Atomic mutants, zombie plagues, alien overlords, cannibals and brutal contests – we can imagine dystopian futures. I hadn’t heard of ‘Purging’ in an apocalyptic context before. It’s a short window in which violent crime goes unpunished for the greater good. But a Purge could never happen in our society, could it?
Dystopia (literally bad place) is the opposite of utopia – a concept used by philosopher Thomas More in 1516 to describe an ideal society. Characterised by dehumanisation, authoritarian governments, ruthless mega-corporations, environmental disasters, or other things associated with a dramatic decline in society, they are often found within the science fiction and fantasy genres. Think 12 Monkeys, Planet of the Apes, The Matrix, The Hunger Games, A Clockwork Orange and Mad Max. A dystopian society gives a chilling glimpse of a possible future and sets the scene for a good story.
Throughout history, purges have been perpetrated by totalitarian regimes against dissenters. With a dystopian society in place, Science-Fiction brings both ideas together. The 1967 episode of Star Trek The Original Series: (S1/Ep21) Return of the Archons, was first to explore this. The Command Crew of the USS Enterprise beam down to a civilised planet just before ‘Festival’, a period of sanctioned violence, destruction, and sexual aggression. The festival is a means of social control, imposed by a benevolent supercomputer. There is an underground resistance, but there is so much left unexplained – even though it is only a 45 minute episode. The episode was written during America’s war with Vietnam, and despite the prominent humanist views of Writer/Creator Gene Roddenberry, the episode is a criticism of a totalitarian (communist) society.
In the Rick and Morty episode, Look Who’s Purging Now (S2/Ep9), Rick and Morty arrive on a planet just before a ‘festival’. As in Star Trek episode above, it’s a night of lawlessness and violence without consequences. It’s a fascinating idea and the two stay to watch. The episode references the 2013 film The Purge throughout – already hurtling down a rabbit-hole, I had to watch that next!
The Purge (2013) sets up a very interesting dystopian scenario. Based on the not too distant future of an America where there has been an economic collapse (like the one in 2008). When a political party called the “New Founding Fathers of America” is voted into office, 12 hours of every year is devoted to the purge. Ostensibly to satisfy the inherent human craving for violence. While the middle classes are safe inside their heavily fortified homes, mobs of students, disgruntled employees and PTA mums take to the streets to settle scores, do a bit of looting or worse. All participants are given a handy excuse too: purging is for the greater good, being purged is a great patriotic honour and a wonderful sacrifice to make on behalf of your nation.
The film touches on a darker idea; that purging is nothing more than a cynical form of population control. That the poorest, the most undesirable, those unable to defend themselves (the sick, homeless and disabled) are purged from society. The results are dangerously oversimplified. With the ‘unproductive’ successfully purged over 8 successive years, the economy is booming (presumably as people have listened to the Brain-Gremlin (from the 1990 film Gremlins 2: The New Batch!) and put everything they have into canned food and shotguns!), unemployment is at 1% and crime at an all-time low.
Before production, the film was labelled “too un-American” due to its themes of violence and gun control, it was released as a home invasion/horror film and did better than expected at the box office. It leaves too many questions unanswered. Although senior politicians are exempt, it does not reveal who is behind the purges or what their endgame is. We are told that hospitals close, but do prisons and care homes open themselves up for the purge? The film received a mixed and puzzled reception from audiences and critics alike, but went on to spawn another five films.
How would our society respond in a purge? The 10/80/10 rule of human behaviour can help us understand. I have blogged about this before. This was explained to me during some fraud training delivered by the West Midlands Police that 80% of people will go along with or even participate in fraudulent behaviour if they believe they will not get caught. 10% of people will happily join in and gleefully take the opportunity to commit fraud, while the remaining 10% will actively oppose any wrongdoing. This ratio also pops up frequently in economic theory. It’s a fascinating idea, you can apply it to a hypothetical situation: from a Nazi occupation to finding a wallet in the road. Or a purge.
Austerity is a purge against disabled people and it has been going on since 2010. Successive Government’s ‘business as usual’ approach, maintaining discredited benefits while reviewing them, simply does not work. Pip was introduced in 2013 to support disabled people meet some of the extra costs (Scope estimates these costs to be at least £12k per year) of being disabled and has not been reviewed properly until now. My friend Emma explains the problems with Pip on her blog. This month, The Timms Review declared Pip (personal independence payment) “unfit for purpose” and warned that it is failing to keep pace with how disability, health and work have changed over the past decade. This report shows that the clumsy claims process has long been a problem and places an unfair administrative and emotional burden on many disabled people and their families.
Carers Allowance was also exposed almost two years ago as unfit for purpose. The plight of some unpaid carers, who were hit with demands to repay huge sums or face criminal charges was bought to light. Despite an independent review published last year and the introduction of reforms, this is still happening today.
In 2022, I warned that disabled people were being led down a dark path. I described ‘a perfect storm’ of Government Policy, Global Media and The Pandemic that was killing disabled people. 4 years later, We have a new government who are struggling to make changes quickly enough. At last year’s Budget, the Chancellor optimistically announced that austerity was ‘coming to an end’. It hasn’t. The worst of the pandemic may be over but we are left with the fallout. The media still portrays disabled people in negative ways.
It is not just disabled people who are in a bad place. There is not an elite class or a 6000 year-old supercomputer behind this. We are already at the edge of society and always the first to get pushed over.
Everyone is headed towards disaster and it comes down to greed. According to the World Inequality Lab, the richest 10% of the global adult population holds between 75% and 82% of all global wealth. They also own the corporations that make them richer and keep the rest of us trapped in cycles of poverty and poor health. It’s not as simple as blaming the super-rich elite. Much of the blame rests with the 80% of us with our compliant consumption of meat, plastics and fossil-fuels. It does not help that we also dismiss the 10% who try to resist.
There are life-changing drugs that are unaffordable, more and more people are being pushed into poverty, pollution is all around us and the world is on fire. We can’t keep looking away, we have to break out of this trap and purge ourselves of our dysfunctional relationship with capitalism.
Richard C Brown MBE – July 2026
World According to Me: 