn’t involved as much in the child’s upbringing.
To me this does read like dumb parents can only raise smart kids if they keep out of their lives. And while I see why the conclusion “dumb parent raises dumb child” comes about, this is a very dangerous oversimplification. Yes, it has nothing (or little) to do with eugenics. But with language like this the way is paved to shame people that we perceive as dumb to be unfit parents. And while social programs as you mentioned would be the obvious way to tackle such nuanced issues, that kind of reasoning can quickly lead to a perception that only smart people (the “right people”) should be having kids. Because it seems like the easier, more straightforward solution (which it obviously isn’t, but that is how populist speech works).
As for the movie - the problem with the dude in the opening sequence is not that he is low class or dumb. The problem is that he is an inconsiderate asshole (who is, btw, not too present in his children’s lives).
How exactly do you want to define dumbness to begin with? A low IQ? So at what IQ should people have children, where is the cutoff? Are people who are street smart but bad in school and IQ tests dumb? Are these who have no street smarts at all but ace in school dumb? Are people who do not agree with your political reasoning dumb? (Like, I hate Trump with all my passion, but I would not say he is dumb. He is an awful and troubled human being but he is definitely not dumb in an IQ kind of sense.)
I don’t like to take Forest Gump as an example as he is not real (and since I don’t really like that movie) but it might fit here; would he be a dumb or a smart person? Is he fit to be a parent?
I think it is obvious that a good parent is a caring, loving, open person, not necessarily one that is smart or can teach their child how to live. This is what society should be for. But arguments like “dumb people raise dumb children unless they aren’t involved” are really just a step away from treating anyone who is not in the right 50% of the bell curve as an idiot who is undeserving of procreation. Which is why I found the statement above problematic.
Only if to take it to the most extreme possibility. For all the issues I have with how I was raised, I’m thankful my parents were too busy much of the time and left me to watch PBS or play in the woods. As an adult, when I heard one of my 5 year old relatives chant “No Thanks Obama, You Can Keep The Change!” and get praised for it, I wretched inside.
I’m not advocating for child abduction. There are already plenty of real world examples of how terrible that is. But that we should be 1) investing in public education more and 2) discrediting private/home schools. Also, we need better Publicly run and funded Homeschool options for kids who CAN’T be in a classroom, including livestreamed classrooms and/or a virtual space.
Also, what we’re calling “intelligence” is really social behavior. IQ tests are only really useful for comparing different groups within the same culture or the same group across time. Other then that, you can’t directly measure intelligence as different groups of people will need and value different traits and skills. The only real qualifier for intelligence is basic tool use and that’s so universal, are ape relatives have it.
Yes, and I simply disagree. If what you are saying was true, humanity as whole would still be farmers, hunter and gatherers.
“natural selection” doesn’t have to be explained by the genome.
Neither does eugenics.
Right. The solution to ignorance is education. Not selective breeding programs.
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The whole notion of intelligence being inheritable and letting the “stupid” (or rather: the poor) reproduce indiscriminately is basically the original idea of eugenics.
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Intelligence is inheritable
Intelligence doesn’t even have a proper definition in the biological domain. If you have any scientific proof that intelligence is inheritable, do show!
You can juggle words all you want: you’re describing eugenicist principles. Those aren’t only morally unjustyfiable: they’re simply wrong with an oversimplified understanding of evolution and intelligence.
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I don’t know how else to phrase it: the claim that intelligence is breedable is a eugenicist foundation.
Evolution is a process, you’re confusing evolution with evolutionary science.
Your definition of intelligence is incredibly oversimplified. Intelligence is not an inheritable trait (as in: the difference in intelligence of human population does not significantly stem from genetic differences).
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Genes make a substantial difference, but they are not the whole story. They account for about half of all differences in intelligence among people, so half is not caused by genetic differences, which provides strong support for the importance of environmental factors. This estimate of 50 percent reflects the results of twin, adoption and DNA studies. From them, we know, for example, that later in life, children adopted away from their biological parents at birth are just as similar to their biological parents as are children reared by their biological parents. Similarly, we know that adoptive parents and their adopted children do not typically resemble one another in intelligence.
I mean, it’s not nice to joke with eugenics but I think it was no more than that and besides the movie explicitly mentions that research of important topics halted in favour of projects with a more promising outpay and that education became worse and worse by the year, which are both very real threats.
We’re talking about that movie where a man of below average intelligence goes to the future and saves the world by teaching them the value of education, right?
No, a man who is average in every measure
Well, watching the world burn and 8 billion people contributing to that, I can get behind some eugenics.
Yeah!
Poordumb people should have been banned from reproducing ages ago! It’s not like there’s a economic-political system continuing to knowingly destroy the planet in service of number go up!It’s the
poordumb people!/s
See, now I didn’t say anything about eugenics for the poor or dumb. I just said I supported the idea of eugenics. I would be very happy to start with the wealthy and powerful first. (Although one might make a good argument that there is a significant overlap between the rich and the dumb)
Idioctacy isn’t about how stupid society has become, it’s literally justifying Eugenics.
Source?
It was not supposed to be an instructional video
I wish, at least the US would have a cool president that isn’t two steps from a stroke
It’s comforting to know that while things may seem to be going in one direction, the opposite is actually happening. IQ isn’t a static measurement, nor is it all that useful… However it has been trending upwards ever since it’s inception. Meaning that what 100 IQ currently is used to be closer to 130 back in our grandparents time.
lol – yep its scary true
wait, what country is on six year election cycles and has elections this year
Mexico. Six year presidential term, and they had elections this year.
Well the senate and most governors are on a six year cycle
I would estimate 1/3rd of each
Surely about 1/6 or so!
Russia?
