<p class=”p1″><span class=”s1″><i>Fifteen Million Merits</i></span></p>
<p class=”p2″><span class=”s1″> Throughout the protagonist’s day to day life, he is constantly shown how many merits he has. This over time will make him believe that who he is, is tied to his monetary worth, You can see this the instant the satirical episode begins, when he gets up to brush his teeth and his merits are there on the mirror. This is almost a way for those who control him to say that to wake up, he owes them a part of himself. Another visual element influencing the lives of the “civilians” are the people in yellow. They are considered to be the lowest class of all people, even getting yelled at and abused by people on bikes who are pretty much slaves. The people in yellow are all overweight, which shows that this dystopian society is completely caught up in aesthetics; since the lowest class are represented by overweight people all the civilians tie the way they look with with being a lowlife. Additionally, the people in yellow appear in virtual games where the civilians can kill them in multiple ways for their enjoyment, which is another way the civilians are manipulated into caring about how things look, not what they really are. All of this is done to exploit the civilians and motivate them to bike every day, as well as purchase their healthy foods, like bananas and apples. In this dystopian society, people are antisocial, only care about themselves, and obsessed about making more money because of the people who control them. Although this world is way more severe than ours, it proves an inherent flaw in capitalism. Capitalism manipulates the consumer into thinking and acting a certain way, and this show portrays that in its worst, darkest possible outcome.</span></p>
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