Humanity Is Insane: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

* ''[[Death Note]]'': This is pretty much the conclusion of [[Shinigami|Ryuk's]] ''[[All There in the Manual|Human Observation Journal]]'' (which he finds highly amusing.)

* In ''[[Macross Frontier]]'', {{spoiler|this was in fact the ''entire cause of the show's central conflict''. The Vajra, being [[Bee People]], didn't quite get humanity's whole 'individuality' thing, and assumed our lack of clear, unifying purpose and direction to be the result of a catastrophic breakdown of our [[Hive Mind]]. Being nice, altruistic types, they decided to rescue the being they believed to be the human [[Hive Queen]], Ranka, [[Bug War|and the rest was history]]. To their credit, though, they eventually realised their mistake, and even went as far as to sacrifice millions of their own to prevent the Frontier fleet from being obliterated by the [[Big Bad]] before offering them a place to stay on their homeworld}}.

* Semi-example in ''[[Puella Magi Madoka Magica]]''. {{spoiler|At one point Kyubey says that [[Starfish Alien|in his culture]], [[Blue and Orange Morality|emotions are considered a mental disorder]]. Although he never comes out and says this, the implication is that he and his kind view all humans as insane for having emotion. There is also an implication of [[Power Born of Madness]] from their perspective, as they are trying to turn emotions into energy.}}

 

* ''[[The Killing Joke]]'': Several of the Joker's more notorious schemes are attempts to prove this is true to everybody else—and maybe to himself. Otherwise, he'd have to face the possibility that maybe the world ''isn't'' crazy... that maybe it's just him.

{{quote|'''[[The Joker]]:''' Faced with the inescapable fact that human existence is mad, random and pointless, one in eight of them crack up and go stark slavering buggo! Who can blame them? In a world as psychotic as this... any other response would be ''crazy!''}}

 

* ''[[Men in Black (film)|Men in Black]]'': This could be why human thought is viewed as an infectious disease by some aliens. No wonder they don't want us to get our hands on a [[Universal Translator]].

* In the direct-to-DVD sequel, ''[[Starship Troopers (film)|Starship Troopers]]: Hero of the Federation'', the Arachnids (or Bugs) use this as a justification for attacking and taking over humanity.

* In ''[[Avatar (film)|Avatar]]'', when telling Jake he will be taught the ways of the Na'vi, Mo'at says, "We will see if your insanity can be cured."

 

* [[Values Dissonance]] can leave modern readers with the interpretation that it is the ''humans'' portrayed in the works of [[H.P. Lovecraft]] who are insane, being so fixated on a ridiculously dull, narrow-minded view of the universe that any exposure to the fact that they ''don't'' know everything there is to know about the universe and/or are not inherently gifted above even other branches of the human race causes them to end up going mad.

** This is particularly noticable when one compares straight up Lovecraft-authored protagonists to those of more "[[Sword and Sorcery]] branches" of the [[Cthulhu Mythos]], such as [[Conan the Barbarian]], where the protagonist, whilst still finding the [[Eldritch Abomination]]s to be scary, manages to take a stand at them and comes out ultimately mentally unscathed.

* In [[David Weber]]'s ''[[Out of the Dark]]'', the invading alien Shongairi are confused and flabbergasted by humanity's continuing resistance against them even after they've killed half of Earth's population. They eventually realize that, [[Humans Through Alien Eyes|by their own standards]], humans are clinically insane. The Shongairi, being a pack-based carnivorous species, have a psychology focused on pack-mentality, with the rest of the pack submitting instinctively to the strongest "alpha" once s/he has demonstrated superiority. All other species they've encountered are herd-based omnivores or herbivores, who will submit to deflect violence away from the herd as a whole. However, humans are family-oriented instead of pack- or herd-oriented, and as a result the act of bombarding entire cities off the map and killing half the population just ''pisses them off''. Since the need to protect family overrides submission, and pure, undiluted ''hate'' due to harming or killing family drives humans to keep fighting regardless, the humans come off as completely insane to the Shongairi.

 

* In ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' Spock often feels this way about humans. Particularly emphasized in the Leonard Nimoy song "Highly Illogical".

* The other aliens in ''[[Farscape]]'' only have Crichton as their example, so they try to imagine [[Planet of Hats|a whole world full of Crichtons]]. He usually comes off as bizarre and insane to them due to his incessant pop culture references that nobody but he understands. Given the sort of [[Mind Rape|mind raping]] and... more that Crichton goes through over the years, he truly does genuinely become a little insane (inasmuch as it is possible to be a 'little' insane), so their assuming this of humanity as a whole likely goes up.

** [[Stargate Atlantis|And Rodney]].

 

* In ''[[The Darkness]]'' [[FPS]] it's stated at one point that the Darkness, ([[Eldritch Abomination|cosmic horror, demonic force of chaos and destruction]]) wasn't originally [[Exclusively Evil|evil and crazy]] but that Humanity drove it insane. ([[Unreliable Narrator|However, this is learned in the Darkness's own realm,]] so odds of [[Mind Screw]] are high).

* The ''[[BioShock (series)]]'' franchise is stock full of these. No matter how good the intentions of its creator, Andrew Ryan, the city of Rapture delved into unethical human experimentation and chaos not long afterward (part of it caused by Ryan abusing his power). Later, Sophia Lamb and her cult following came along, hoping to eradicate the ego or self that is responsible for human evil... by forcibly experimenting on her own daughter in hopes of creating the ultimate altruistic being, deprived of free will. And in the upcoming Bioshock Infinite, where the setting takes place in a fantastic city floating in the sky constructed by the U.S. government as an icon of hope to American ideals, everything goes to shit when the city loses contact and disappears for a decade. Ironically, probably the only sane people you ever encounter is the {{spoiler|forcibly brainwashed}} protagonists.

'''Harbinger''': Inconceivable. }}

 

* Humanity is described in ''[[Buck Godot]]''

{{quote|"When Humanity joined the Gallimaufry, the first impressions of established idea sifters were rather disappointing. Yes, they were entertainingly crazy, but their quirks were mere amplifications of other neuroses and psychoses that had been in and out of vogue for millennia."}}

* ''[[xkcd]]'': [http://xkcd.com/556/ This one]. Be sure to read the [[Alt Text]].

 

 

 

== [[Real Life]] ==

 

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