Society Marches On: Difference between revisions

* ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20110819194031/http://www.webscription.net/10.1125/Baen/0743436067/0743436067__17.htm Cocoon]'', a short story by [[Keith Laumer]], has everyone living in virtual reality tanks a couple hundred years in the future. The husband "goes" to a virtual office and does virtual paperwork, while the wife sits at "home", does virtual housework and watches virtual soap operas all day. When the husband comes "home", he complains because the wife hasn't gotten around to punching the selector buttons for the evening nutripaste meal yet.

* ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'' has several parts where social mores have not dated so well. One example is the alien from Betelgeuse who tries to pretend he's human, and English, by adopting what he thought was a very common name - [[wikipedia:Ford Prefect|Ford Prefect]]. While probably funny back when the first radio serial was released, the fact that he's named after a car that hasn't been around for nearly half a century completely ruins the joke, and to date ''no'' adaptation has changed the name to something like "Ford Focus" or "Ford Fiesta". Another possible example is the claim that humans are "ape-descended life forms" that "are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea". This was back when digital watches were fairly new but not totally ubiquitous, but reading it now, can you think of ''anybody'' in a developed world that is still that impressed with digital watches?

** Interestingly, when a comic book adaptation was being written (in the early '90s or so), Adams was approached about changing the line about "digital watches" to "cell phones", and he adamantly refused, insisting that the cartoonist was missing the point. So, what ''was'' the point? Well, um... er... ah! Cell phones are actually useful devices due to their mobility, while digital watches have no advantages over regular watches. So, Adams probably considered digital watches a pointless novelty while thinking that cell phones are actually useful. Uh, you know, probably.

** As shown in the television series, the watches he was talking about used power-consuming LED displays, and so you had to push a button to see the time. The joke is probably that Douglas Adams found those types of watches impractical.

** On the other hand, lots of jokes based on George complaining about his "button finger" (with the implication that what we are lazy about will just get more crazy in a world where you just push buttons all day) are more of a [[Funny Aneurysm]] due to increasing awareness of Repetitive Strain Injury.

*** Not to mention several jokes about the standard work week being ''9 hours'', based on the popular conception of the time that technology would allow people to work far less. Not only has the exact opposite happened for many people but cell phones and email has allowed bosses to contact employees 24/7 meaning that the separation between work and leisure has become blurred.

***** Most people rarely sees free time as leisure time, but rather time to use to get more work in for more money. Their parents and grandparents worked the same hours, but earned far less.

* Many future-themed classic cartoons, from [[Looney Tunes]] to MGM, fit this trope. In many instances, they even assume the ''dress styles'' of the era in which they were made will still be relevant in the future.

 

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