Note: This journal entry was written on January 31st and postmarked February 3rd. It has been stuck in the abyss of the USPS mail system until delivered on February 23.
There’s a story that has always stuck with me.
Scientists placed a group of ten monkeys in a large cage. In the middle of the cage was a ladder, and on top of the ladder, some desirable food. As soon as a monkey attempted to climb the ladder to reach the food, the scientists sprayed all the monkeys with cold water from a hose. After a few monkeys tried and the whole group was sprayed multiple times, the monkeys learned to police themselves. Whenever a monkey started climbing the ladder, the others would pull him down and beat him up. Since no monkey reached the top, none were sprayed.
After a few days of this system working, and no monkeys being sprayed, the scientists removed two of the original monkeys and replaced them with two new ones. As expected, the new monkeys immediately tried to climb the ladder, and as expected, they were pulled down and beaten up by the other monkeys. After a few tries, the new monkeys stopped attempting to climb, even though they had never been sprayed and probably didn’t even know there was a hose. They just knew not to go up the ladder. A few days later, the scientists removed two more of the original monkeys and replaced them with new ones. The cycle repeated. The new monkeys tried to climb the ladder and were beaten up before the hose even came out. Every few days, the scientists continued swapping out original monkeys with new ones until there were none of the originals left. At this point, with no original monkeys in the cage, the monkeys were still beating up any monkey that tried to climb the ladder. These monkeys had never seen the hose or tried to climb the ladder themselves, except for tradition.
Some things to think about.
My unit/wing has a restroom across the hall from the shower room. The restroom looks a lot like something you’d see at a baseball stadium: five toilets, three urinals, two stalls across from six sinks. No doors, so walking down the hall, you can look right in. Every time I walked down the hall, I’d see two or three sinks running full blast with no one using them. Never the same ones, it seemed.
My impulse was to turn them off to save water, but I didn’t want to ruffle any feathers about something I didn’t understand. After a few days, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I started asking people, “Why are the sinks always running?” I got a lot of different answers: “white noise,” “I don’t know,” “because screw them, we can waste their money!” No one seemed too confident with their answers. Then, finally, someone told me what I believe to be the correct answer. The showers here are really hot—scalding hot, volcano lava hot. So, if you keep the hot water running in the sinks, the whole system has less hot water, and it makes the showers a little bit cooler. I’ve since experimented, and having the sinks running while taking a shower definitely does help.
It still blows my mind that more than half the inmates in my wing have no idea why they do it, but they leave the sinks running, or turn them on, on purpose.
You never were one to follow the herd. Good thinking to explore the reasonings, that’s why you are you!