History Main / TheMetricSystemIsHereToStay

** The crowning irony to all this is that officially, the United States ''does'' use the metric system -- the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_Conversion_Act Metric Conversion Act of 1975]] declares metric to be "the preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce," and [[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Executive_Order_12770 Executive Order 12770]] directs the Secretaries of the executive branch and their departments to "take all appropriate measures within their authority" to enforce its usage within the Federal government and promote education about its usage to the general public. Even earlier, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendenhall_Order Mendenhall Order of 1893]] officially defines U.S. customary measurements ''by reference to their metric equivalents'' -- that is, even people who think they aren't using the metric system are actually using it with a conversion factor applied.

** The crowning irony to all this is that officially, the United States ''does'' use the metric system -- the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_Conversion_Act Metric Conversion Act of 1975]] declares metric to be "the preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce," and [[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Executive_Order_12770 Executive Order 12770]] directs the Secretaries of the executive branch and their departments to "take all appropriate measures within their authority" to enforce its usage within the Federal government and promote its usage. Even earlier, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendenhall_Order Mendenhall Order of 1893]] officially defines U.S. customary measurements ''by reference to their metric equivalents'' -- that is, even people who think they aren't using the metric system are actually using it with a conversion factor applied.

* The 3rd edition rules for ''TabletopGame/StarWarsD20'' used meters, when literally all other games based on the UsefulNotes/D20System were based on the imperial system.

** Whenever a waypoint is placed on your {{HUD}}, it always measures distance in either metres or kilometres[[note]]Except, strangely enough, the PC version of ''VideoGame/HaloCombatEvolved'', which uses feet and miles.[[/note]].

* Creator/GeorgeOrwell's Literature/NineteenEightyFour gives some focus to everybody having to use the metric system; for instance an old man in a pub wants a pint of beer, because half a liter is not enough and one liter is too much.[[note]]Pubs in the UK use the Imperial system, in which a pint is equal to 568 milliliters, as opposed to 473 for a US pint.[[/note]] The protagonist Winston Smith is shown to think and work completely in metric, whereas British people at the time of the book's publication would have exclusively used imperial. Orwell was against the complete scrapping of Imperial, though he supported the use of the metric system in scientific work.

"Never heard of 'em," said the barman shortly. "Litre and half litre — that's all we serve. There's the glasses on the shelf in front of you."''

* Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "On a Clear Day, I Can't See My Sister":
-->'''Judge Harm:''' From now on, the restraining order is set at 200 feet.\\

** Another reference appears in the episode "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS3E23BartsFriendFallsInLove Bart's Friend Falls In Love]]", where Troy [=McClure=] mentions starring in an educational film dating from the early 70's titled "Here Comes the Metric System!".
** Also played with in "Homer the Great", where the Stonecutters (Freemasons parodies) sing a song about all their deeds, which includes keeping the metric system down.
* ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'': For the most part, the series uses metric in keeping with ''Star Wars'' custom. There are, however, two occasions — in episodes [[Recap/StarWarsTheCloneWarsS1E13JediCrash "Jedi Crash"]] and [[Recap/StarWarsTheCloneWarsS2E10TheDeserter "The Deserter"]] — where Imperial measurements are used for no discernable reason other than "this show was made by Americans".
* Although not science fiction, ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' always uses metric units, even in casual dialogue. It's an interesting choice for an American kids cartoon. Considering it is meant to look like an anime from Japan however, metric might be used since Japan ''does'' use the metric system.

** When the metric system was introduced in the United Kingdom, ''Punch'' did a satire which was purportedly a government information pamphlet that accompanied the switch from "Biblical" measures to Imperial (how many cubits in a yard?). Which was quite funny considering that there were people who wrote complex theories trying to justify the Imperial system, which differs quite significantly from the weights and measures used in the Bible, on religious grounds, demanding that it should be maintained against the "godless" Metric system. [[note]] There are some people in America, mostly in fundamentalist circles, who genuinely believe this to this day. SI being created in France -- by the rabidly anticlerical First Republic directly in the aftermath of the French Revolution -- does ''not'' help.[[/note]]

* Sometimes American writers attempt to avert WeAllLiveInAmerica by remembering the UK has (officially) adopted the metric system, but fail to realize just how resistant to it a lot of British society is, and therefore doing a lot of conversions to meters and kilograms for things that most Brits would measure in feet and pounds. In one ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatMouseDetective'' fic, Basil's sister warns Dawson "Give [Basil] a centimeter, he'll take a kilometer", something it would be very odd for a British person to say today, much less in the 19th century when the UK was reluctant to sign the Meter Convention (something it finally did six years after the US).

** Nearly all physiological measurements used by medical professions are quantified in metric units, which is very important for calculations of dosage, concentrations, etc. to avoid confusion over whether a medicine was supposed to be 40 grams or 40 ounces, where a mix-up can be deadly. Both prescription and over-the-counter medications are measured in milligrams for pills and milliliters for liquid doses. Body temperature is an occasional exception, as it's the one physiological variable to which the average person is able to assign a desired numerical value: convincing patients who grew up with Imperial units that 37.0º, not 98.6º, is an ideal number to read on their home thermometers is often more trouble than it's worth. Blood pressure is measured in millimeters of mercury.

* ''Machinima/CivilProtection'' implies that Earth's gone metric post-Combine-takeover when Mike gives directions in "Shadow of a Doubt":

* Sometimes American writers attempt to avert WeAllLiveInAmerica by remembering the UK has (officially) adopted the metric system, but fail to realise just how resistant to it a lot of British society is, and therefore doing a lot of conversions to meters and kilograms for things that most Brits would measure in feet and pounds. In one ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatMouseDetective'' fic, Basil's sister warns Dawson "Give [Basil] a centimeter, he'll take a kilometer", something it would be very odd for a British person to say today, much less in the 19th century when the UK was reluctant to sign the Metre Convention (something it finally did six years after the US).

* Creator/GeorgeOrwell's Literature/NineteenEightyFour gives some focus to everybody having to use the metric system; for instance an old man in a pub wants a pint of beer, because half a litre is not enough and one litre is too much.[[note]]Pubs in the UK use the Imperial system, in which a pint is equal to 568 millilitres, as opposed to 473 for a US pint.[[/note]] The protagonist Winston Smith is shown to think and work completely in metric, whereas British people at the time of the book's publication would have exlusively used imperial. Orwell was against the complete scrapping of Imperial, though he supported the use of the metric system in scientific work.

** The show often (but not always) uses metric units that are not used in contemporary Britain in its futuristic stories, such as kilometres, even though it almost always sticks to miles for stories set in contemporary Britain. Examples of futuristic stories that use kilometres include [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E6TheMoonbase "The Moonbase"]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E4ColonyInSpace "Colony in Space"]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS17E5TheHornsOfNimon "The Horns of Nimon"]] and [[Recap/DoctorWhoS33E2DinosaursOnASpaceship "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship"]].

* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' and its movies were known for using both the metric and imperial systems, sometimes in the same sentence, in a faintly baffling manner... [[RealityIsUnrealistic much like]] [[ModernStasis the modern scientific community]] [[CreatorProvincialism and US military]]. The novelisation for ''Film/{{Star Trek IV|The Voyage Home}}'' featured Scotty having to mentally translate from metric to US customary when talking to the factory owner.

* ''TabletopGame/BattleTech'': All measurements have always been done using the metric system- this is most noticable with ranges and speeds are given in meters and kilometers per hour and mass done in kilograms and metric tons.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' and ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}} 2020'' both used metres for ranges and kilogrammes for encumberance purposes.
* The 3rd edition rules for ''TabletopGame/StarWarsD20'' used metres, when literally all other games based on the UsefulNotes/D20System were based on the imperial system.

* Despite the occasional request from modders looking to reenact the Apollo program in as much detail as possible, ''VideoGame/KerbalSpaceProgram'' uses metric for in-game measurements of distance, speed, temperature, mass, and thrust. Resources like electric charge and fuel, on the other hand, [[https://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Parts#Units_of_measure are labeled in arbitrary unnamed units]]... though even those are loosely based on metric measurements.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Technobabylon}}'', a 2087 news article mentions that the [[UnitedEurope European Federation]] has converted to decimal time, divind a day into 10 hours, an hour into 100 minutes, and a minute into 100 seconds. Obviously, not everyone is a fan, and other nations have no intention of moving away from the traditional 24-hour clock.

** For various reasons, British road signs still give distances in miles despite the fact that the metric system has been taught exclusively in schools since at least the early 1990s. The usual cited reason for not changing is the sheer expense of changing pretty much ''every roadsign in the land that has a number on it''. Every distance sign and speed sign would need to be replaced, which would be a colossal undertaking for little practical benefit -- even if you don't know how long a mile is, all you really need to do is follow the numbers on the speedometer.[[note]]Although larger countries such as Australia (see below) have done this, the problem that the UK faces is that they have far, ''far'' more signs than Australia. It's estimated if the UK wants to switch all their signs to metric it'd take five times as much effort as Australia.[[/note]] There's also the problem that nearly all UK cars display miles per hour as the primary unit; while kilometres per hour has been legally required to be also displayed for decades, the km/h figures are often small and hard to read.

* Canada officially adopted metric in 1977, but its adoption by the general public has been hit and miss -- for instance, many people use Celsius for outdoor temperature but Fahrenheit for indoor and/or body temperature, or measure long distances in kilometres but short and medium distances in inches and feet... unlike Brits who are more likely to use centimetres and metres for short and medium distances, but miles for longer distances. Rural Canadians living in the prairies often use miles, simply because the grid roads are a mile distant, so measuring out three miles on an unmarked road is easy -- three major cross roads, and you're there. This has a lot to do with the vast majority of Canada's population living within 100 miles (160 km) of the U.S. border and getting nearly all U.S. media, so the population is still constantly exposed to the old system, unlike in, say, geographically isolated Australia where it was much easier to simply ban use of Imperial.

* Irish road signs were a hilarious mish-mash for a long time: Distances were given in kilometres, but local speed limits were displayed in miles per hour until they finally changed them. Some older road signs with the distances displayed in miles are still present on some backroads.

** Retailers exclusively use the metric system for ''all'' foodstuffs apart from beer and milk, which are defined in both systems... though that's more due to being required to by EU regulations, and some grocers will still sell fruit or meat by the pound if asked (they must list the metric equivalent). Market traders made a huge fuss about this when the regulations first came out, with some greengrocers who were fined for refusing to do so being heralded in the press as "the metric martyrs".

** Audio jacks are measured in millimeters, with the 3.5 mm length being the most common.

Although fiction set in the present-day United States tends to use [[UsefulNotes/AmericanCustomaryMeasurements imperial units]], fiction set in the future is more likely to instead use the metric system. This may be because it makes things seem more futuristic: scientists use SI units (the current and modern incarnation of the metric system), the United States itself uses indirectly the metric system (American customary units are defined by the NIST in terms of metric units), and most other countries, except [[UsefulNotes/ThatSoutheastAsianCountry Myanmar]] and UsefulNotes/{{Liberia}}, officially use the metric system.[[note]]Although it just means Myanmar's and Liberia's governments aren't actively making effort to switch to metric; both countries do use metric a lot.[[/note]] As it is, the U.S. military uses it if only to stay in sync with its allies.

* Pakistan went metric in the 1970s, replacing the Imperial system. The process is still not totally complete. Celsius has replaced Fahrenheit completely (except in medicine) and liters are used more than ounces and km are increasingly replacing miles, although the later is still commonly used. OTOH, inches, feet, yards, etc. are used in everyday life. It's 6 feet, not 1.82m. A person weighs 200lb, not 91kg. Seriously, try and use the metric system for anything. In the business world, the Imperial system is still used.

** Thanks to a law passed during the UsefulNotes/LyndonJohnson administration and expanded in the 90s after NAFTA, many consumer goods are labelled in BOTH metric and customary, with it being maddeningly inconsistent as to which is dominant – generally it's whichever number is better-rounded; that's why soft drinks are sold in both traditional and metric sizes. Contracts with the U.S. government legally require measurements to be in metric units; however, an almost blanket exemption is trivially obtained (and the original law routinely ignored), so we're stuck with non-metric for the foreseeable future thanks to apathetic and cheap government. There are a few packaged products that are labelled ''only'' in customary or metric, which is where it gets really weird. [[labelnote:Here We Go]] Milk (labelled in divisions of a gallon) was specifically exempted by Congress from ever having to go metric. Same with Beer (listed in ounces). Wine and spirits, by contrast, are metric-only – this was acceptable to the public because, by lucky coincidence, the common bottle size of [=750mL=] is extremely close to the volume of the classic "forty" ([=757mL=]).[[/labelnote]]

* ''Film/{{Avatar}}'', naturally. ("[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klick_(unit_of_length) Klick]]" is military slang for kilometer, in case you were wondering.) Also normal person slang in Canada.

* Sometimes American writers attempt to avert WeAllLiveInAmerica by remembering the UK is (officially) on the metric system, but fail to realise just how resistant to it a lot of British society is, and therefore doing a lot of conversions to meters and kilograms for things that most Brits would measure in feet and pounds. In one ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatMouseDetective'' fic, Basil's sister warns Dawson "Give [Basil] a centimeter, he'll take a kilometer", something it would be very odd for a British person to say today, much less in the 19th century when the UK was reluctant to sign the Metre Convention (something it finally did six years after the US).

* Sometimes American writers attempt to avert WeAllLiveInAmerica by remembering the UK is (officially) on the metric system, but fail to realise just how resistant to it a lot of British society is, and therefore doing a lot of conversions to meters and kilograms for things that most Brits would measure in feet and pounds. In one ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatMouseDetective'' fic, Basil's sister warns Dawson "Give [Basil] a centimeter, he'll take a kilometer", something it would be very odd for a British person to say today, much less in the 19th century when the UK was reluctant to sign the Metre Convention (which it finally did six years after the US).

** Retailers exclusively use the metric system for ''all'' foodstuffs apart from beer and milk, which are defined in both systems... though that's more due to being required to by EU regulations, and some grocers will still sell fruit or meat by the pound if asked (they must list the metric equivalent).

-->'''Barbara:''' Don't be silly, Susan. The United States has a decimal system. You know perfectly well that we do not.\\

:: A good guess on the part of the programme's producers, as the UK would indeed decimalize its currency eight years later. It was not, however, all that psychic, as decimalization was already being seriously discussed, and it was fairly obvious it would eventually be adopted.

:: A good guess on the part of the programme's producers, as the UK would indeed decimalize its currency eight years later. It was not, however, all that psychic, as decimalization was already being seriously discussed, and it was fairly obvious it would be adopted.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In the first episode, [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild "An Unearthly Child"]], the title character, Susan Foreman, doesn't know [[UsefulNotes/OldBritishMoney how many shillings there are in a pound]]:

** The show also often (but not always) uses metric units that are not used in contemporary Britain in its futuristic stories, such as kilometres, even though it almost always sticks to miles for stories set in contemporary Britain. Examples of futuristic stories that use kilometres include [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E6TheMoonbase "The Moonbase"]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E4ColonyInSpace "Colony in Space"]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS17E5TheHornsOfNimon "The Horns of Nimon"]] and [[Recap/DoctorWhoS33E2DinosaursOnASpaceship "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship"]].