Harrison Bergeron - Film and history The Awakening of the Zombies “Everyone was finally equal. They were not only equal before God and the law. They were equal in every way. No one was smarter than anyone else. No one was more beautiful than anyone else. No one was stronger or faster than anyone else. This is a short but powerful excerpt from the short story Harrison Bergeron. Not only does it make you wonder why everyone is equal, but it also makes you wonder how did everyone become equal? In the short story and film, Kurt Vonnegut presents a frightening vision of human society in the United States in the future, in which American citizens are all uniform. This then leads to their loss of individuality, and thus to the absolute deformity of humanity. Both the film and the short story share these themes, they also have a multitude of other similarities, but also have many differences. These differences, the irony and symbolism between the two, are what I will attempt to explore. The first apparent difference between the film and the short story is that the short story takes place in 2081. In the story, the government regulates everything, not just intelligence, but also strength and beauty, and disables people appropriately . The strong are forced to carry bags filled with lead bullets; Beautiful people are forced to wear masks so that others do not feel unequal in terms of appearance. People who are too smart are forced to wear radio transmitters in their ears, which are tuned to a government station that constantly bombards them with horrible sounds to scramble their thoughts. In the film, the year is 2053 and everyone is forced to wear mind-altering headbands that sit on their temples. These headbands electronically alter intelligence, effectively lowering one's IQ to the desired "average" point. Unlike the story, in the film no one wears masks to hide their appearance and some are more handsome than others, making them unequal in appearance compared to others. Additionally, the only "weight bags" worn were those of a dancer on television who carried a small ankle weight bearing no resemblance to the huge weight bags depicted in the story. Another difference is that, in the story, Harrison Bergeron apparently had the status of a god among these ordinary people. He was fourteen, seven feet tall, athletic, handsome and a genius..