101 Reasons Not to Trust a Mime

Last Updated on December 1, 2025 by Michael

Nobody asked for this.

Literally zero people on this entire spinning rock woke up today and thought “finally, someone needs to expose the mime industrial complex.” That thought occurred to no one. And yet here we are. It’s some ungodly hour of the morning, the coffee gave up on doing its job ages ago, and this document now exists because SOMEBODY had to say what every child has instinctively known since the first time a grown adult in face paint trapped themselves in an invisible box and stood there expecting applause like they’d just cured a disease.

Mimes are suspicious as hell.

Not “quirky artist” suspicious. Not “eccentric creative who marches to their own drum” suspicious. We’re talking “why won’t you just USE WORDS like literally every other human being who has ever lived” levels of suspicious.

You think that’s dramatic?

Good. Keep reading.

The Obvious Stuff (1-15)

Starting with the basics. The things your gut knew at age six but your brain was too polite to say out loud because society taught you to be nice about everything, including inexplicable silent people in striped shirts.

1. They refuse to speak. Not “can’t”—REFUSE. You could be on fire. Actual flames. And a mime would do a little “oh no, fire!” gesture instead of, you know, opening their mouth and screaming for help like any normal person would.
2. The face paint. Every single day. By choice. Nobody is forcing this. No one wakes up with a gun to their head being told “you MUST paint your face like a sad Victorian ghost.” That’s a decision. A weird, unsolicited decision that someone keeps making.
3. They pretend walls exist where there are no walls. That’s not art. That’s gaslighting with jazz hands.
4. Has anyone ever seen a mime’s tax returns? Has the IRS looked into this? What’s getting written off? Invisible props?
5. Always with the stripes. You know who else does stripes? Prisoners. The Hamburglar. Waldo. (Also suspicious—why is everyone looking for that guy? What did he do? Why is he hiding?)
6. Two thousand years of miming. Zero press conferences. Not one statement to the media. Complete radio silence, which is ironic, because silence is literally the only thing they do.
7. The slow motion thing. Just deciding to operate at 0.25x speed. On a public sidewalk. During your commute. Making everyone’s Tuesday weirder for absolutely no stated reason.
8. Can’t read their lips because their lips don’t move because they’ve weaponized silence as a personality trait.
9. Shoes are way too shiny. Nobody’s shoes are that shiny. What are they compensating for?
10. Constantly trapped in invisible boxes that conveniently cannot be measured, photographed, or verified by science.
11. No mime has apologized for any of this. Not once. Ever.
12. They make YOU feel dumb for not understanding what they’re doing. Classic manipulation.
13. Wind does not work the way mimes say it works. That’s just physics. They’re lying about weather.
14. Every single day, a mime looks in the mirror and actively chooses to continue doing this. On purpose.
15. White gloves. What fingerprints are they not leaving behind? What crimes are they not being connected to?

Quick Note on Trust

Here’s the thing about trust.

Trust is built on reciprocity. Basic exchange. You share, someone shares back. “Hello.” “Hello.” “What’s your name?” “Steve.” “Nice weather.” “Sure is.” This is how humans have operated for literally all of recorded history.

Mimes looked at this entire social contract and said “nah, gonna go pretend to climb an invisible ladder instead.”

Behavioral Concerns (16-35)

16. They yank invisible ropes and expect you to applaud.
17. They climb invisible ladders to invisible destinations and refuse to disclose what’s up there.
18. They get stuck in invisible boxes and need YOUR emotional labor to escape. That’s codependency with extra steps.
19. They fight winds that don’t exist. The National Weather Service has no record of these alleged gusts.
20. They hand you invisible flowers like that’s romantic and not technically just giving you nothing.
21. Sometimes they pretend to be robots?? A silent person impersonating a different type of silent thing?? That’s a disguise on top of a disguise.
22. They never break character. Normal humans break character. Stub your toe, you say “ow.” That’s just biology. Mimes apparently transcend biology.
23. They’ve infiltrated every major city. Paris. Tokyo. Denver, for some reason. That one corner in your town. They’re everywhere.
24. Try Googling “mime emergency contact.” Nothing useful comes up.
25. They make unblinking eye contact while pretending to drown. While you’re just trying to eat a sandwich.

Now it gets worse.

26. You can’t argue with someone who refuses to speak. They just stand there doing THE FACE.
27. Interpretive hand gestures can’t be fact-checked.
28. They could be thinking anything. World domination. Grocery lists. Harsh judgments about your outfit. You’ll never know.
29. Any secret told to a mime stays secret forever. That’s too much power for one striped individual.
30. Do mimes talk at home? When no one’s watching? Nobody knows because they won’t say.
31. No one has ever gotten a text from a mime.
32. The silence creates a power imbalance. You’re rambling, oversharing. They’re just absorbing.
33. Couples therapy with a mime would be a disaster.
34. What’s on a mime’s voicemail? Is it just breathing? This genuinely keeps people up.
35. They nod and shake their heads but who can verify any of it is genuine?

Unanswered Questions (36-45)

36. Why?
37. No seriously, why?
38. What exactly are you doing?
39. What does your mother think about this?
40. Can you just… not?
41. Who trained you for this and who told them it was okay to train people for this?
42. Do you do this at home alone in front of a mirror at 3am?
43. What’s the five-year plan?
44. Have you considered accounting? Welding? Literally anything else?
45. Who hurt you?

Forty-five items in. Zero responses. Completely typical.

The Box

We need to talk about the box.

You know the one. The invisible box. THE move. The thing that made you uncomfortable at age seven and honestly still does.

46. The box has never been measured.
47. Never photographed.
48. Never peer-reviewed.
49. Might not be a box. Could be a hexagon. They won’t clarify.
50. They escape every single time. 100% success rate on a problem they invented.

More Trustworthy Than a Mime

Quick list:

51. A used car guy who calls you “chief” and “boss” in the same breath
52. A Nigerian prince email
53. Gas station sushi that’s been there a while
54. That friend who “definitely Venmo’d you back”
55. A Craigslist apartment with no photos that says “cozy”
56. WebMD’s opinion on your headache
57. A raccoon making eye contact with you
58. Your cousin’s pyramid scheme
59. Fortune cookies from the C-rated restaurant
60. Anyone who starts with “no offense, but”

Every single one. More trustworthy than a professional silent person.

The Bigger Picture

This isn’t just about individual mimes. There’s a whole system.

61. Mimes exist in every country on Earth. That’s coordination.
62. Mime schools exist. With tuition. And graduation. Someone accredited this.
63. The striped shirt is a uniform. Uniforms mean organization. Organizations hold meetings. Mimes are holding meetings where nobody talks but consensus somehow happens???
64. This has been going on since ancient Greece. Two thousand years of planning… something.
65. Marcel Marceau was famous. FAMOUS. For not talking. Society rewarded this.

Practical Problems (66-75)

66. A mime can’t order for you at a restaurant while you’re in the bathroom.
67. A mime can’t read you your Miranda rights.
68. A mime can’t testify in court.
69. Nice.
70. “Emergency contact: a mime” has never helped anyone.
71. A mime can’t call 911. What if they witness a crime??
72. A mime won’t tell you about the spinach in your teeth.
73. A mime can’t warn you about the wet floor.
74. A mime can’t give a best man speech. (Actually, depending on the best man, might be an upgrade.)
75. A mime can’t yell “LOOK OUT!” when something’s falling toward your head.

That last one is actually really concerning.

Physical Red Flags

76. No one has ever seen a mime eat.
77. Or drink.
78. Or sneeze.
79. Or cough.
80. Or make any involuntary sound whatsoever.

That’s not human behavior. That’s something else wearing a person suit.

81. The blink rate is off. Watch closely sometime.
82. Their resting face is painted on. You never see the real one.
83. The walking-in-place thing defies physics.
84. Too flexible. Suspiciously flexible.
85. They hold poses for hours. Human bodies don’t want to do that.

More Red Flags

86. No mime has ever endorsed a political candidate. Where do they stand on anything?
87. The beret remains unexplained. Was there a vote? A memo?
88. Zero mimes on LinkedIn. In this economy.
89. No one’s seen a mime at a grocery store. Do they eat? (See: 76-77)
90. No mime has ever been on a podcast. The one format where you have to actually speak.
91. They could be lip-reading every conversation around them.
92. A mime in a dark alley is genuinely terrifying. At least a mugger tells you what they want.
93. They practice alone, in mirrors, in silence. That’s the opening of a horror movie.

The Final Stretch

94. Every mime can read this list. And not one will say a word in defense.
95. You don’t know any mimes personally. Nobody does. They appear, perform, and vanish.
96. No one has ever successfully followed a mime home. Is there a mime dimension??
97. They invent crises and heroically solve them. Classic manipulation.
98. The global mime community has never released a statement. About anything. Ever.
99. Children laugh at mimes, but children also eat crayons, so that’s not really the endorsement you’d think.
100. Right now, somewhere, a mime is performing. Thinking mime thoughts. And there’s nothing anyone can do about it.
101. Here’s the worst part. You’ll finish this list. All 101 items. And next week you’ll walk past a mime on the street. And you’ll think “oh, charming.” Maybe drop a dollar in the hat. They’ll bow silently. And you’ll walk away feeling vaguely pleasant about the whole thing. And you will never know what you just participated in.

Because they’re not going to tell you.

Ever.

So

Maybe this is overblown. Maybe mimes are perfectly lovely artists expressing the ineffable human condition through silence and movement.

But they won’t confirm that. They can’t. Because they’ve made it their entire life’s mission to never explain a single thing to anyone ever.

That’s reason 102.

Sleep well knowing there’s a mime out there right now. Somewhere. Thinking whatever mimes think. Planning whatever mimes plan.

Never going to explain any of it.

You’ve been warned.

Don’t @ the author. Actually, do @ the author. Because unlike mimes, there will be a response. Probably unhinged. But VERBAL. Which is more than they’ll ever give you.