50 Years Later Is Soylent Green Proving Accurate?
The movie Soylent Green released in 1973 was a Sci-Fi look into the future. Depicting scenes of corporate wealth and those people living in extravagant surroundings Vs. most of the citizens are living in the streets or overrun broken-down housing. The police are being used more as riot squads than anything, as the masses wait and fight for food handouts. Which in this future are processed and manufactured food chips. Topping it all off is the acceptance of government-assisted suicide.
You can search and find better summaries and even the full movie to watch.
Below are some recent news stories that are matching up with the future Soylent Green predicted.
1.) The extremes of the 2-class (have vs have-nots) system:
Well, that’s pretty obvious and everywhere today.
2.) Manufactured Food:
We are seeing more news headlines like this with plant-based meats, and talk of insects for student lunch programs. To help you find this on Google, use the search term “Lab-Grown”.
The difference between this and the movie is that today we are still trying to make it look feel and taste like the real animal. In Soylent Green they gave up on that and just make squares or chips.
3.) The government assisted suicide:
Besides current Doctor-assisted suicide in a few states, Canada recently passed a Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) law. So this is happening.
Today I saw a post regarding a VR experience out there that is designed to sort of simulate a near-death scene. They even had an out-of-body experience and the image used in the article flashed me back to a famous scene in the movie.
Fortunately, I don’t recall any news stories about the connection made in the movie. However, like in the movie, it does feel like we are living in a time when the media would not report on it, even if it was happening?
