While popular movies and TV shows paint a dystopian future full of surreal landscapes, totalitarian governments, and post-apocalyptic scenes, it is more likely to consist of unappealing and mundane scenarios. In fact, once you look past the meticulously curated universe of social media, it may seem we’re already living in it. Senseless ads, broken machines, canned dinners, dreary headlines — we’re constantly bombarded with chilling reminders of the "boring dystopia" we find ourselves in.
While it may be hard to wrap your head around this phenomenon at first, you gradually get the hang of it. And then start seeing it everywhere you look. Here’s where the prominent corner of Reddit called 'A Boring Dystopia' enters the picture. "A subreddit for chronicling how Advanced Capitalist Society is not only dystopic but also incredibly boring," as the moderators describe.
When you think of it, the group seems to be the unofficial mirror of our society by sharing the most upsetting, ridiculous, and all too real examples of modern-day dystopia that prove something's not quite right with this world. Below, we wrapped up the newest batch of their posts to give you a reality check and hopefully inspire you to fix the near future. So continue scrolling and upvote as you go!
Psst! When you're done with this list, be sure to check out Bored Panda's earlier pieces full of dystopian madness right here, here, and here.
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Welcome To America
Silly rabbit. You just listen to us old entitled white guys ... we know what's best. God is directing us for your salvation.
There’s No Hate Like Christian “Love”
they're killing adults, people with actual lives, to prioritize unborn fetuses. and once they are born, they stop caring. i'm convinced now that everyone just wants control.
Explained Nice And Simple
In case you've never heard of "boring dystopia" before, the term was coined by the late British academic and cultural theorist Mark Fisher in 2015. It refers to the bland and mildly coercive signs that flourish in a late-stage capitalist society, which give out pervasive feelings of unease, discontent, and isolation.
That same year, Fisher started a Facebook group that documented these signs as a way to become more aware of the world around us. Members got the chance to share pictures of rarely seen England and the page quickly filled with eerie images of broken machinery, ragged shop signs, and cameras closely monitoring decaying streets.
The group brought together examples of "Silicon Valley ideology, PR and advertising which distracts us from our own aesthetic poverty, and the reality of what we have." All of this was accompanied by a description: "Neoliberal England is a boring dystopia. Here's why."
Flawless Logic
And Yet They Manage Our Life
And corporate American shows a great willingness to take any kind of government handout when the economy tanks. But my God don't call it socialism.....
Is This Signs Of A Healthy Economy?
"[The group] wasn't that well thought-out at the start, to be honest," Fisher said in an interview with Vice. "I'd never done a Facebook group before." See, he shut down the community when he noticed it started to become like any other group on the platform.
"It was just recirculating 'content' and sending links, keeping people inside what I would call capitalist cyberspace instead of looking outside at their own environment. It felt like it was reinforcing the condition it was intended to displace," Fisher explained. Although many felt it was an untimely end for the popular group, 'A Boring Dystopia' sprung up in its wake soon after. The subreddit was created in 2016 and has already amassed over 750k devoted members eagerly waiting for the newest posts.
Tax The Churches
And The Cycle Continues
‘Bout Sums It Up
"Boring Dystopia was partly about the fact that no one can care about stuff any more," said Fisher. "It's not that they don't care, but in a city like London, or any intensely pressured urban metropolis — add to that the pressures of capitalist cyberspace and people just feel like they perpetually have no time."
"Our resources for caring are depleted, and that has aesthetic consequences," he added.
"Pepsi Family"
From Mad Magazine, 1968
Little Girls Are Braver Than Some Of These Cops
Previously, we reached out to Macon Holt, Ph.D., a researcher at Copenhagen Business School and author of Pop Music and Hip Ennui: A Sonic Fiction of Capitalist Realism, to learn more about this phenomenon. According to him, "boring dystopia" is related to another term introduced by Fisher — "capitalist realism". He used it to describe "the pervasive belief that capitalism is the only viable form of the political, social and cultural organization following the end of the cold war."
"Boring dystopia is more about the aesthetic experience of living in capitalist realism at a point in time when the system appears ever more unsustainable (ecologically, [politically], and in terms of increasing inequality and decreasing standards of living) but in which no other way to organize society has emerged," Holt told Bored Panda.
Who Else?
The government here (Australia) gave out some cash during the pandemic to stimulate the economy. Every person I know who qualified for the cash used it on the dentist.
Maybe We Laugh So We Don't Cry. Or Rage
Why. Are. People. Writing. As. If. One. Word. Was. A. Whole. Sentence.
Lock Up The Poor
Absolutely. Can't pay bail, exorbitant 'court fees,' thousands of dollars to an ankle monitor company? You're stuck in jail.
Although we may imagine a dystopian future similar to exciting movies like Blade Runner or The Matrix from the '80s and '90s that offered depictions of going out with a bang, it is more likely to consist of mundane scenarios. "As the years in which those images came around, none of the dreams or nightmares came true," Holt said.
"Instead, space travel is becoming the hobby of billionaires while they ignore the ecological crises they could perhaps help with, AI and robots seem either to be surveilling us while they vacuum or when we click on a link, and the VR worlds of the metaverse are just ways to charge us more rent for spaces that we can't actually occupy."
Indeed
How Much Have You Contributed To The Modern Day Feudal System?
America Is The Best Country In The World!
While this list involves some of the most evident examples of boring dystopia, Holt mentioned bureaucracy is also a common one. "Like the terms of a rental contract that forbid tenants to use cooking oil on the stove, so a landlord can keep the deposit if a single drop is found on the extractor fan hood."
"NFTs are perhaps a good example of boring dystopia," he continued. "If a sci-fi writer were to dream up a situation in which people paid the money they had earned doing actual work for a certificate of verification that they own a .jpeg of a bored ape, their editor would probably say the world the story depicted would be too depressing to publish."
It Sucks
The True Perspective
Attention: Homeless
He also noted that our beloved Bored Panda also draws attention to the conditions of contemporary boring dystopia in its name and tries to break up the monotony of the everyday. "In boring dystopia, people are often anxious about work, housing and the future of the planet, and there's very little to alleviate this. As Mark Fisher put it 'No one is bored, everything is boring.'"
Modern Problems Require Modern Solutions
Enjoy Another Recession And Global Warming Child
Australia is thinking about bringing back the baby bonus payment to get people to have more kids....because you know a small payment will solve all the reasons people dont want to have kids.
For some, pictures pointing out modern-day dystopian reality could be a source of entertainment. For others, they may create a daunting sense of a lost future. Speaking of the latter one, Holt said that the material things that make people feel that way (skyrocketing housing prices, student-loan debts, insane medical bills — the list goes on) stem from actions at various levels of society.
"It is just what happens when the interests of people with power align," he added. "Boring dystopia is the experience of our faith in the future having been betrayed. There is no quick fix. Instead, to quote Donna Haraway, we have to 'stay with the trouble' if we want to commit to a future we can flourish in."
When Your Boss Is A Robot
America - Solving The Real Problems!
Maximum Price, Minimum Quality, Ideal Suffering Of The Peasants
Yup, a 50 cent candy bar now costs $2.50 and is an ounce smaller. "New and improved" though!
"One piece of advice that is really easy for coming to terms with and starting to imagine a way out of boring dystopia would be to read Fisher's Capitalist Realism: Is there no Alternative? It is an incredibly accessible piece of critical theory and is only about 86 pages long. It is a great jumping-off point for finding out more. Read it with friends and talk about it after. It is a great way to feel less alone in a world that seems to be ever more isolating," Holt concluded.
"He Has Some Pretty Old Ideas About Things"
What A Dream
A crippling injury that results in a litigeous windfall. The American Dream....
Interesting
When fiction meets reality, like "The Handmaid's Tale". Next chapter, "Soylent Green"?
We Need To Stop And Reverse The Fingers
And this is the bad news: no matter at all our everyday little sacrificies, there´s not reversing to the collapse if the world still working this way
You’re Supposed To Like Working
Let me tell you, it's not because I have a deep passion for opening boxes of overpriced plastic merchandise. It's because my parents aren't millionaires.
Quality Healthcare
I Wouldn't Be Able To Afford A House Anyway, But Might Give A Try?
Oh look at this! They made a mess, but it's our fault? When my aunt was my age, she bought a house. Today, i'm not earning enough with my job to pay a rent of a little appartment. I can pay grocerries to help my mum and pay a restaurant for her birthday, but without my mum, i'll be in the streets.
Our Society Is Flawed And Rotten To The Core
He Really Just Came Out And Said It
Can We All Agree It’s Time To Tax Churches?
Can You See It?
2meirl4meirl
That's not correct. We can change the future. The future is not static. We change it through our present actions.
Ah Yes, The American Healthcare System™
Basically
Actually, he (the orange turd) was an extra of sorts. Would only allow the inside of his hotel to be used if he was in the movie. I believe his scene has been cropped now.
Organize And Join A Union
"The Circumstances"
Reminds me of the period of the late 60s to 1998 in Northern Ireland, which were called "The Troubles". Growing up in Belfast, that name was normal. It never struck me until I moved away, and talked about it with others, how polite that term was. Looking back, it's more like a term that the mainland gave to its little shame off the west coast.
Can't Have Anything
When did my sixth grade social studies teacher get a job setting Amazon policy. Seriously. Dude would joke about how your eyeballs needed to be "swimming in their sockets" before he'd let you go pee, especially if you were a girl. People about pissed their pants he was such a d**k.
Small Town Texas Politician Shares The Real Reason Police Are Armed
He's not wrong. My brother is an officer here in Texas. He's probably one of the best people I know- far better than myself. He was once caught on camera ( this dude was going around to different stations to "provoke" or "see if he'd get arrested" for filming the exits of said station. He'd done it a few times at other places and got what he was after, but the minute I saw my brother talking to him, man, I was so proud of him. Everytime the dude would call him a pig or tell him "you can't do anything to me!!", my bro just talked in a normal voice. Calmed him down and asked what he was REALLY doing. Then explained that filming the exits of a government building makes him look like a terrorist, or that he wants to hurt people. Dude was doing it to sue those stations that would arrest him. That was the day I knew he was in the right position. He's an Army veteran, Purple Heart recipient and my hero.
A Grim Reality Sets In
The Boomer Generation are so plentiful versus the Gen X'ers, there will be no CPP or OAS by the time I get to 65. There are literally not enough of us paying into the federal pension plan to ensure there's enough money for us when we get to that age. So. I will work until I die. Period.
A Boring Police State Dystopia
Funny how crazy conservatives talk about the "Radical Left" trying to make the U.S. into the USSR or Nazi Germany, when we already have a similar police state because of ultraconservative policies.
Daaamn, What A Good Ideea
A Straight Up Scam
That's so awful to do to someone who is looking for a job and probably doesn't have that money to begin with. On the other hand, it is a very creative scam they got going on there. I'll give 'em that!
Accidentally Accurate
USA Be Like
Note: this post originally had 119 images. It’s been shortened to the top 50 images based on user votes.
more like American who lives in dystopian nightmare... In my country I'm still allowed to have an abortion, and i have free health care
I was talking to a woman who vacationed in several places in Europe. She went to England, France and Brussels. She said the food was so fresh in each of those places and that there were laws that control the amount of processed food sold. Then I thought about it...they offer health care to the people. It's to the government's benefit to keep the people healthy. Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
What that woman failed to mention (probably because she wasn't aware) is that the price of those groceries has become so exorbitantly expensive over the past 8 months that people are switching to refined carbs and crappy food that is more affordable. Of course and as usual, southern Europe is taking the blow harder than northern Europe despite being the producers, due to stagnant wages and structural unemployment.
Load More Replies... more like American who lives in dystopian nightmare... In my country I'm still allowed to have an abortion, and i have free health care
I was talking to a woman who vacationed in several places in Europe. She went to England, France and Brussels. She said the food was so fresh in each of those places and that there were laws that control the amount of processed food sold. Then I thought about it...they offer health care to the people. It's to the government's benefit to keep the people healthy. Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
What that woman failed to mention (probably because she wasn't aware) is that the price of those groceries has become so exorbitantly expensive over the past 8 months that people are switching to refined carbs and crappy food that is more affordable. Of course and as usual, southern Europe is taking the blow harder than northern Europe despite being the producers, due to stagnant wages and structural unemployment.
Load More Replies...