How Stupid Can We Get?

Did you happen to catch the commercial where concert-goers are holding a car up by their outstretched arms, letting the pristine vehicle “people” surf through the front rows? Well, there was a tiny disclaimer at the bottom of the screen which warns that you shouldn’t actually do this in real life. I’m glad they told me, otherwise my next Barry Manilow concert could’ve been tragic. Imagine having to get out the jaws-of-life because Eric got a little too carried away with a Subaru during the anthem known as “Copacabana” (dare you not to sing along).

How stupid can we get? Where is the line drawn between safety and an I.Q. test that our population seems to depend on someone failing? I recall just months ago when an avid skydiver jumped off a banned-from-skydiving cliff to prove the safety of the “sport.” I also recall the videotape following the skydiver down to a gruesome demise. Other than creating more footage for the ever-educational “Faces of Death” series, what did it accomplish?

Is it stupidity or a suicide mission? The little-watched movie “Fight Club” hit on an interesting take. It claimed that men are looking to prove themselves in such a passive society as this. But aren’t women, too? Much is changing in this world, including the gender power struggle. Is the confusion of our once-established “roles” creating a dumbed-down version of ourselves, not unlike those who grew up near nuclear power lines, or is it breeding “thrill-seekers” who are nothing more than potential suicides that cheat death secretly to their own chagrin?

Is it the technology? In his timeless Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler refers to the notion that human beings receive tools many years before they are prepared to use them properly. He may have been referring to political machinery, but can the open doors of the Internet, even faster-than-fast food and so many other “instant gratification” processes be creating a listless, challenge-less society that will screw itself over if another Ice Age won’t screw them over first? Do we crave an enemy, even if it must be found in our own cracked mirrors?

Or is it just a stupid commercial?

-Eric Butterman