Hello peeps of the world.

I hope your day has gone as well as mine. My day started with a sleep in (as it's one of my days off) and then a nice loooong shower and lunch with a dear friend - just lunch, not the shower as well - whom I used to date. There is something very spesh about having lunch with someone you've been intimate with. I don't know why but there is. Pity she's married really.

I want to ask a question today boys and girls. Why is it that while we all aspire to being special and unique the majority of people seem to preffer conformity over individual expression. In order to get a good job (say as a lawyer) you have to conform to a particular kind of dress standard and hair cut and facial hair styandards and then when it comes time to interview you, they ask you what it is about you that makes you different. WTF? Obviously nothing, You have the same haircut as every other guy in the building, the same suit and the same clean shave... what do they think is going to be different about the way you think? My conclusion: prolly not a lot.

Conversely, when a "popstar" goes all out and gets the hair from hell, the magazines are all over it like flies (good analogy) and the fans can't get enough! Fans seem to identify with a performer based on their look as well as their music. Sex appeal has a lot to do with this and would explain why Marylin Mansons' fans are from every walk of life and gender. It doesn't explain why most of Kylie Minogues' fans are teenage girls and middle aged men, while teenaged boys don't buy her CDs at all. 

It is my belief that the great spirit (call it god or whatever you like) made us all different, with different talents and abilities and that was because he/she wants us to explore the boundaries and be as different as possible, to great ourselves into works of art. Of course this would make any kind of uniform a sin and that would mean no armies or police which would end in utter and complete freedom for all...ahem, I mean chaos of course.

That said, we all seem to preffer to conform and be "normal". What a betrayal of this great gift we have for individuality. What if we were all like possums and had the same colours and the same hair cut and clothes... not that possums wear clothes but you get my drift right?

What a terrible fate to be all the same, I couldn't imagine it myself. The real question here is: although we do vary a little bit from one another in terms of minor differences like hair cuts and clothes, we all seem to be afraid of anything that is a little different; why? Take for example a friend of mine some years ago who when she first saw my "mohawk" said she couldn't look at me. She was only joking at the time but I knew that deep down she was really having trouble accepting me because of a hairstyle. How silly and yet one wonders where this comes from?

 In an experiment on pigeons, the researchers stuck a "crown" of red feathers on an ordinary grey ( gray for our american friends) pigeon and waited to see if the females would react. They did, and the newly crowned grey suddenly became the most popular mate in the aviary. Why is it that humans react the opposite way? Are we just afraid of anything that is a little too different? Do we mistrust someone who appears not to be like us? Is this the whole reason for racism? Chimpanzees, it must be said do exactly the same thing. If a member of another group wanders over to theirs, they are likely to kill it or run it off into the bushes. They will, however abduct potential mates from another group and induct them by choice into their own group. Not unlike many humans, they are very picky about who joins their little "tribe". What is it that scares them about "foreigners" and is this applicable to us?

A more important question is: if I wear a crown of red feathers, will girls like me more? Why don't I have a girlfriend anyway? Is it my hair? My breath? Or is it that I'm foreign?