Are We Headed for Buy-N-Large?
In the movie WALL-E, 700 years in the future, humans float around in chairs everywhere, have view screens right in front of them all the time, and are completely taken care of by a company called Buy-N-Large. because of these things, everyone of them is fat; plus, 700 years of idleness has bred smaller and weaker bones. This might be obvious, but how do you think this speaks to our present state of human-ness, especially as Americans?
posted by Neal Paradise at 10:53 PM
20 Comments:
Science fiction has dealt with this type of questions quite thoroughly. Personally, I'm quite pessimistic and I don't think humanity will last 700 years to begin with barring some major change of direction (and global warming offers just the right opportunity for us to do so, yet no one takes the plunge).
If you look at is statistically, if the chances of a nuclear exchange taking place at a given year is 1% (not that far stretched given the proliferation of nuclear weaponry), then what chance do we have of making it through 700 years?
That aside, there will be no reason for evolution to select weaker and smaller bones unless we were to select our children for weaker and smaller bones. Barring some new weird fashion we won’t, which brings me to say that I don’t like the way evolution is often misrepresented. The general public acquires most of its knowledge about evolution at the cinema, so it’s a pity the cinema doesn’t try to offer a more real representation of things.
This was a bone of contention with a lot of people. My girlfriend is all set with seeing WALL-E since she read in a blog that all future people are grossly obese, and she was annoyed that the movie arbitrarily singles out fat people as the #1 trait of sloth, or poor health. That, and these increasingly obese people have smaller and weaker bones? That doesn't make a lick of sense.
I feel the need to jump in with a few corrections here:
I'll address Eve (YRF's girlfriend, not the film's heroine) first. I hardly think that the filmmakers arbitrarily selected obesity as a signifier of sloth. It seems more likely to me that they said, "You know, if these future humans eat all day and seldom move, they'll probably be rather round." Her complaint to me sounds a bit like being annoyed that someone arbitrarily chose sunburned people as a #1 trait of prolonged sun exposure.
As to the bones, they're not a symptom of obesity, they're a symptom of being in space (as NASA has noticed). And it's not something that occurs over the generations of evolution, it happens within a few months of being in space (though I can understand the confusion, since the bone loss discussion makes up all of .7 seconds in the film). If you want to pick nits here, you'd say that bone loss is a symptom of weightlessness, and the spaceship in the film seems to have some sort of simulated gravity. To which I'd counterargue that sitting all day in a hoverchair probably replicates weightlessness to some degree.
To Moshe's point, I'll say that I, on the other hand, am really quite optimistic about the future--I think it'll be awesome. I'm certainly not blind to the risks--of nuclear war, of global warming, of unstoppable mutant viruses, of an asteroid smashing us to bits, or any of a number of other global catastrophes that could happen--and I can understand why being pessimistic is a perfectly reasonable stance. But in addition to being optimistic by nature, I can't help but note humanity's (and life's in general) capacity for adaptation and survival. We survived an ice age (or our distant ancestors did), we survived the bubonic plague, we survived two world wars. All are catastrophic, but always some subset of humanity manages to survive and adapt.
And getting all the way back to PM's question, I find WALL-E's constantly entertained and chubby populace to be a reasonable extrapolation of the trends of the last fifty or so years. (If I were going to question it, I'd question the uniformity of it.) But I think that's less the point of the film than the point that humans can learn and that we can, when push finally comes to shove, reinvent ourselves.
That was beautiful.
Seriously, guys, this does all seem a bit nit-picky here. And I'm the one commonly blamed for being unable to check my brain at the door! What I love about WALL-E is that it makes its points without pointing fingers. I didn't feel it was preachy. And the humans in the film are actually very likeable and worthy individuals. Sure, there are a lot of little things about the film that we can pick apart...but in my opinion, in light of this very good movie, it's nowhere near worth it.
But hey, who am I to break up a good debate?
"Her complaint to me sounds a bit like being annoyed that someone arbitrarily chose sunburned people as a #1 trait of prolonged sun exposure."
And she wouldn't have a leg to stand on if she were just singling this film out. But it's not quite as cut and dry as that. Think of it as a straw on the camel's back.....Hollywood and most TV shows typically portray overweight people as greedy pigs, gluttons, or general assholes. That's sometimes, but not generally the actual case. Look at Sammo Hung....he's packing quite a few extra pounds on that frame of his, and he can do stuff most of us could never do, physically. Generally being overweight is not great healthwise, but those with a pear-shaped build are at much, much lower risk than those with a preponderance of visceral fat. I might be in "better shape" than Eve, for example, but her blood labs look a hell of a lot better than mine. Sure, WALL-E isn't guilty of making fat people look like morons (As in practically every low-brow comedy ever made), or sending out mixed messages (looking at you, Shallow Hal), but it's not helping, whether or not the consequences of overeating and sloth as becoming overweight make sense (they do, but.....). And it's not really matter of political correctness, I think, than just arbitrarily picking on something.
I can certainly understand the straw-breaking-camel's-back idea, and heaven knows that Hollywood hasn't been kind to the overweight in general.
But it's the "arbitrary" word that I keep getting stuck on. The makers of WALL-E, commenting on Americans' increased tendencies toward consumption and inactivity, simply extrapolated on that tendency, which really leaves them no choice but to make their characters a bit roly-poly.
I guess the word "arbitrary" suggests to me that they could have just as easily chosen something else, but, for the life of me, I can't figure out what that would be.
I think it's important to mention that the way that humans are portrayed in WALL-E are done so with a reason, not just for kicks. While I stated that the film isn't preachy, which I stand by, there are some very clear points that it does strive to make, and I think that the obesity part ties into that.
We humans leave earth because we've trashed it, essentially, and we fully embrace a futuristic system of working with robots in a number of ways. Initially, the break from earth is meant as a luxury vacation, and that for a limited amount of time we get to enjoy not having to even "lift a finger." But as time goes on, the earth situation doesn't improve, and people get used to their lifestyle. Which means that every day is a luxury vacation.
In any case, the film is making a number of points here, one being about taking care of the earth and what that means, and another being taking care of ourselves and what that means. So I don't think that having people of the future represented as obese is just something they did for a laugh.
I can understand what you're saying about the rest of Hollywood, it's just a shame that this film (as tame as it is) is the one to break the camel's back.
I didn't say that it was WALL-E singling that out, more like anybody else in Hollywood. There are lods of examples, but I can't think of any specific ones at the moment.
This is the point: while portraying an increasingly inactive and lazy human race by showing them as grossly obese may well be a legitimate and accurate choice, it's portraying overweight people in a negative light. Not an inaccurate light, but one that's negative nonetheless. If you belonged to a group or some sort of minority that was constantly being singled out/picked on/portrayed in a certain way by the media, it would get old for you pretty damn fast, and you wouldn't care if there was a halfway-legitimate reason to do so, as in WALL-E.
I can see that. Regardless of how realistic or legitimate the representation is, I think this just comes down to an issue of personal preference. There are a lot of themes presented from the media that annoy me, no matter how accurate or inaccurate they may be. Some annoying examples for me are: religious people in film are usually idiots, and though this isn't the same thing, I hate the need for women to always have gobs of sex appeal to be taken seriously.
To each his (or her) own.
man, not being able to access our blog during the day really sucks; look at all this stuff i missed!
firstly, i believe some of the examples YRF was looking for are Norbit, Diary of a Mad Black Woman, and both Nutty Professor movies.
i purposefully didn't put my next point in my initial question, because i wanted to spark debate. yes, WALL-E portrays an initially dismal and ridiculous future for humans, but one of the things that's so great about it is that it ends on a very hopeful note. the power of love and human persistence wins out over technology in the end. just look at the characters of John and Mary; not much to distinguish them from the rest of the crowd, yet they discover that by breaking out of their routines, they open all kinds of doors of possibility. AND, they discover this together.
the Captain is another example of the power of curiosity and persistence. he consumes information about the Earth that was at an insatiable rate, and gets excited enough about the possibilities to defy the norm and lead the humans to start Earth over again. he's even breaking barriers in the small things with those first steps he took without the hover-chair, probably the first steps he ever took.
i think the movie would agree with you, DW: the future is going to be awesome.
Doctor, thanks for correcting me with the bones' evolution saga. I didn't watch the film and just relied on PM's description which seemed to have indicated towards the work of evolution. My point was that evolution works at the gene level, and being inactive does not mean that your genes change to make your bones weaker (otherwise the Jews that have been circumcising their kids for thousands of years would have bred circumcised kids by now).
Regarding stupidly annoying stereotypes, lest we forget the eternal image of the computer nerd, born with big thick eyeglasses.
As per optimism for the future, I would like to explain why I tend to disagree. Obviously, I hope I'm wrong, but the main difference between now and the past is that there are too many of us humans around. Instead of living in small secluded populations, the type of arrangement that means one village can avoid getting wiped off by a virus or maybe even develop resistance to the virus, we are now one big village.
As for the specific examples provided by the Doctor: the past world wars took place when we didn't have the capacity to annihilate ourselves; we may have survived ice ages but our genetic indicates we were down to some 15,000 in number not that long ago (close shaves don't come any closer); and the chances of a civilization killing asteroid hitting us are very low.
I'm looking forward to the next set of wars: the fossil fuel wars (they've already started with Iraq) and the global warming wars.
Lastly, being that the discussion was triggered from the American point of view, allow me to refer you to the conclusions from the recent G8 summit, in which the USA was the one to block initiatives to address global warming.
Moshe, I frigging hate it when you single out the actions of the American government as if they represent the wishes of the (intelligent)American people. They don't. They only get away with it because of voter apathy, which I think is changing. But in this case, Bush ALMOST has a point. I think he should suck it up and lead by example, especially when the cost down the line is far greater. But it IS a little foolish to point fingers at American when India and China are exempted from the Kyoto Protocal, and when combined, the two alone exceed the US in damage done. It's not going to work unless everybody gets on board, but for a change, Bush does have a point.
I really didn't mean to drag the discussion that way, but to address your issues:
1. I definitely don't think the acts of the American government represent the wishes of American people. In my opinion, the USA does and represents what corporate USA wants it to do and it's the dollars that do the talking. For the record, the
USA is not unique there; I don't think Australia is much better.
2. You're right about India and China, but someone has to lead the way and in my opinion these should be the affluent countries.
I apologize for taking this discussion to the bottomless pit of politics.
"You're right about India and China, but someone has to lead the way and in my opinion these should be the affluent countries.
I apologize for taking this discussion to the bottomless pit of politics."
Well, it's not as if the film has nothing to do with politics. And after 8 years of Republican "leadership", America's foreign "policies" are a bone of contention with me.
At any rate, I think that portrayal of future people as lazy and fat is a little disingenious, because it flies in the face of another mass media message: If you're not thin and attractive, you suck. Hard.
Look, I'm not trying to get anyone upset or anything, and I'll be the last person to support the idea that people need to be thin and attractive to have worth.
However, this whole discussion completely surprises me. I can see both sides very clearly, and I agree with a lot of what is said. But...why this movie?? This movie that has so many good, positive points about humanity and love and loyalty? It just boggles my mind. Especially if there are arguments being made from people who haven't seen the film. Let's not discourage debate and conversation, but let's also not make solid conclusions about a movie before it has been seen. I think this is a point we've made in other posts on this blog, and it's a valid one.
Granted, I don't need to see Saw to know I won't like it, but I think this is far from being the same thing with WALL-E.
As I reflect on what motivated me to make that last comment, I think it came from what was previously said: "At any rate, I think that portrayal of future people as lazy and fat is a little disingenious, because it flies in the face of another mass media message: If you're not thin and attractive, you suck. Hard."
This really rubbed me the wrong way, and the reason is that I feel this is far from the point they were trying to make in the film. And I don't like the idea of people who haven't seen it thinking that that's what they were going for. I think it's just a bit of a broad assumption.
I have been watching this debate and wondering when or if I should jump in. Here's what I think: This movie is not trying to insult larger people. It stands to reason that if you never get up from your hover chair and get everything served to you, you're gonna get fat. That is just common sense! It is not trying to insult, it's showing the inactivity of the passengers as an indictment of childhood obesity. That's my two cents.
P.S. I really want a hover chair!
that's interesting. i didn't see a childhood obesity thing in there; i just saw an American consumerism thing. but maybe they're the same thing, or at least tightly connected. as far as i know, childhood obesity is largely an American thing, so really consumerism can extend to children, with interesting results when you apply it there. but again, what was great about this movie was that it painted a rather dismal picture for humans, and then had them break out of it to a much better, sunnier place. i really don't think it was pointing a finger at fat people in particular. it was just saying, "we as Americans are on a bad road, but it will get better as time goes on." perhaps it was also saying, "things need to get a whole lot worse before they get better."
While I'm still formulating my reaction, I'll share this article, which is way too relevant to our conversation to ignore: http://www.slate.com/id/2195126/
"But...why this movie?? This movie that has so many good, positive points about humanity and love and loyalty? It just boggles my mind."
Two words: bad timing. Think about the Rodney King incident...it wasn't the worst thing to happen to a black person in L.A., but ti was enough to set off the L.A. Riots in the early 90's. Wall-E was a target for that particular choice because it's visible, and acclaimed.
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