/Sci-fi
There’s something deeply unsettling about watching a movie that was meant to be absurd satire and realizing… it feels more like a documentary now. That’s what happened when I rewatched Idiocracy.
It used to be a comedy—ridiculous, exaggerated, and cartoonish. A movie that made fun of a dystopian future where intelligence had collapsed and the world was run by the loudest, laziest, and most mindless people imaginable. But now? Now it feels like a terrifying reflection of the world around me. And honestly, I can’t laugh at it anymore.
I’m not just being dramatic. I see it everywhere. In the way people think, talk, and act. In what’s valued. In what’s rewarded.
The scariest part is that we’re living in it. Right now.
The Decline Isn’t Just Intelligence. It’s Wisdom.
A lot of people say, “society is getting dumber,” and sure—there’s some truth to that. But what Idiocracy and today’s world both lack isn’t just intelligence. It’s wisdom.
Wisdom is knowing what really matters. It’s the ability to think critically, to reflect, to understand the consequences of actions, and to value the long-term over the instant. Wisdom doesn’t come from scrolling Instagram for hours or parroting memes—it comes from experience, silence, thought, curiosity, humility, and learning from failure.
And that’s what’s gone. Not because we don’t have access to knowledge—but because we’re drowning in information without ever learning how to think.
Social Media: Where Idiocracy Leaks Into Reality
What used to be confined to entertainment or “just online” has now seeped into the real world. I see it every single day in my college.
Students scrolling through reels in the middle of lectures. Meme references used as a substitute for actual conversation. A constant loop of slang, dark jokes, and sarcasm—like people are afraid to be sincere or thoughtful. They act like performing stupidity makes them cooler or superior.
Dark humor has taken such deep roots that people joke publicly about things that are deeply sensitive, without the slightest empathy. It’s like they don’t even register real-world pain unless it goes viral.
This mindset, born online, is now how people live. And the worst part? It’s rewarded. Thoughtfulness isn’t trendy. Nuance doesn’t get views. Outrage, shock value, and stupidity do.
A Broken System That Thrives on Distraction
It’s not just individuals—it’s the entire system. Look at the government. Look at the media. Look at the conversations we’re having as a country. while real issues—poverty, education, healthcare, climate change—are ignored. Because people crave entertainment more than truth.
And politicians? Most of them don’t even have real ideologies anymore. No grounded vision. No philosophical depth. Just greed and manipulation. They distract, divide, and entertain, not lead. They’re not building an informed society; they’re just managing chaos, keeping people docile and dumb.
In a system like this, wisdom is a threat. Independent thought is dangerous. So they do everything they can to numb it, drown it, silence it.
What’s Missing Isn’t Just Resistance—It’s Awareness
A lot of people might say Idiocracy lacked resistance. That no one in the movie stood up and fought back. But I think the truth is even darker: no one even knew what was wrong. They didn’t know there was something to resist. They were too far gone.
And that’s what terrifies me most about today.
People don’t realize what we’ve lost. We’ve normalized stupidity. We’ve romanticized ignorance. We’ve made it fashionable to not care. And when someone does care, when someone tries to raise important questions or push back against the system—they’re either ignored or mocked.
We reward influencers more than educators. We applaud drama over discovery. We measure success in followers, not in impact.
Where Are the Thinkers?
Once, the world was moved forward by thinkers. Scientists. Innovators. Artists. Rebels. People who saw beyond their time and dared to imagine something better. Some of them were ridiculed, rejected, even punished for their ideas—but they didn’t stop. They kept thinking, kept building.
And for a while, we celebrated that. Scientists were treated like rockstars. Educators were respected. There was an era when truth, reason, and research mattered.
But now? The biggest influence on people’s lives isn’t a philosopher or a physicist—it’s the algorithm. And the algorithm doesn’t care about truth. It cares about engagement.
There are still people who question everything, who build quietly in the shadows, who refuse to surrender their minds to the noise. But they are being buried under waves of low-quality content, influencer drama, and fast dopamine.
They’re trying to swim against a current that’s designed to drown them.
