There's a lot of human behavior I don't understand. Used to make me feel like an alien as a kid.
Like the super unhealthy parasocial relationships people think they have with famous people, and more appalling is the way the media feeds right into it. People acting like it's normal to obsess over details about celebrities personal lives is very weird to me.
I don't understand cheating... just break up and then you can fuck who you want. Why does deceiving someone and breaking their trust have to be a part of it? Why is that necessary?
I don't understand how you can be the richest elongated muskrat in the world, so rich you just doubled your wealth, and not do anything to help people who need it. I don't know how he can live with himself. And what I really don't get is that he clearly wants the world to see him as some sort of important amazing brilliant person. So why not do the thing. DO THE THING AND HELP YOU SELFISH FUCK
Don't even get me started with bigotry. It just does not make sense. Why does someone's skin pigment effect people so drastically? Why does the gender or sexual orientation of strangers matter? People need to focus on themselves and mind their business. If someone would like to make minding your business the new fad of 2025 I'm here for it.
Littering is one of those things I struggle the most to understand.
I can somewhat grasp it in extreme cases, like when you’re dealing with something really dirty and there’s nowhere to put it. But I’m talking about casual littering - things like throwing candy wrappers on the ground when you could just as easily put them in your pocket.
I don’t think anyone sees themselves as a bad person. Even when we engage in bad behavior, we usually have some story we tell ourselves to justify it. But I can’t put myself in the mindset of someone who casually throws trash on the ground for someone else to clean up. It’s kind of like walking around and cussing at random people - it just doesn’t make any sense. You have to know that you're the problem.
Celebrity gossip. I'm just not interested in who married who, who's wearing what, who's doing who.
And reality TV, but if ratings are any indication, I'm the weird one on that.
The need some people have to be part of a group.
I've been "alone" for such a long time that it probably affects how I see things like this, but I just don't get the need some people have. I'm thinking from things like worshipping a politician just to be part of a group to more simple things like needing to insert yourself into a group at work just to be "one of the guys." I've always just done my own thing and never considered myself part of anything, whether friend groups, work "cliques," or whatever. If it was "Tim, Tom, and Tina" I could be friends with all of them, but I never felt like I needed to be, or even ever was part of "their" group. I just come and go as the situation arises.
Some things like politics I obviously fall into one category or another based on my beliefs, but I don't conform or alter my beliefs just to maintain a position within that group.
Preferring looks over functionality.
So many things in today's world are dogshit covered in a pretty wrapper and everyone eats it up. Meanwhile things that actually work well and last get ignored because they're not pretty.
I'm not saying things can't be pretty but you should never put form over function.
I can’t understand how getting in an argument with a family member cannot be solved by explaining my side then listening to their side so everyone’s on the same page. I think this is why it’s sometimes said women want someone to listen whereas men want to solve the issue. I cannot understand not trying to solve the issue. If I think I was right or logical then I want to explain it but I also want to hear the other party and arrive at a middle ground then hug. That never works and I cannot get it.
A group of humans need to pass through a doorway with two doors. The leading human opens one of the doors and passes through the doorway. The next human follows them through the open doorway, and so does the next, and the one after them. The humans bunch up around the one open door, funneling themselves through it rather than opening the other door right beside it.
Then I, the smartest and best of humans, make use of my divine and otherworldly gifts to open the other door that was right there the WHOLE TIME. Truly I am a gift upon the world. Someone should give me chocolates.
Hate. Like I don't understand how someone can hate others for the dumbest shit like race or sexuality or gender. Like, I don't truly hate people easily, and when I do hate them, it's because of their actions and/or words. Hating things/people is so exhausting. Idk how people can carry that shit around all the time.
Eating boogers!
Why!? Like sure, kids do it but they also eat sand and basically anything they can put in their mouth.
But why would you do it as an adult?! You can pick your nose and the fling it away, or even wipe it on a wall like a psycho, but eating it?? I guess at least it's keeping the environment clean?
Wanting to be popular. Wanting to know famous people or worshipping them. Dressing the latest fashion. Participating is all the fads.
A lot of ceremony-like events confuse me.
They seem designed to be as tedious and gruelling as possible. Consider Graduation Ceremonies, or the ceremonial part of Weddings. Just hours in a hard chair, listening to some old motherfucker blabber on and on about random bullshit. (the parties afterwards I understand and respect, even if I'm the opposite of a party person. The only thing I like about parties is the excuse to dress up and eat cake. But hey, people enjoy dancing and drinking and stuff, that makes sense to me.)
Is this some Neurotypical thing I'm too Autistic to understand? Like do people actually enjoy this?
EDIT: Actually, since I brought up drinking when talking about parties.
.... I don't comprehend people that like alcoholic drinks. It's one thing to enjoy the feeling of being buzzed, we all want to turn off our brains sometimes, and of course it is literally addicting.
But I am talking about people who apparently enjoy the taste. Every type of booze I tried tasted like something between "medicine" and "actual poison".
People will spend a fortune in Wines and Beers and they all just taste bad. Then they'll swear up and down "no no dude, this wine is super sweet" and then you try it and it tastes like every other wine, which is to say it tastes like you took grape juice and sucked out all the joy.
A type, true believer office people.
It's all laid out, you have at most 100 years and 50ish healthy ones if you're extremely lucky, and you want to spend more energy then you absolutely have to... micromanaging others and bragging about maximizing your office work output as you eek out a living?
I genuinely find the coworkers that try to drown themselves in corpo kool-aid disturbing. Soulless. I find them as sad and pathetic as they probably find me for my half hearted, clearly mocking impression of corpo culture, as I don't show my true self at work.
Like just.. Why? It's a job. The owner truly doesn't care if you live or die. Stop bragging that you canceled on your family yet again in favor of your "work family."🤮 They think they're setting an example for their coworkers to follow, but I'm just sitting there pitying them.
Impersonal revenge. I understand the overwhelming emotions when it personally happens to you and needing that "payback". Not that i support it, but i understand it and I'm pretty sure I'd feel the same at the moment if it happened to me. But when it's people you don't know, and you still seek "justice"? There's no justice in increasing cruelty in the world. It only makes the world worse, not better. I think a lot of prejudices, like racism and such, evolve from this way of thinking, and our civilization would be a better place if we stop our revenge centered thinking. Hurting someone because they hurt you or others is weird to me. There are so many other ways to punish people without hurting them without a benefit other than "it makes me feel good to see them hurt because they're bad people".
A very light one, but "Gotta have it all" attitudes in video games.
I too, remember the Gamecube days when the console didn't connect to the internet, and if there was anything to unlock in the game, it came from hitting buttons really well. We're now in the days where the glittery, shiny purple armor (with the same armor stat) sometimes costs money. And yeah, quite often it's more money than I'd say it's worth.
I guess I just don't get the people who still get a bunch of "cool" things in the game, but still feel angsty and frustrated because they don't have everything - because they haven't completely cleared their minimap of every objective, gotten a platinum achievement, or grabbed that one pointless thingy that only shows up through RNG.
I tend to experience a "majority" of games that I enjoy, and that already is enough to absorb a lot of my time. For games that have DLC content, I might buy one or two skins I like, and still spend less in total, inflation-adjusted, than I would on one disc back on my gamecube.
Most of them
I'm going to be the 'tenth dentist' here and say eating spicy food.
I understand that eventually people build a tolerance so it hurts less but I can't comprehend being willing to even reach that point, especially since it's still not completely pain free I have been told.
Those I've asked say it's a really good flavor, but to me that sounds like being willing to eat a handful of broken glass (assuming no long term damage) as long as it tastes good. There are other foods that taste good and don't hurt, not even slightly.
Watching reading videos.
I also enjoy these, but what on earth is that about? We have videos of someone's face telling a story, we have videos of things happening for us to see (real and fake), why are stories read aloud while the words appear on the screen so interesting?
Also, we have access to the websites where these stories are coming from. This is the part that does make sense to me, I often miss those certain comments that make the best stories... So it's like a best of the best compilation to watch the reading videos.
But still, why? Why is a reading video the preferred way to find these cherry picked posts and comments from Reddit and Tumblr. Wouldn't a Best Of collection of screenshots or reposts do that job?
Not technically a behavior, but - having hurt feelings over other people expressing their negative opinion about myself.
Like, say someone tells me I look bad of that I acted badly or whatever. I see three options:
- They're right, so it's a good thing they told me.
- They're mistaken, so it doesn't really matter (though the fact some people might think that way is still valid information)
- They're being mean, in which case I don't really care about what they say.
I guess it's some defense mechanism? I can see how that would work with people prone to narcissism, but having ones feeling hurt over things like that seems normalized in (most?) societies.
Oh, also religion. People believe in an all powerful being that personally cares about every person in the world, but is unwilling to reveal itself? Despite having zero corroborating evidence? And he's responsible for every good thing that happens to me therefore I should see that as proof it exists and believe more, but if something bad happens that's because I didn't believe hard enough and should therefore believe more? And you're sure about that and don't see how that might be purely because this answers a psychological and social need? I understand I'm exaggerating a bit, and no offense to religious people, but... I don't get it.
This product costs $14 to make, they sell it for $30.
They remove three screws and replace the beautiful $6 screen with a bottom of the barrel $3 screen saving $3.06. People would easily pay $5 more for the nicer screen, but they can only focus on cost cutting instead of making a still modestly priced great product.
Dancing.
I'm biased because I'm rythmically deficient, but it makes no sense to me. It's just weird wiggling.
Worse still is clubbing, which is just dancing in a hot, sweaty dark room where the drinks are $13 each amd you don't get to pick the music, or turn the volume down.
This might be the most boomer thing I've ever written.
Counting someone else’s tragedy as a personal blessing AKA when the privileged make someone else’s tragedy about them.
“I’m so blessed” whilst looking upon someone who’s struggling with mental or physical issues/homeless. And they explain it as their way of having gratitude.
I’m all for the gratitude lists but it’s not meant to be another channel wax on the narcissism and quell esteem issues by comparing yourself to others. Need a benchmark to know you’re doing well? Compare yourself with where you were yesterday. Not where someone else is today.
Esteem boosts shouldn’t come at the cost of pulling attention from someone else’s tragedy to pat yourself on the back.
How some people have to constantly get into someone else's business that doesn't have any negative affect on their lives or society and try to force the latter to conform to the former's worldview. Religion is notorious for this, demanding others conform to the ideology's rules even if they have no desire to participate or believe, but it can also be as simple as being critical of someone's differences and trying to make them change.
People being mean or cruel to other people or living things just to see them suffer. I don't understand it.
People out here stating obvious human problems and I'm out here like: why do humans like Chocolate?
People who treat their friends as more unconditional than ethics.
Over compensating when an injustice is learned. We don't change anything meaningful, it seems, and when this happens, we create a whole new problem
Judging people for how those people spend their money.
Hear me out, poverty and wealth inequality is a systemic societal issue, and just like one person recycling plastic bottles isn’t going to solve pollution or global warming, just like that one person doing charity or whatever isn’t going to solve systemic wealth inequality.
Tax wealthier people at higher rates, but don’t judge someone for getting a gold toilet after they’ve paid their fair share to society.
Life is all bullshit and made up anyway, and if someone’s self actualization involves getting a gold toilet, then who am I to say no? Not everyone wants a gold toilet, and no one should try to get one by ruining someone else’s life. If your money is ethically sourced, and you’ve paid your taxes, get two gold toilets, who cares.
Abuse.
