this post was submitted on 21 Feb 2025
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798
USA gets closer to Idiocracy every day (lemm.ee)
submitted 3 days ago by Namahanna@lemm.ee to c/politicalmemes@lemmy.world
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[–] yesman@lemmy.world 21 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Idiocracy usually gets criticized for it's embrace of eugenics. But today I'm going to point out that the future envisioned by the movie is 100% right wing. Not since Red Dawn has a move more closely aligned with reactionary politics.

What's the conflict of the movie? Stupidity. That's the cause of all the problems. Not institutions, not systems. Even corporate greed and mismanagement are down to dumb executives. Because if smart and qualified people were in charge, there would be no problems with corporations. Government? Same story, we just need an average white guy with dictatorial power to come in rescue the DEI hires.

[–] LodeMike 9 points 1 day ago (2 children)

embrace of eugenics

I genuinely don't know where this comes from? Did I miss something in the movie?

[–] TheObviousSolution@kbin.melroy.org 12 points 1 day ago

Recognizing a trend versus being a proponent of the most horrible to approach it is an Idiocracy level leap in logic. The movie does not endorse eugenics in any way. At most, it displays a caricature of things, like genetics, as movies are apt to do.

[–] uienia@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Because its premise is that stupid parents exclusively get stupid children, and stupid parents gets more children than intelligent parents. That is how the world ends up as it is in the movie.

But that is of course not how intelligence works. Stupid parents can get intelligent children, otherwise intelligent people would never have existed in the first place.

Of course that doesn't make the movie embrace eugenics. It is just an unimportantfictional premise meant to explain why the world is at it is in the movie.

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

But that is of course not how intelligence works.

But intelligence is influenced by genetics. Early twin studies of adult individuals have found a heritability of IQ between 57% and 73%, with some recent studies showing heritability for IQ as high as 80%.

NYWATDBIDSYWV

[–] uienia@lemmy.world -3 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Which is nowhere near the 100% which the movie implies.

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

The movie doesn't imply 100%.

The hypothesis they use is that stupid people have more kids and become the majority. It shows the genetic selection occuring over many generations.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Add in the effects of poverty, poor nutrition, lack of education, then top off with peer pressure and you get close to 100%

[–] LodeMike -1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Oh hmm. Does it mention genetics? It could be more of a cultural thing.

[–] Mnemnosyne@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago

The way I perceived it, that's exactly what it was. Yeas, the kids of stupid people are stupid but I don't recall it being specified it was genetic. The sequence in the movie just made me think it was upbringing and lack of education.

Stupid people on average will have stupider kids, if their parents believe education to be a prissy intellectual thing for gay liberals and not for good decent hard working people like us.

[–] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 day ago

Is that Rob Dyrdek holding a chainsaw next to an excited Hobbit? Is that what I'm looking at here?

[–] Chainweasel@lemmy.world 209 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (4 children)

I wish.
In Idiocracy the public wanted the smart people in charge, President Camacho even stepped aside when he knew he was unqualified compared to Joe.
In whatever the hell this is, the public demonizes intelligence.

[–] dipcart@lemmy.world 79 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Carl Sagan, in 1995:

I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...

The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance

[–] Hasherm0n@lemmy.world 53 points 2 days ago

Isaac Asimov in 1980:

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.

[–] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 12 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

celebration of ignorance

There’s two sides to that!

People are pretentious and think they know complex issues better than dedicated experts, but they also look down upon them and their institutions as pretentious.

Carl Sagan was spot on, but I think he’d be surprised how much people not just look to superstition and hype, but are so personally confident about warped realities they live in. There’s no nervousness about the crystal clutching, it’s passionate, absolutely certain enthusiasm.

Propaganda has always been a part of America, but I think we were more willing to nod our heads at experts and established institutions in the past. That system let some shady shit slip through, yeah, but it still worked better than what’s going on now.

[–] Serinus@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

People have been saying, "I'm worried because the kids are so dumb" since the dawn of time. This has a couple extra grains of truth thrown in, but not much that wasn't already apparent.

[–] Kecessa@sh.itjust.works 5 points 2 days ago

The majority of the silent generation end their parents weren't saying that when their kids could finally go to school past second grade.

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[–] BranBucket@lemmy.world 45 points 3 days ago

This.

It's an absolutely unfair comparison for Camacho, who was a pretty good leader considering the setting of the film.

[–] Laereht@lemmy.world 8 points 3 days ago

I guess it shows what I believe: that eventually humanity will tire of punching ourselves if we don't cause our own extinction first.

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[–] hOrni@lemmy.world 81 points 3 days ago

President Comacho tried to help the country. He didn't actively work against it.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 85 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Posts like this are pure cope. Idiocracy was better than the actively malicious government we have now.

[–] Damage@feddit.it 26 points 2 days ago

They were stupid but not evil.

Nobody in the movie sought to oppress others for their own gain.

[–] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 45 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Would anyone here prefer the current administration over President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Camacho?

[–] superkret@feddit.org 40 points 2 days ago

Camacho actually wanted to solve the country's problems.

[–] AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 41 points 2 days ago

No, as others have pointed out, Camacho knew he wasn't the smartest and listened to the guy who was. That's leagues above where we are.

[–] xor@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 points 2 days ago

not at all

[–] Gradually_Adjusting@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

Don't make me beg

[–] No_Money_Just_Change@feddit.org 32 points 3 days ago

Sadly no.

Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho changed his believes when presented with evidence of the contrary and stepped down from power as soon as someone more suitable was found

We are in a timeline where the president of idiocracy would be the better option

[–] MNByChoice@midwest.social 20 points 2 days ago (5 children)

Huh. Usually the chain is removed so no one gets hurt or has to be careful.

Am I wrong that the chain is in place?

[–] ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one 10 points 2 days ago

I wouldn’t be surprised that Musky just grabbed a chainsaw with no safety precautions.

[–] xor@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 2 days ago (1 children)

they have chains that just have ball bearings on them so it can still spin… some haunted houses use them

[–] Serinus@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago

Do you think Elon gives enough of a shit to ask someone?

He got so mad at the government telling him no that he overthrew the US government.

[–] Serinus@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I sure as hell wouldn't mention that ahead of time.

[–] Rawdogthatexe@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 days ago

Yeah it's CPAC so collateral damage is... acceptable.

[–] Kecessa@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 days ago

The brake is probably ON but I haven't checked the video to confirm

[–] Majorllama@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

I would hope it's at least a super dull chain, but something tells me that's not it.

[–] RangerJosey@lemmy.ml 25 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Oh we're there. Remember the Covidiots shitting out their intestinal lining to own the libs?

We been there.

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[–] TingoTenga@lemmy.world 16 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It's fucking there.

[–] BedSharkPal@lemmy.ca 14 points 3 days ago

It's worse. There is stupidity and ignorance and then there is melevelence and outright hatred.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 10 points 2 days ago

Until the dipshits in power start listening to the smartest people on the planet, it will never be close enough.

[–] akilou@sh.itjust.works 13 points 3 days ago (2 children)

That thumbs up guy is real and not photoshopped in? Jfc

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 19 points 3 days ago

Not only is he not just some "thumbs up guy" he's "libertarian" president of Argentina Javier Gerardo Milei... Who is currently doing a bang up job of ruining his country too.

We live in the worst timeline. :/

[–] FlexibleToast@lemmy.world 6 points 3 days ago

He is the chainsaw guy. He campaigned using a chainsaw as a prop for slashing budgets.

[–] RedditWanderer@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Terrible what the ring has done to business bilbo

[–] Diddlydee@feddit.uk 8 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

The rest of the world is watching America through splayed fingers, shaking heads with embarrassment.

[–] TootSweet@lemmy.world 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Is that a Boring Company(tm) Not-A-Chainsaw(tm)?

[–] Madison420@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

I dunno but I really hoped sometime else was going to point out how shitty that chainsaw looks, I'd also love to see Elon cut down a tree without an Internet connection to look it up.

[–] SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

I can’t believe Elon pulled out his hooker chasin’ chainsaw on stage.

That thing would probably break if you tried to cut a log with it.

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