Kiefer Sutherland, Reiko Aylesworth, Carlos Bernard, Jude Ciccolella, Glenn Morshower, and Mary Lynn Rajskub in 24 (2001)

This list is not only the result of the overwhelmingly obvious dumbing-down that's been propagated for the last few decades in western Europe and America by the entertainment industry (as well as other sources), but more specifically it is the result of my growing frustration whenever I switch on a "documentary" channel, hoping to find an interesting, informative - i.e. real - documentary.

Obviously, I'd lost that hope years ago already, not as of recently. But after so many years of witnessing this accelerated devolution, my patience had reached critical mass, and I simply had to react to this disgusting onslaught of rubbish and lies. I want to compile as many examples of this ever-flowing river of trash as I can.   About 15 years ago, Discovery Channel used to have scientific programs, even challenging programs that went against the tenets of political correctness, but now it's all fake reality-TV hooey. The National Geographic, once a legendary institution that stood for serious exploration and science, now stands for political indoctrination, cheesy sensationalism, and goofy hahaha comedy programs. The History Channel used to be jokingly called "The Hitler Channel" because of its numerous WW2/Hitler programs, but bad as it was now it is far worse: it's become just another reality-TV pile of useless junk. Travel Channel, Planet Earth, and BBC Earth are examples of other culprits. And that's just the channels I have: there must be 100s of others that serve mostly as dumbing-down machines. Documentaries are not a dying breed, they're a dead breed. As dead as the Dodo bird. Quasi-documentaries and propagandamentaries replaced them.

The list consists of non-scientific, quasi-scientific, semi-scientific and anti-scientific "documentary" series, programs and films, plus pseudo-historic films/series. This list is about the wholesale rape of science and history on the small and big screens, focusing predominantly on the last 30 years or so.

When I say "orchestrated" dumbing-down I am not implying a vast global conspiracy that involves 100,000 "one-percenters". Some of these entries - especially the politically-laden films - are definitely part of an orchestrated (political) movement to stupidify and armageddonize audiences (hint hint a certain former Vice President of the U.S. who now lives off millions he'd made from ecological fear-mongering), whereas most of the TV series shown here were created more spontaneously and are based purely on jump-on-the-band-wagon profiteering off a fad. For example, haunted houses being "inspected" by charlatans pretending to be psychics.

Of course, supernatural gobbledygook has never been just a temporary fad, it's been part-and-parcel of human ignorance for millennia. Except that a prehistoric caveman or a 15th-century serf had very valid excuses for their ignorance. What excuses might modern-day paranormalists have? Pretty much none.

In recent years/decades, the level of propagandist brainwashing and sensationalist "science documentaries" have hit the television (and even the big screen) like a crapavalanche that won't stop and only seems to get stronger, bigger and more omnipresent. Practically every major film company is in on it. Motives? Either financial or political, and sometimes both. (Any political motive is by definition financial as well, in 99% of all cases. A certain ex-Vice President has created enormous wealth by preaching Doomsday scenarios to the clueless and the naive.)

Some of these films/series are the very obvious kinds of trashploitation "documentaries" that advertise the existence of Bigfoot, the Yeti, alien invaders, the Loch Ness water-lizard, UFO cover-ups and other silly rubbish.

But I've also included the less obvious scams, i.e. the more refined and better funded (politically funded) "serious" films and TV series that don't lie about everything but "cleverly" combine facts and lies in the service of promoting fashionable/current ecological fables. These are the politically-orientated entries veiled as "dire ecological warnings by concerned citizens": all those propagandist shows/films that proudly, pompously (yet unconvincingly) wave the flag of "real science" while misusing science for nefarious ends.

Unfortunately, a lot of these entries feature real scientists, i.e. archeologists/anthropologists/biologists/physicists/cosmologists with college degrees (and even cushy government jobs) who have no qualms about participating in crackpot-science programs, as long as the check is in the mail... There is a rapidly increasing trend among (younger) scientists to promote hogwash and non-science as real science, simply because it brings them easy/quick money. They are hired by non-principled producers (and populist politicians) to lend their films/shows "credibility". I mention some of them in the entries below, though it should be anyway rather obvious who these "mercenary" scientists are. Some of them are household names.

Of course, some of these programs/films use clueless 16 year-old upper-class kids to promote their lies through, because clearly a 16 year-old kid from a wealthy/privileged elitist family is so much more convincing than a middle-aged scientist who refuses to appear in garbage... (This really should tell you everything about the dishonest intentions of certain producers of these laughable films.) What's next: animated Disney cartoon characters preaching save-the-Earth malarkey?

Included also are history "documentaries" that show extreme bias and/or lack of substance: programs that approach history from a very superficial angle and/or with a clear political agenda, and/or with the focus being on sensationalism rather than truth and facts. Added to these are also biopics and "historical" fiction films that toy with historical facts in ways that are obvious, blasphemous, and fantasy-like.

Many history documentaries that are factually sloppy have not been included, simply because I am not aware of their flaws. I am not an expert on Roman Times nor the Viking Eras, for example, so I am not competent to judge just how flawed some of these programs are. Hence many such series that deserve to be here aren't listed.

This list will never be complete, because:

a) Some shows/films aren't listed on IMDb, especially many non-American ones

b) Many new dumb shows/films are being made as we speak

c) I can't possibly be expected to hunt down every single piece of nonsense that exists currently

Hence this list should probably be at least twice as long as it is. My intention isn't to get ALL the rubbish on the list, because that's impossible for one person to do, but it's to show you just how rampant dumbing-down has become, and how accelerated this devolution is.

The order is somewhat structured: the list starts off with UFO stuff, then goes into ghost territory, then climate change, and later biopics, psychics, religious tales, and other nonsense... There are sections, it is more-or-less ordered.

This is the order, more-or-less:

UFO/Aliens, Ghosts, Monsters, Climate Change, Moon Hoax, Flat Earth, Bible/Evolution, Pseudo-Medicine, Movies, Diana, Hitler, Slavery, Moore, 9/11, Psychics, Nostradamus, Bermuda Triangle, Exorcism. 

Anti-Science, Biased History & Deception: Orchestrated Dumbing-Down?

Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation (2019)

Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny in The X-Files (1993)

Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry, and David Schwimmer in Friends (1994)

Lists Related to Phenomenon

More to explore

Recently viewed