Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Nation of Retards

Wonkette provides some thoughtful context and analysis to Newsweek’s polling data.

Nation of Retards

How dumb are Americans? A fifth of you think most of the 9/11 hijackers were from Iraq, which makes sense as 41% of you think the September 11, 2001, attacks were an Iraqi military operation. An elite 11% were able to identify the chief justice of the Supreme Court.

If you’ve wondered who could possibly approve of Dick Cheney, it is likely the same 10% who believe the American or British empires predate the Roman Empire, or the 8% who chose “sports utility vehicles” as the one thing that definitely does not contribute to global warming.


Related: I just watched Mike Judge’s Idiocracy; at times it was so stupid and also not-stupid. It’s already getting a cult following on DVD like his Office Space did.

Here’s a litmus test. If this clip makes you laugh, then you should rent the film ASAP. If it’s just weird to you, then you definitely shouldn’t, cause you'll really hate the movie.




It’s almost a dystopian science fiction film, in a way. In the future, people have been dumbed-down so much that the top TV show is called "Ow, My Balls” which only shows a guy hurting his balls. The clips of this show-within-a-movie can be enjoyed on two levels. First as cutting cultural commentary, revealing the poisonous anti-elitism in our society. And also on the level of it being funny watching a guy kicked in the balls.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't know if i told you about that movie, but i know i told jon. i didn't actually find it funny...i really just found it kind of sad, and partially true. after living in the hills of tn, i could see some of the events described in the movie happening today! maybe i'll find it funnier on second viewing (as i did with office space) or maybe i just need more time away from tn to find it funny again.

anyway, gotta stop typing, its bating time.

Anonymous said...

And another thing...
there are people who believe that the moon landing is faked.
not smart people.
nope, top in that field is a man who lives in a trailer with cats in the desert, and a "self educated" engineer.

Paul said...

Yeah I don't know if it was uproarious...but the ideas are interesting. It's almost a scary movie if you think of it as science fiction. And it's an absolutely terrifying movie if you think of it as a documentary. Makes me want to fire guns in the air for no reason.

All I know is it tanked in the theaters and has already sold millions of DVDs (same pattern as Office Space). Maybe people are only watching Idiocracy once though while Office Space has joined the repeat-viewing Pantheon with Dazed & Confused and The Matrix.

Anonymous said...

President Camacho reminds me of an Eddie Murphy character in Coming to America..... I think it was the leader of the band "Sexual Chocolate"

I quote Dumb and Dumber, "hey everybody, we landed on the moon!"