Funny how sometimes in life you can get the best results by just ignoring whatever rules society has imposed upon you. Or whatever rules you think society has imposed upon you.
A few weeks ago, my friend and I were at a conference in Nashville.
The conference was Epsilon Connect — an event hosted by the gentlemen and ladies over at Epsilon Theory, which is one of the most important collections of adult writing on the internet. I don’t mean adult as in Not Safe For Work, I mean adult as in thought-provoking and serious.
So we woke up on the last day of the conference, got some coffee and attended the last discussion. When the conference was over, we still had hours until our flights out of Nashville Airport (a team scheduling error).
Of course we had to check out of our hotel rooms at 11:00 am — leaving us several hours of “what do we do now” time. We talked about possibly going to the airport and just lounging at the power-equipped desktop area. Plug in our computers, deal with the noise, and just try to be productive.
But then my friend said, “well, or we could just go upstairs and use one of the hotel’s conference rooms.” And, like any reasonable person, I was a little confused. I mean, you can’t do that. You can’t just hijack a Marriott conference room because it’s more convenient than whatever else you were going to do. Especially since we’re technically no longer guests of the hotel.
So we found an empty one and did it anyway. And, being diligent and industrious individuals, we decided we’d better go ahead and close the door so we don’t get interrupted. So we got plugged in and got a few hours of work done. After all, we decided, what’s the worst that could happen? Someone is gonna walk in and scowl at us and say “you can’t do that”? Well, then we’ll leave.
Eventually we decided we’d go grab some lunch before we wrap up and get our Ubers to the terminal. So we left our stuff, walked downstairs and ordered lunch out of the hotel restaurant. (At this point we were just mocking them.) And when we came back up, we found that someone had been in our conference room. And they had set up an additional 2 large tables, plus chairs… clearly getting ready for something. And they had gently moved our computers and luggage over to the coffee counter and left them there for us. So we packed up our things and generously donated the conference room back to the Marriott.
Even if we had walked in on a meeting in progress, what were they going to do? Not let us get our things? I mean I’d have felt a little bad, but we didn’t technically hurt anyone. Win-win, arguably.
And then I screwed up and left a little too late for the airport. In fact I left 30 minutes before my flight boarded. And my Uber ride was 25 minutes. Which meant that I was almost certainly going to miss my flight. I mean, who could possibly hope to show up at a large international airport on a Friday afternoon and get to their gate in, like, 14 minutes, and be just in time to be one of the last passengers on the plane?
So I did, and I got on the plane.
If I’d have told my grandparents or any reasonable law-abiding citizen what I was up to, they’d have said “dude, you can’t do that. You can’t just show up to the terminal when your flight is boarding. That’s not how air travel works.”
And of course I would not recommend flying this way, because it’s risky. But it seems you can, in fact, do that. If you get a little lucky.
I had a buddy in high school named Rob. Rob engaged in what you might call spiteful compliance. Aside from the pot, Rob lived his life within the confines of the law. But he did it in a way that makes legal personnel furious. A way that makes upstanding citizens (and police) shake their heads in disgusted defeat. He was an absolute smartass.
One time Rob, being the resourceful and outdoorsy type, built himself a homemade moped. A bicycle with a motor on it. I went over one day and he took me into his big industrial garage to show me what he’d built.
He was explaining to me how he actually used a pretty powerful motor — much more powerful than it needed to be. Then he explained how they’re technically street legal if you stay on the side of the road, wear a helmet, and use an engine no more powerful than 50cc. He said as long as the engine didn’t exceed 50 cubic centimeters, he wouldn’t have to register it and buy a license plate.
And then he showed me the back of the bike. Right there on the engine housing in gold paint was written “49cc.”
And then he laughed for about 5 minutes. Because, what are the cops gonna do, impound his bicycle and have a mechanic test the engine’s power? No. They’re going to scowl at him and ask if he’s fucking kidding them, and then they’re going to let him go. Rob wasn’t kidding. He was dead serious. He knew that as long as he was behaving reasonably and not being a menace, he’d be allowed to use his bike.
Now I do not think you should be like Rob. And I don’t even think you should be like the Nashville version of me. Because that version of me almost got stuck in Tennessee overnight. And the only reason I’m telling you these stories is because nobody got hurt.
Sometimes if someone tells you “you can’t do that,” it’s for a lot of good reasons. And you shouldn’t, because to do so would injure you or others, or tear at the fabric of society. But sometimes it’s for no reason other than That’s The Way We Do Things —Those Are The Rules. And that’s really not a good reason, for anything.
Jem and Scout Finch didn’t have any malicious intent when they snuck out past curfew in To Kill a Mockingbird. They weren’t causing trouble. They just knew something was up with Atticus, and they were worried about him. Sure enough, they were able to intervene outside the jailhouse and Scout’s bright-eyed innocence saved him from disaster. That’s a much more wholesome example. Their curiosity and their worry led them to disregard their father’s rules, and yet he was grateful they did.
Something that a lot of really interesting people have in common, whether it be in business or anything else, is that they only follow rules that they have really good social or moral reasons to follow. In other words, they only follow rules that they themselves would have created in the first place. Which means a lot of them, but not all of them. It’s not about anarchy and selfishness, it’s about thoughtfulness and intention.
And frankly, sometimes in life people have bad rules for you, and the moral thing to do is to tell them to fuck off. The world needs some of that. It keeps a culture and its people from becoming stiff and parochial. It’s a software update process for the fabric of society. And that’s a good thing. That’s a necessary thing.
I got a lot of scowls in high school. A lot of teachers saying “you can’t do that” after I skipped school for the seventh time that month. Or after I simply elected not to do my assignments, at all. Like, for instance, reading To Kill a Mockingbird. But now here we are 15 years later, I’m doing okay, I’ve finally read the book because I finally wanted to, and the only damage done was the time those teachers wasted scowling at me.
Drink some water and rescue Atticus Finch with your innocence.
JDR
“The truth is not obvious, and the obvious need not be true.” - David Deutsch
I'd argue that rules that seem to exist for no reason other than "That’s The Way We Do Things" often times do have good reasons to exist. There's probably a long process preceding the inception of those rules. Imo you have to be careful not to disrespect that.
Challenging societal norms — the way it is described here — reflects a person's desire to stand out from the crowd. It's mostly about ego. Jem and Scout's intent on the other hand was to protect their father. That's something else entirely.