People are strange

A meditation on the sheer baffling oddity of the human species...

Everyone's a weirdo

My Gran used to have an amusing little plaque by her phone with the legend 'All the world's weird save thee and me, and even thee's a little weird'. (Actually it said 'queer' not 'weird', but that doesn't give quite the right impression these days.)

Or as the writers of 'Yes, Minister' had it: 'It's one of those irregular verbs isn't it? I'm an individual; you're eccentric; he's barking mad'.

The title of a book by John Ortberg expresses it rather nicely: 'Everyone's normal till you get to know them'.

Or as I prefer to say, people really are weird buggers sometimes.

Inconsistent and irrational

Humans are inherently inconsistent, irrational and idiosyncratic

Human beings - that's you and me, hopefully - are inherently inconsistent, irrational, idiosyncratic, paradoxical, unpredictable and unfathomable. They are prone to mood swings and sudden apparent shifts of personality. They may be as nice as pie one minute and bite your head off the next. They may state an opinion with great conviction one day only to state the polar opposite the next, without apparently realising any inconsistency. They can quite happily hold double standards and mutually contradictory beliefs. They can be intelligent in one area yet stupid in another; able to understand complex cosmological theories and yet unable to hold down a job or form a successful relationship. History has demonstrated that it's even possible for a kind and loving parent to be at the same time a brutal concentration camp official.

Pride and prejudice

People are given to groundless yet unshakeable prejudices, glaring blind spots that they alone fail to see, irrational fears and desires, weird tastes, bizarre beliefs and opinions, unpredictable sensitivities, odd habits, illogical reasoning, strange and twisted ways of thinking. They are quick to take unnecessary offence and to leap to improbable conclusions. They can be sceptical of obvious facts and yet be taken in by ridiculous hoaxes. They can construct the most elaborate and bizarre conspiracy theories rather than accept the plain truth. Perhaps most bizarrely of all they can fool and deceive themselves in the most complex and clever - yet utterly stupid - ways imaginable.

Secrets and lies

nobody is without some secret oddity

People have secrets and strangenesses you could never guess. The quietest and most obliging person can be fantasising about murder; the most respectable pillar of the community can be hiding an addiction to kinky porn. I genuinely believe that nobody is without some secret oddity, some element of sheer barking weirdness or hidden unpleasantness in an otherwise apparently sane and decent personality. For a few, this emerges in newsworthy acts of madness or monstrosity. For everyone else, it remains hidden or comes out in more minor and harmless ways.

Sadly, all of this still includes you and me. Well, definitely you anyway, and perhaps me just a tiny weeny bit. All the world's weird save thee and me, and even thee's a little weird...