The invention of Lying/ Idiocracy

These two films are two of my favorite comedies.  They both made very little money at the box office.  I always watch them when I come upon them on TV.  I think the premise of each film is unique.  They are satirically funny in a much deeper way than probably even the authors intended. 

The Invention of Lying stars Ricky Gervais and Jennifer Garner.  The idea is that no one has ever lied in the world and Ricky's character discovers he can steal and pay the bills by just not telling the truth.  He then lies to his mother on her death bed to prevent her from being so scared about dying and ends up being the modern day Moses with his "Ten Commandments" written on Pizza boxes.  I am certain that religious zealots hated this movie-but I thought it was really clever and funny.

Idiocracy takes Luke Wilson into the future 500 years from now due to a hibernation experiment.  The world has encouraged commercial beauty and wealth and discouraged intellectual ability.  Therefore Luke Wilson is the smartest person in the world.  I found this movie hysterical.  As an educator, I am aware of the "dumbing down" process.  Many may think this is just one of those dumb smell my farts movie-but I found the premise really on target.

I have been teaching for the past thirty years.  People ask me - what is the difference in the students?  The truth is there isn't really that much difference in the maturity level.  Ninth graders are still basically very immature with a huge difference in the boys and the girls. The real difference is that the overall attention span has decreased.  The students require a lot more variety of stimulation to get them interested in the topics.  The parents protect their children and believe every word they are told. There is less money allotted for education and teachers have to spend a lot of their own money in order to have exciting and stimulating lessons.  I can go on and on.

There are wonderful students out there that have been raised to be very honest and helpful.  These are just unfortunately out shown by the few super obnoxious ones that require all of the teachers attention in classrooms that are overcrowded. 

If you want to improve this problem look at towards the future. We need to invest in our children. We need to stop the shameless worship of movie and sports stars.  We need to have rich people pay their fair share of taxes and save our school.  Otherwise Idiocracy may end up being a reality instead of a comedy.