America Dumbs Down

[fuzzygobo]

There's a show on Spike TV that started a new season called Repo Games. Here's the deal:

The repo man comes to your house to take your car away (I know it's a hassle paying off your car folks, but the bank wants to hear from you ONCE in a while). In order to keep your car, he'll ask you five trivia questions. All you have to do is get three right, and your car is paid off, and everyone's happy.
Get three wrong, you're gonna be doing a lot of walking.

The questions asked are general knowledge, nowhere near as hard as anything asked on Jeopardy. So the average Joe stands a fair chance at winning. But it still breaks my heart watching people blow it.

Question: Four states border Mexico. Name two of them.
(One lady's answer, after a moment's heavy thought): .............Is Canada a state?

I hate seeing people lose their car, and I'm rooting for the underdog.

"Come on, Billyjoejimbob! I know you know the answer! You learned it in fifth grade! Remember fifth grade? You spent your three best years there!"

If this show is scripted (as someone claimed), I'm sorry, you couldn't pay me enough to go on tv and pretend to be that dumb. (Same goes for Jerry Springer, where people got a few hundred bucks for their fifteen minutes of fame).

If the show is NOT scripted (and this scares me!) and this is as smart as some people will ever get, where is our society heading? Remember folks, this is not quantum physics:

Question: Fill in the blank. Hey Diddle Diddle, the cat and the fiddle, and the cow jumped over (blank)?
Answer:......... P. Diddy?

Please tell me Americans really aren't that dumb, or are they?

 

[Misskermie]

Did someone really say....

Wait, so these guys are adults?
I'm 13 and I know better!

Hey diddle the cat in the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon!
Wow.
Now, I know what borders mexico but not on top of my head. LOL

 

[CensoredAlso]

The only thing Americans are guilty of is allowing insulting Reality garbage like that on the air.

 

[Drtooth]

I'm sorry, but "something absolute crap on TV" is far from America dumbing down. We're already there, and have been for some time now. Dumbing down is calling a NOT at all French product "Freedom fries" out of spite for a smarter foreign government that foresaw that a certain war being a quagmire is DUMB. Refusing any reforms to Health Care because some rich fat loud mouths that can afford to abuse prescription drugs say it's "Commy-en-ism," basically using a Jedi Mind trick on everyone saying "You really don't want health care reform" after years of the public saying the contrary... that's dumb. Denying a woman stuff women use because they're afwaid their taxes will go up, and are so afraid they have to basically liable that not public figure by saying how much sex they think she has (still not half as much as Rush has) is DUMB! Heck, the whole "we let Dubbya write a blank check for 2 unwinnable wars, yet count every single penny the Demmy-crats spend, but refuse to raise taxes because having them pay for their share of the drunken debauchery that's been going on since the 80's to basically fill the till because the world owes the rich a living" almost Stockholm Syndrome feeling in the US proves that we're already there.

We're at the risk of becoming at best either the Mike Judge film Idoicracy or Wall*e, or at worst some sort of more Mad Max styled Hunger Games.

 

[Sgt Floyd]

Most reality shows are scripted. I really think thats the case here. And you say that you wouldn't act dumb on tv, if you needed the money bad enough because you couldnt buy food, you would do anything for it.

 

[Drtooth]

One more non-political thing to add to the rant...

It's Spike TV. Does anyone give a rat's crap about what's on Spike TV? The network that foisted Stripperella on the world. At best the network had reruns of Ren and Stimpy and Star Trek TNG. And that was at the beginning. Like what on Earth does it even air now?

 

[beatnikchick300]

I'm sorry, but "something absolute crap on TV" is far from America dumbing down. We're already there, and have been for some time now. Dumbing down is calling a NOT at all French product "Freedom fries" out of spite for a smarter foreign government that foresaw that a certain war being a quagmire is DUMB. Refusing any reforms to Health Care because some rich fat loud mouths that can afford to abuse prescription drugs say it's "Commy-en-ism," basically using a Jedi Mind trick on everyone saying "You really don't want health care reform" after years of the public saying the contrary... that's dumb. Denying a woman stuff women use because they're afwaid their taxes will go up, and are so afraid they have to basically liable that not public figure by saying how much sex they think she has (still not half as much as Rush has) is DUMB! Heck, the whole "we let Dubbya write a blank check for 2 unwinnable wars, yet count every single penny the Demmy-crats spend, but refuse to raise taxes because having them pay for their share of the drunken debauchery that's been going on since the 80's to basically fill the till because the world owes the rich a living" almost Stockholm Syndrome feeling in the US proves that we're already there.

We're at the risk of becoming at best either the Mike Judge film Idoicracy or Wall*e, or at worst some sort of more Mad Max styled Hunger Games.

I have a funny story about Idiocracy (one of my favorite non-Muppet movies, BTW) that's related to this. I heard that one reason said movie got virtually no publicity when it first came out six years ago is that test audiences.....didn't get the joke. Wow. People here really are dumber than anyone realizes.

 

[Drtooth]

I have a funny story about Idiocracy (one of my favorite non-Muppet movies, BTW) that's related to this. I heard that one reason said movie got virtually no publicity when it first came out six years ago is that test audiences.....didn't get the joke. Wow. People here really are dumber than anyone realizes.

That's part of it... it's actually because that there was no logical way to market the movie. They couldn't release the thing because they couldn't make a trailer that made any sense or even hinted that the film was a satire. And as we all know, the most important thing about movies is to market them. Studios often fluff marketing campaigns, create misleading trailers (that's why every kids movie ever has to show their worst, most cringeworthy scenes in the trailers...even adding farts that weren't there), and basically make just horrible, horrible trailers that make it look like you're watching something completely different than the movie's supposed to be. Look what happened with Disney's Tangled, trying to get a male audience.

And therefore, they couldn't market the thing, they wound up shelving it until there were enough complaints to release it on DVD.

 

[mr3urious]

And therefore, they couldn't market the thing, they wound up shelving it until there were enough complaints to release it on DVD.

It did do much better there, though.

 

[Sgt Floyd]

One more non-political thing to add to the rant...

It's Spike TV. Does anyone give a rat's crap about what's on Spike TV? The network that foisted Stripperella on the world. At best the network had reruns of Ren and Stimpy and Star Trek TNG. And that was at the beginning. Like what on Earth does it even air now?

1000s ways to die. The only good show