The Show that changed our World

GI Joe: A real American Hero is the most influential show of all time.

This is a fact. You think I'm joking? You should know by now I never joke. Ever. I can sense your doubt and shall prove that GI Joe has shaped our world profoundly. The shows worldview was well advanced of its animated counterparts. Alien robots defending mankind might be a blockbuster movie but certainly not a current world event.

Geo-politically, the world we live in is virtually identical to that of GI Joe. The Special Forces units of United States Army are fighting a terrorist organization, while the Russians wield a lot of power, face a common enemy but are not really our friends.

Does this sound familiar? It does if you woke up at 5:30 a.m. August 17, 1985 to watch the Joe Team fight COBRA in an action packed commercial for toys. That is what the show was. It blurred the lines between patriotism, commercialism, entertainment, and advertising, kind of like Fox News.

Since the fall of Soviet Russia the United States Military has moved more and more to specialization and commando tactics, the same type of specialization and commando tactics portrayed on GI Joe. Coincidence, I say nay.

Cobra Commander inspired Osama Bin Laden. COBRA inspired Al Queda. The biggest difference being COBRA used legitimate business to fund their terrorist plans while Bin Laden got all his money from selling oil to American companies. Since Big Oil is closer to a drug dealing than business, so it’s totally different.

But Wait, there is more.

In the show GI Joe would occasionally team up with the Russians to beat the terrorist if it suited their over all purposes. The U.S. and Russia now partner in the real world war on terrorism, but on Russia’s terms. Russia’s main concerned with securing their own seventy and security. Russia also did this in children's program about war designed to sell toys. Man the 80's were so awesome. God bless Ronald Reagan.

The show also promoted a liberal social view that has permeated the culture as a whole and the military specifically. The "Don't ask don't tell " policy was in the show back in 1985 in the world of Joe. Look here is proof. Gays are now on active duty just like back in teh day. Gung Ho and Shipwreck were almost as gay as these two. Women are also now serving on the frontlines like Lady Jaye, Scarlet, and The Baroness did.

I think I have shown that both the geo-political and military industrial complex of today are strangely similar to GI Joe. So here's the question, How is the world we now inhabit not the one shown in the 1984 cartoon?

Laser rifles.

We do not have laser Rifles and that is a shame
K Tuttle