4 Reasons People Get Suckered Into Idiotic Kickstarters

4

Narcissists Contribute to Dumb Kickstarter Campaigns to Get Attention

Karaoke is both universally hated and universally popular because our egos are greater than our intolerance for watching drunken people throat-wail the Offspring while waiting for the mic. We can't all be rock stars, but we really like pretending we are. Similarly, we can't all come up with some hip new Internet phenomenon, but we can fund one while desperately waving our hands in the air, like this guy, who pledged $10,000 to the potato salad campaign.

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"Mom, you can just call me to voice your disappointment with my life choices."

3

We're Programmed to Look for Communities

Earlier this year, one guy started a Kickstarter to chart the deliciousness of a burrito, and 250 backers gave him over $1,000 to do it. Back when getting $1,000 for a burrito was extreme, one guy showed up in the Kickstarter's comments more times than we're even comfortable displaying:

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"Mom, you can just call me on the banana I pretend is a phone to voice your disappointment with my life choices."

2

Getting on a Bandwagon Means Trying to Steer It

Along with swallowing your tongue via rage seizures, the second danger of scrolling through these Kickstarter comments is being drawn into one of the hundreds of other stupid funding projects being plugged by various desperate strangers:

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1

It All Boils Down to Herd Mentality

There's a reason people are willing to shock strangers to death because a dude in a white coat tells them to, or why you can draw crowds with just a few people standing in one place looking at nothing. It's called herd mentality, and it gives people the ability to join in on something without fully understanding it:

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Great. Potato salad hipster is a thing now.

We're dealing with evolutionary impulses that have been there from the days when we were shitting and living in our own fear, which is why it only takes 5 percent of a crowd to steer the entire group if they seem to know what they're doing. We're all just herds of cattle following whoever moos the loudest.

And that's kind of the real joke here -- not that everyone has ironically funded this guy's potato salad, but that they are literally taking a symbolic stand against charity by proving their ability to throw their money away because they think it makes them special, even though everyone else is doing it.

kickstarter.com
Ah yes, the joyous irony of TOTALLY not being suckered into something.