While on an outing with an old childhood friend, we stopped by at McDonald’s
since her siblings are feeling a bit peckish. I let them purchase their food
first while I lingered around a CD booth to look for interesting movies and
only after a while I joined them. About time I was beginning to get hungry too,
but seeing the queue is long enough to reach our seat, I decided to wait for a
moment since only one available counter is open. Took long enough for the queue
to subside so I decided to join the queue.
Upon closer inspection the counter next to it is actually open and a man
dressed sharp in business clothes, ties and all is waiting patiently there for
the workers to get his order, just beside a long line of people. Being me, I
noticed NOBODY dared to queue behind him, all alone and comfortable waiting
there with ample space as opposed to the line of 8-12 people jostling together
just to get their order. Maybe the line is slow on the other side. I decided to
wait for a while to observe whether someone with a sound mind decided to line
up behind the long queue, or behind the blissfully waiting businessman. Nobody
did, instead they opt to choose the line with the larger group of people.
Being my oblivious, deviant self (and too hungry to care), I trotted to
the counter just beside the businessman since he is just waiting and not
ordering. Wearing red clothes at that time wasn’t the
only reason that I may have attracted stares of disbelief from the long lines
of doom. Wasn’t jumping the queue so I had no reason to feel guilty. This is a
gamble that I took since waiting behind the only waiting person is better that
joining the long lines of doom, at least I have greater chance of getting my
food faster this way. Sure, while waiting beside the still-waiting businessman
already a customer has been served. Another one, and then another and still the
businessman’s order is nowhere in sight.
At this point of course I have questioned my life decision, thinking it
would be more convenient to follow the crowd beside me. But thinking logically,
it would be best to stay put since more people had queued in the long line of
doom. Somebody might have formed a snarky idea in his head about a lone girl
who stands beside a person who already waited long enough, “What a fool! If
only she queued in our line she would be getting her food faster.” Whatever, I
have decided and I should stay true to my decision. Then the cashier came with
all the orders and the businessman got his food and went away, contented. Yay.
Then I got to order my food with a triumphant feeling of beating the line
beside me, if I were to queue there.
Only then I saw people started to flock behind me, sensing an
opportunity of a shorter queue. Dude, why didn’t you do it sooner? Are you
perhaps scared to stand beside some sharp-dressed guy? This thing never fail to
amuse me till now. Perhaps I am thinking too much, but hey, there must be a reason
why this happens.
Munching on my reward of being on
the shortest queue (2 person vs 10+ person before others joined in), I pondered
upon this occurrence. Maybe some psychological factor is in play. Is it herd/mob
mentality? A strong desire to conform to the crowd? Or scared of grabbing a new
opportunity? Mulling over my curiosity, I considered all the aforementioned
reasons to be plausible before panicking. If I have witnessed this effect is in
play in a small scale, then surely this thing has happened before in a larger
scale, too. Like something deeply ingrained in a society, people following
blindly what others do just to fit in. And what if some individual decided to weaponize
this ‘mob mentality’ to control people’s actions and using it for nefarious
purposes? *Opens history book* Oh wait, there is so many examples here…What a
paranoia-inducing thought.
Since then I have decided that it is
truly okay to be different from everybody else. Being human with free will,
your choices in life should be based upon what you believed in, not what others
are currently doing.
