History Main / PhlebotinumInducedStupidity

* In ''SoulNomadAndTheWorldEaters'', [[spoiler:Danette appears to be TheDitz for much of the game, but it turns out that the block on her memories is to blame. When it's finally removed, she's only a little bit ditzy.]]

* The novel ''BimbosOfTheDeathSun'' is centered around the author of a [[ShowWithinAShow novel within a novel]] with the same name, whose basic premise involves solar radiation messing up computers; as a side effect, it also make women world-wide lose intelligence. Despite what it sounds like, he wasn't doing it to [[AuthorTract make any kind of social point or be chauvinistic]] -- the idea was simply based off of the fact that some diseases are linked to sex.

* The end of the PresidentEvil arc in the {{DCU}} explained LexLuthor's blaming {{Superman}} for a kryptonite meteor heading for Earth, putting on PoweredArmor, and ranting madly on national TV, by him having injected himself with a mind-altering mixture of Bane's Venom formula and liquid kryptonite. Why he decided he needed some pretty low level SuperStrength despite being the President of the United States is definitely PlotInducedStupidity though. Damn you Loeb.

* "AUM" in the ''{{Illuminatus}}!'' trilogy is a hallucinogenic drug cocktail that renders users highly creative and supremely gullible at once. When one character tests it by spiking the punch at a meeting of a FictionalCounterpart to the Knights of Columbus, the group ends up renouncing Christ and adopting geocentrism.

* CalvinAndHobbes:

* In one episode of ''AdventuresOfSonicTheHedgehog,'' Dr. Robotnik accidentally takes a Stupid Pill instead of a Smart Pill.

* ''WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants'': "You won't get away Man-Ray; not while we have the Orb of Confusion!" Which, by the way, causes a wave of confusion that ''starts'' with the person who turned it on, making it a very ''literal'' IdiotBall.

* Played with in an ''I.M Weasel'' Short on ''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken'', in which [[ButtMonkey I.R. Baboon]] managed to publish a book that apparently turns everyone who reads it into complete and utter idiots. Lamenting on this turn of events, I.M. Weasel decides to expose himself to the "stupid powers"... but remains unaffected. He eventually realizes that everyone around him was already a stupid twit and he just didn't notice it.

* In the ''{{Eureka}}'' episode "E=MC...?", eating cloned chicken meat causes most of the town to lose their knowledge, common sense, attention span, emotional maturity, etc.

* The novel ''BimbosOfTheDeathSun'' is centered around the author of a [[ShowWithinAShow novel within a novel]] with the same name, whose basic premise involves solar radiation messing up computers and (as a side note) making women lose intelligence. Despite what it sounds like, he wasn't doing it to be chauvinistic - he's an electrical engineering professor and the phenomena were based in his research.

* The ''JudgeDredd'' comic had an experimental weapon named "the Stupid Gun." It fell into the wrong hands--HilarityEnsues.

* In an episode of ''ChalkZone'', Craniac 3 tries to get Rudy with a smart bomb. It is sentient, though, and does not want to blow itself up. He instead opts for the Dumb Dart, which lowers intelligence.

* There's an episode of ''JimmyNeutron'' where Jimmy builds a "brain drain" helmet to lower his intelligence to normal levels. Unfortunately, the helmet works a little too well and he becomes a blithering idiot.

* An episode of ''RockyAndBullwinkle'' featured "goof gas". Bullwinkle was too stupid to be affected by it. Boris remarked something like, "Goof gas affects the brain. No brain, no effect."

* An episode of ''InvaderZim'' had a power amplifier that "radiated pure stupid" when [[TheDitz GIR]] hooked himself up to it.
* In the ''ReBoot'' episode "Enzo the Smart", Enzo messes with the clock speed of Mainframe in an attempt to make himself smarter. He asks it to make him twice as smart as everyone. Instead of becoming smarter, everyone else becomes [[LiteralGenie half as intelligent]] as him.
* [[TheSimpsons Homer Simpson's]] stupidity isn't natural: a crayon lodged in his brain takes 50 points away from his previously average IQ.

* Used as a brief gag at the end of one episode of ''BuzzLightyearOfStarCommand''. RobotBuddy XR has had files he's not supposed to have on his brain chip throughout the episode. At the end he deletes them. However, he also erases most of his IQ by mistake.

* In ''ThePenguinsOfMadagascar'' episode "Sting Operation," the penguins use one of Kowalski's inventions to make themselves stupid [[spoiler: so that they can't feel the hornet's stings.]]

* [[JohnnyTest Susan and Mary Test]] built an intelligence amplification machine, and Johnny used it to give them an IQ of 22.

* ''LiloAndStitchTheSeries'' has Experiment 319, named Spike, who can spray spikes that raises peoples' silliness by 99%, leaving them only 1% clever.

'''Examples:'''

* Raki

Generally played for comedy, with the afflicted people talking in [[SimpletonTalk exaggerated "stupid" dialect]] and making decisions that are a TakeThat against whatever the writers oppose. In almost all cases, the effect hits both "book smarts" and "common sense", even though they're different kinds of intelligence. For extra fun, one character will be functionally immune to the effect due to already being stupid.

Generally played for comedy, with the afflicted people talking in exaggerated "stupid" dialect and making decisions that are a TakeThat against whatever the writers oppose. In almost all cases, the effect hits both "book smarts" and "common sense", even though they're different kinds of intelligence. For extra fun, one character will be functionally immune to the effect due to already being stupid.

* An example where the change is permanent, the Creator/StephenKing short story ''The End of the Whole Mess'', was about some Phlebotinum applied to the world's water supply in order to make everyone less aggressive. It worked, but it caused the end of the world anyway, because a side-effect was rapid onset dementia/Alzheimer's.

* In an episode of ''ChalkZone'', Craniac 4 tries to get Rudy with a smart bomb. It is sentient, though, and does not want to blow itself up. He instead opts for the Dumb Dart, which lowers intelligence.

* ''LiloAndStitchTheSeries'' has Experiment 319, named Spike, who can spray spikes that raises peoples' sillines by 99%, leaving them only 1% clever.

* The ''BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' episode "Beer Bad." Buffy drinks cursed beer which turns her into a cavewoman. (Although she still looks the same, the guys who drink the beer literally look like cavemen. Granted, Xander expressly cut her off before the rest) Ends with a SpoofAesop:

* In the utterly depressing [[AlternateUniverse alternate]] MarvelUniverse that serves as the setting for ''MutantX'', there is a DumbMuscle character called The Brute. He used to be brilliant scientist Hank [=McCoy=] before his notorious ProfessorGuineaPig tendencies took a tragic turn, leaving him too stupid to figure out how to reverse what he'd done to himself.

* The end of the PresidentEvil arc in the {{DCU}} explained Lex Luthor's blaming {{Superman}} for a kryptonite meteor heading for Earth, putting on PoweredArmor, and ranting madly on national TV, by him having injected himself with a mind-altering mixture of Bane's Venom formula and liquid kryptonite. Why he decided he needed some pretty low level SuperStrength despite being the President of the United States is definitely PlotInducedStupidity though. Damn you Loeb.