Is The US Becoming A Dystopia?

We all love a good dystopian movie, but at what point do we have to start considering real life dystopian? In this episode, we're taking a look at some troubling trends in the US, and by extension the rest of the world.

Is The US Becoming A Dystopia? – Second Thought

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Citations and Further Reading:

Movies and TV depicted:

The resurgence of dystopian media:

Wildfires in Greece:

Wildfires in Australia:

New IPCC report:

Ambrosia plasma transfusions:

Hospital inequality:

Blackrock CEO on retirement:

Tech company “innovation zones”:

Ways to get involved:
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW):
Democratic Socialists of America (DSA):
Socialist Rifle Association (SRA):
Socialist Party USA:
Communist Party USA:

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About Second Thought:
Second Thought is a channel devoted to education and analysis of current events from a Leftist perspective. Welcome!

[grawlinson]

there should be a monopoly game specifically suited to our generation, where you can't buy any property, you just run around the board paying rent

[gregoryferraro]

I used to love satire and dystopian themes. I don't anymore. Can't escape into fiction when it isn't fiction anymore.

[SeptemberStranger]

Today, I had just learned about someone I know committing suicide because they couldn't afford insurance for assistance with mental health.
Imagine seeing someone on the verge of suicide and telling them they can't get help because they're poor.

[hawkeyenextgen]

The worst part about our current dystopia is that it's incredibly dull and hardly exciting. We have entered an age of unprecedented disenchantment and lack of initiative, it's like our leaders want us to be bored out of our skulls.

[gabrieljordan]

As an electrician I personally do a lot of side work in low income areas so people living in poverty can at least have working electricity.

[mickeyg]

“Cyberpunk was a warning, not an aspiration” - Mike Pondsmith, creator of Cyberpunk franchise. Dystopia will be full of neon lights and advertisements, prosperity for the few is not prosperity, don't let national GDP or hi-tech toys fool you.

[ars]

“America went from barbarism to decadence without knowing civilization”
- Oscar Wilde

[hypatiakovalevskayasklodow]

The people coming to America from Europe definitely know how dystopian it already is. I had to spend few months for business there few times of the last few years. It was scary. I don’t they get how much scary it is. The amount of homeless people. The amount of obese people. Extremely old people working. The education. The isolation. The car dependency. I had good insurance and it was so difficult to first get an appointment and second to get there, that I simply decided to take the odds and not buy my insulin medicine for the few weeks. Then I came home and got the medicine in a matter of two hours, whole month worth for about 5$

[anyawillowfan]

The reason we like dystopian fiction is because they show someone, or a group of people, usually from the 'working class' surviving, and often overturning whoever is in charge. We want to believe we could survive anything (we all imagine ourselves as the protagonists, not the billions of people who die), while maintaining human connections of love and friendship.

[barquerojuancarlos]

And corporations love it, when we say "it's the government's fault". It takes corporations off the hook

[FlubbydaTubby]

I don't normally comment on videos but I don't know what to do. The world as a whole is a shitshow. I used to have dreams of being a musician or an audio engineer, but now I don't care. There's no point anymore. Say I do make it and become a professional musician, I then get shoved head first into the evil corporate machine, seeing the worst parts of humanity possible. I don't even care about making a living anymore because we're all going to die soon. I'm tired of being a slave and I'm tired of the disillusionment. We live in a super villain's nation. It's all a farce. I know everybody knows this but I can't escape the thought, and it's eating away at me. I don't know what to do

[seandowns]

During the height of the pandemic waiting in line to get into a store with empty shelves I jokingly said "This reminds of a 1970s scifi movie set in a dystopian future." Not realizing how on target my joke was. If Soylent Green shows up on the shelf at my WalMart, I'm going off grid.

[professorgrimm]

Blackrock already sounds like a company from a dystopian movie.

[SerpentGirl]

What scares me the most is how owning a house on medium income is nothing but a dream for me. In my area I just saw a $110, 000 house sell for $200, 000. It was less than 1000 sq feet, single story, had no basement. I weep for the generations to come after mine.

[joeshmoe]

Rewatching this now and remembering how I digested it a year ago, my understanding of what you’re really getting at took a long and skeptical time before it was clear, and in the end I realized your agenda and the way I honestly feel inside are such the same. Thank you, thank you for being objective and impartial.

[FormulaFanboy]

This is not a question. It's not a debate. This is a dystopia.

[lebigmacke]

In 2021, a lot of dystopian movies suddenly look like a good outcome. But right now, we might end up somewhere between Mad Max and Snowpiercer.

[huburgalula]

The news, at least in my country, doesn't even say a thing about climate change. It's just "Greece is burning. It's terrible. Now on to sports."

[the_algorithm]

The piece you put at the end about ways to make an individual difference in the face of overwhelming indifference was fantastic.
You should add that part into all your videos.
I hear so many lament (or excuse) that there is nothing "we" can do to make a difference and nothing will change.

I hope that your message at the end f this video teaches some that, yes, there is a way YOU can make a difference.

Thank you

[Mads]

My mom used to make me list three things I liked about the US whenever politics came up because I was always so (rightfully) negative. I don't know that "being grateful" applies to our situation.