WALL-E, ADHD, and social systems
Pixar’s 2008 animated film WALL-E is one of my favorite movies of all time.
It’s not without problems, but I love the way it uses music, lighting, and action to tell a story with limited amounts of dialogue. I love the Ellie-and-Carl montage in Up! for the same reason.
I recently watched WALL-E as Sociological Storytelling by Pop Culture Detective, and had a bit of an aha moment about ADHD and social systems…
The video essay talks at length about how people typically follow paths of least resistance. Often, when people behavior a certain way, it’s because the social systems in which they operate expect them to rather than because of any individual preference.
WALL-E is atypical among his fellow robots, and does not follow the social norms and paths of least resistance aboard the Axiom.
ADHD folks (and neurodivergent people in general) are a lot like this, too.
The social norms that neurotypical follow often seem silly or nonsensical. We tend to resist authority-solely-for-the-sake-of-authority. We need to know why. “Just because” isn’t a good enough reason to do anything.
In the movie, WALL-E is met with a lot of resistance. He’s a lone weirdo deviating from the system for much of the film.
But then he finds his people. And together, they change the world.
In a world of robots blindly following the predefined paths, be a WALL-E. Challenge the status quo and nonsensical systems. Make the world better.