Jack Gustafson
I think it is highly unrealistic to think that Soylent Green could ever be an actuality, not just because I’m basing this off of a Sci-Fi movie, but due to human nature. I find it highly unrealistic for there to be massive overcrowding, food shortages, and an environmental catastrophe without there being massive disease to weed out the human population. Without a doubt, I believe that most of the Earth would die out by the time living becomes as bad as in Soylent Green. Disease becomes the odds-on favorite for weeding out the population as there would be shit-ton of people with malnutrition running around; I’m sure people would start eating each other before there could be the illusion that they weren’t, for them that would be a godsend.
Okay. Ignoring disease and cannibal armies, we should expect law and order to completely collapse with an anarchic society occurring rather than an authoritative one. I think it is unrealistic to think that any government would be able to stay in power when there are that many people who have little faith in their government. You may point to China or North Korea but we can see that the population is controlled and conditioned to understand that their way of living is the best, but there is no way that the entire planet could be made to act like that without considering the extreme loss of life that would go along with that action.
The chances of Soylent Green actually occurring are incredibly low, even considering all the conditions that existed within the film. Perhaps I just see things in a black-and-white manner, but I think that humanity as we know it would cease to exist before anything like what happened in the film could happen. People in general are only concerned about their basic needs, so I believe that if we had massive overcrowding, overcrowding to the extent that we saw in the film, most people would support extermination of minority peoples in order to stay alive. I hate to think that I am so pessimistic about human nature, but I think that would be the natural outcome, that or vigilante groups doing what the government wouldn’t do.
Why would it be unrealistic to assume that any government would be able to stay in power when that many people have little faith in their government? What about a majority of the governments of Africa and the Middle East? What about the U.S. Congress? The last time I checked the U.S. Congress had an approval rating south of used car salesmen and Sham-Wow salesmen, yet the re-election rates of members of Congress are higher than existed in the Soviet Politburo. What about Haiti? Nigeria? Bangladesh? And yes, China? Where is the disease that is taking out the overpopulation in each of these countries? I don't see it. What I do see is massive overcrowding in each of these countries and malnutrition (with control by a totalitarian government).
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