The NPC herd paradox: those who mock conformity follow it too

Digital herd: what you won't do to avoid being an NPC

Ordering food on Glovo, voting or getting vaccinated: actions that are routine for millions but that, for the "NPC sheep" subculture, are proof of belonging to the herd. The list of forbidden behaviours circulating these days is not a joke. It is a counter-manifesto: rejecting delivery, refusing the vaccine, steering clear of unions and elections, not staying twenty years at the same company. Added to the list are watching television, visiting exhibitions you don't care about or trinc every passing trend, including the eclipse one.

The irony surfaces when the critics themselves admit to falling into the very behaviour they condemn. Ordering a Glovo, for instance, slips in as a more than reasonable exception at a hotel. Vaccination, which in health terms is a rational decision, is presented as a sheepish reflex. The contradiction reveals that the line does not separate the critical thinker from the automaton; it separates those who need to prove they think from those who simply act.

Behind the gesture lies an economy of distinction. Demanding of yourself not to do what the majority does also costs resources, time and an audience to validate the dissent. It is the same logic of consumption it claims to fight, dressed up in the pride of being different.

If everyone defines themselves by what they don't do, isn't that rejection the most predictable behaviour of all?