Headscratchers / The Purge: Election Year

• Fridge Brilliance: I originally posed the question "When the NFF member is looking down the barrel or a gun, why does he encourage Dante to "purge" himself, instead of cowardly offering to pay Dante off and explainining that it's not his fault? The NFFA are based around eletism and implied white supermacy, not any of the crap they tell the public about purging their anger, and he already proved himself a massive hyppocrite by trying to kill Roan while he was safe in the chapel. But the NFFA presumably never employ any non-psychopaths for their powers of selfishness and manipulation. He knew that begging for his life would just ensure that Dante shot him, but by doing what he did, he correctly anticipated Dante would feel ashamed and spare him.
• Why did the NFF have to remove the restrictions on class 10 officials to kill senator Roan? It's just begging their enemies to assassinate them, and they're already the bad guys to who obviously don't know the meaning of controversy. Couldn't they just use class 5 weapons on her on a normal purge night and then say "Well what're you gonna do about it, run against us?".
  • Considering that with those polls Roan will have support among politicians and big portions of the society, they could end up in prison afterwards, after all with the Restriction still in Place, killing her is still considered murder by law, purge night or not.
• What is the significance (if any) of moving election day to May 29? Does it have some significance in-universe that I missed or out of universe? I thought it might have been the original release date for the film, but it doesn't fall on a Friday in 2016.
  • Voters are easier to control if there's fewer of them or are too injured to make it to the polls.
• This may fall under the MST3K Mantra but the inclusion of foreign purge tourists opens another plot hole: Why don't Americans emigrate? While not exactly cheap, if the foreign nations of the world are barring immigrants from the US, it begs the question of how exactly the US can continue to survive (since barring immigrants is seen as such an aggressive action that the US would need to take action or else be walked all over, causing the country to collapse). Yet the prospect of even illegally immigrating across the border to Canada never comes up as a consequence of designing an annual murder night that kills the poor. Illegal immigrants are already coming to the US under less harsh circumstances in their own country, yet people don't appear to have considered leaving the US for the same reason in the films.
  • You hit the nail on the head "not exactly cheap". Tens of millions of US citizens are living paycheck to paycheck. Even more only have small emergency funds. It's hard to leave the US without money. The poorest are probably those hit hardest by the purge. I imagine the middle class simply ride out the purge safely in secure homes with plenty of firearms or form a neighbourhood watch. It's probably cheaper and easier than leaving, especially as they likely want to protect their homes and private property. Sure you could leave to Canada for a night but what do you do when your house is burnt down and insurance won't cover it?
  • I originally posted an answer that was taken as trivializing the plight of refugees, so I'll change it. Logically speaking, everyone should be hit hard by the Purge, because even if no one kicks your door down to kill you and your family or sets your house on fire (which being in it at the time will do little to stop), your business gets burned, your customers and coworkers murdered, but that was debated to hell and... yeah, just to hell. It stayed there on the page for the first movie, there's no good answer. Anyways, historically and psychologically speaking, when shit hits the fan in your own country, you're far more likely to revolt to protect what you have than to flee at the first sign of trouble, but a revolution, both violent and non, is the whole point of this movie, so there's really nothing to complain about. You'd think that more people would discuss going on vacation though.
  • Wouldn't the suspension of the rules against targeting government officials put foreign ambassadors and diplomatic personnel at risk? For example, purgers might take it as an excuse to go after UN personnel in New York or attack the various embassies located in Washington.
• This is mentioned on the main page too, but it's been bothering me for weeks. What exactly was the girl from the convenience store going to do after the Purge was over? You kill your parents. Great, now what?
  • She was crazy, nothing more to it.
  • She is also probably wealthy. She drives a nice car, all her friends have swagged out weapons, some plated in gold and diamonds. She's probably got enough money to not have to worry about not having parents. This also explains why she got so angry about the candy bar. She's spoiled and used to getting her way. The one time she doesn't get it she decides to kill everyone.
  • In addition to the above, she probably gets whatever life insurance her parents had.
    • I'm fairly certain the life insurance company wouldn't pay out to someone who purged her own parents. Certainly the parents would be unlikely to buy a policy that allowed that.
    • The life insurance company may not have a choice in the matter, if she has technically not broken the law. The parents would probably have the option of excluding Purge night from their coverage, which would likely mean much lower premiums, but only if they were willing to risk leaving their daughter without an insurance payout in the event that they were killed that night by somebody else. Even if we assume that there's no life insurance payout, she'd be entitled to any assets they left. She also doesn't seem like somebody who considers the consequences of her actions so I'd buy it that she was angry with her parents over something petty and killed them, not stopping to think what this would mean for her afterwards.
  • Forget afterwards, how is she a threat during the Purge? Sure, she has a nice gun and is cutting her way into the store, but she and her friends are going to be stuck entering in single file while everyone in the place has a gun. That's a killzone; all she's going to accomplish is ruining a security door then getting shot.
• Since movie went out of it's way to show that tourists actually arrive just to participate in The Purge this created a very huge plot hole. For example, Russia could easily send in basically a whole division (or even more) worth of Spetznaz operatives disguised as tourists (with weapons, explosives and other equipment stashes prepared well in advance) and just destroy USA in one night - kill all key political figures, destroy key infrastructure, etc which would be extra easy when whole country is in total anarchy for one night. No traces, no evidence of foreign state involvement - hey, everything is legal in 12 hours, right?
  • The government still functions during the Purge. It's just the local law enforcement and emergency services which don't. As for government leaders and key infrastructure, it's a kind of bizarre idea that they'd be easier to get to on the one night everyone is EXPECTING a siege as well as violent assault.
  • Also, before anyone interjects with "is probable that military stations are standing by" or something. Again, whole country in total anarchy for 12 hours. Special Forces infiltrates military installations, neutralizes any personnel on duty, captures all WMD silos and then rolls out red carpet for incoming reinforcements and proceeds to full blown invasion. Country in, I repeat, TOTAL ANARCHY won't be much of a threat for direct military invasion.
    • There are some pretty good points to the above, but it's not likely that USA's main allies could send enough disguised special forces into the country to disrupt it from within, given America's size and resources. Any sufficient number of foreign special forces will likely raise suspicion as well. Furthermore, it's simply possible that the other nations like using the purge as a means to single out and kill their own sociopaths while middle to upper class Americans go to foreign nations for a vacation. No need to get rid of a good, but mordbid trading opportunity.
    • I highly doubt America has any allies in this world. Just saying.
    • Its not TOTAL ANARCHY. The second film shows the Government is very active during the purge (sending it's own death squads out and targeting political dissidents). I don't think they just ignore the country for 12 hrs every year. I imagine all politicians are secure in safe houses. US military and special forces defend important infrastructure. Aircraft carriers and military bases across the world are probably on high alert. Heck the nuclear DEFCON level is probably raised and nukes on standby to launch. People can't do anything in the Purge, explosives are banned, killing government officials or attacking specific places are banned. All the things your Spetnaz would target would be avoided by civilian purgers and can be monitored/guard and if attacked forces can be sent to investigate, protect and retaliate. It's probably the worse time to invade or attack the US.
    • Except that raises a very important question: If enough soldiers are on duty during the Purge to prevent something like that from happening, who's protecting all of their families? Because if their families aren't protected, there would have already been a military coup led by a massive number of disgruntled junior officers and NCOs who've lost family to the purge (sure, generals and their families may receive special protection, but I doubt sergeants, lieutenants, and captains get that). Despite what the filmmakers may think, the vast majority of soldiers in the western world have little interest in being part of a death squad or killing civilians for sport, and an army made up of psychopaths and sociopaths who joined up just to kill isn't going to function very well for the rest of the year, and many of the other soldiers would most likely despise the death squads (If they come from the regular military but have their identities hidden, then someone could probably figure it out based on "who is extremely supportive of the purge and is almost never stuck with guard duty during the purge?")
    • The movies make it pretty clear that there are the official rules of The Purge (all emergency services stand down, larger scale weapons are prohibited, and certain government officials are exempt) and the unofficial and sometimes contradictory rules of The Purge (don't stick your neck out to help people, don't mess with the triage vans, don't mess with the secret government death squads, et al). I'd bet that one of those unofficial rules is "the military looks out for its own", with active duty service members and their families being safely sequestered on military bases that are locked down tighter than a drum, with the highest discipline strictly enforced. We already have a system that encourages the poor and underprivileged to disproportionately join the military, a safe place for your immediate family on Purge Night would just be one more benefit for a recruiter to tout.
    • That might hold water, had it not been established within the first half-hour of the original movie that military veterans, themselves, are fair game on Purge Night. Even if a service member's immediate family (how immediate, exactly? just spouses and kids? parents and siblings? grandparents? how about all their nearest and dearest?) are eligible for protection while that member is serving, nobody stays on active duty forever.
    • It's also possible military laws are still in effect. That way the government doesn't have to worry about, say, sentries freely abandoning their posts or taking bribes to let people in, or people with armoury access selling off weaponry to purgers.
• What the hell were the Secret Service agents outside Roan's house expecting to accomplish? It's virtually guaranteed that the house would be targeted by an organized force, to say nothing of random purgers. Yet they have no cover, no heavy body armour, and any weapons they have are small enough to be concealed in their suits (while not even being at the ready). They don't even seem to be paying attention to their surroundings. Sure, being on guard duty for 12 hours will get monotonous, but they know a threat is incoming. Even if they were certain the snipers on the roof would detect/deal with any major threats, then why be outside at all?