"The federal government has sponsored research that has produced a tomato that is perfect in every respect, except that you can't eat it. We should make every effort to make sure this disease, often referred to as 'progress', doesn't spread"
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Rooney’s line lands because it treats “progress” like an infection: something that moves through institutions automatically, celebrated even as it leaves people worse off. The “perfect” tomato is a miniature parable of technocracy, a joke with teeth. “Perfect in every respect” parodies the way bureaucracies and corporate labs define success - by metrics that look impressive on paper (uniformity, shelf life, transportability) while dodging the only standard that matters to an eater: can you actually enjoy it?
The federal government is the punchline’s engine. Rooney isn’t just dunking on scientists; he’s targeting a system that can fund and validate a research agenda detached from lived experience. The tomato becomes a symbol of public money laundered into prestige projects and administrative proof-of-work, where “innovation” is rewarded for being novel, not for being nourishing. His phrasing also mimics official triumphalism - the press release voice of progress - and then punctures it with the blunt, domestic fact of eating.
The subtext is broader than produce. It’s about modern life’s constant trade: convenience and scalability over flavor, texture, repairability, and human scale. In late 20th-century America, you can hear the backdrop: industrial agriculture, processed food, and the rising suspicion that institutions were optimizing for growth and efficiency while ordinary quality quietly eroded.
Calling progress a “disease” is Rooney’s cynical inversion of the national religion of improvement. The joke works because it’s not anti-science; it’s anti-self-congratulation. It’s a demand that “better” be measured at the point of use, not in the lab report.
The federal government is the punchline’s engine. Rooney isn’t just dunking on scientists; he’s targeting a system that can fund and validate a research agenda detached from lived experience. The tomato becomes a symbol of public money laundered into prestige projects and administrative proof-of-work, where “innovation” is rewarded for being novel, not for being nourishing. His phrasing also mimics official triumphalism - the press release voice of progress - and then punctures it with the blunt, domestic fact of eating.
The subtext is broader than produce. It’s about modern life’s constant trade: convenience and scalability over flavor, texture, repairability, and human scale. In late 20th-century America, you can hear the backdrop: industrial agriculture, processed food, and the rising suspicion that institutions were optimizing for growth and efficiency while ordinary quality quietly eroded.
Calling progress a “disease” is Rooney’s cynical inversion of the national religion of improvement. The joke works because it’s not anti-science; it’s anti-self-congratulation. It’s a demand that “better” be measured at the point of use, not in the lab report.
Quote Details
| Topic | Sarcastic |
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