Sucky Visitors at the Museum

[Dilorenzo]

I very briefly worked - for a week, school work experience - for the Book of Kells exhibit at Trinity College. They had a lot of stuff there on display, including a pair of leather shoes, very old, with a kind of... toothed design, I guess you'd say? Coming down from the opening. And by leather shoes I mean "fresh off the cow," not loafers.

Had someone ask me if they had zippers back then.

[Phantasmagoria]

I've heard some fantastic brain- burps at my local museum

Visitor looking at collection of stuffed birds: "That's not a real seagull! It's far too big!"
No sh*t, Sherlock. It's an albatross

Visitor in dinosaur exhibition to museum worker: "I don't believe in fossils"
Museum worker: "Do you mean you don't believe in dinosaurs?"
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"
Museum worker: *pointing* "That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil."
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"
Museum worker: "... I don't think I can help you"

Man wearing sunglasses in dark section about nocturnal animals: "Why don't they put some brighter lights in here?!"

Woman walks up stairs, crosses room, and stands in front of lift. To museum worker: "Excuse me, how do I get downstairs?"

Similarly, woman standing in lift looking at clearly marked buttons for ground floor and first floor in a CLEARLY two-storey building: "How do I get to the sixth floor?"

Snooty looking man, peering in at children's artefact handling session: "Those aren't real fossils! I'm a professor, I can tell that from here!"
... They were real.

There was one room which led into two further rooms. One door was open, with display cases clearly visible through the door. The other door was closed, with a 'No Entry' Sign on it. Furthermore, visitors had to walk past the open door to get to the closed one. One woman walked straight up to the closed door, and yanked it so hard it burst open, revealing a LOCKED YALE LOCK attached to it, and one of those pull-down metal shutters, upon which sight she wailed "Well how am I supposed to get into the ________ exhibition theeeennnnnnn?"

Also, as a bonus: Why You Shouldn't Let Your Kid Run Off In A Museum
There was a room cordoned off with a rope. There was a 'No Entry' sign hanging from the rope, and another stuck above the doorway. There was no door, but a heavy curtain was drawn across the doorway. This was in the art section, generally an area where kids get bored, and visitors are particularly upset by running, screaming children. One woman was having a chat on her phone (also frowned upon) whilst her child ran round and round the gallery like a squirrel after a barrel of sherbet. Suddenly, the child spotted the curtain and made a beeline for it at top speed. Mother merely watched blankly as the kid whizzed past the No Entry sign. Unfortunately for the kid, museum staff had obviously realised that people would want to peek, and had placed one of those temporary display walls directly behind the curtain... SMACK. The kid was so surprised he didn't even cry. They left rather quickly after that...

[sms001]

I've always believed the "no stupid questions" saying is BS for many reasons, and my volunteer stint helped reinforce that.

The koan in IT circles is "There are no stupid questions... but they are the easiest ones to answer."

As a former DC/Alexandria resident, thank you to you and the countless others who make those wonderful museums a world class institution. Much appreciated.

(Side note: I never really thought the Hope was the best gem in the room, except for keeping all the other people out of my way while I looked at the really interesting stuff.)

[XCashier]

-I'm walking out to take my break, I pass by the animal bones hall - there's a display case showing the skeletons of chimps, orangutans, gorillas and humans to compare anatomy. A woman and her kids are standing there and as I pass I overhear:
Mom: "Well that looks like intelligent design to me! Where's Jesus?"

If Jesus' skeleton were there, it would rather kibosh the doctrine of His resurrection and ascent into Heaven, wouldn't it?

Visitor in dinosaur exhibition to museum worker: "I don't believe in fossils"
Museum worker: "Do you mean you don't believe in dinosaurs?"
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"
Museum worker: *pointing* "That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil."
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"

I suppose he doesn't believe in mountains, rocks, stones, caves, etc. Sorry, that's a speshul kind of stoopid there.

Museum worker: "... I don't think I can help you"

Of course not; you're not a psychotherapist.

[zond]

The koan in IT circles is "There are no stupid questions... but they are the easiest ones to answer."

There are no stupid questions, just an infinite supply of inquisitive idiots.

[shopgirl15]

shopgirl15, I have a couple of serious questions about the Smithsonian:

- Do you have any baby skeletons of Jesus?

Its on loan to the Vatican.

- Why do you have only fossils of dinosaurs? Are they too hard to keep in captivity or something?

We serve the cooked flesh in the cafeteria.

[Seshat]

Stories from my hall

But the best stories are from where I volunteered at - in my hall there were a variety of human skeletons as it was dedicated to forensic anthropology. Now the issue is that we had several skeletons from children - from fetal to adolescence. People with a certain stance on abortion often took offense to the younger skeletons and sometimes decided to make a show of it or come up to me to complain.

Have they never heard of stillbirth? Miscarriage? Mothers dying of whatever before the infant is viable?

Sheesh.

[mhkohne]

Visitor in dinosaur exhibition to museum worker: "I don't believe in fossils"
Museum worker: "Do you mean you don't believe in dinosaurs?"
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"
Museum worker: *pointing* "That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil. That's a fossil."
Visitor: "No! I don't believe in fossils!"
Museum worker: "... I don't think I can help you"

This kind of thing really gets to me - you can't not believe in fossils, they are very evidently there in front of you. Persons who say 'I don't believe in fossils' should be beaten with the femur of something large.

It's possible to not believe the stated age of the fossil, and that's your right, but 'not believing in fossils' is like 'not believing in bread' - a sign that you can't think, AT ALL.

IDIOTS.

[shopgirl15]

This kind of thing really gets to me - you can't not believe in fossils, they are very evidently there in front of you. Persons who say 'I don't believe in fossils' should be beaten with the femur of something large.

It's possible to not believe the stated age of the fossil, and that's your right, but 'not believing in fossils' is like 'not believing in bread' - a sign that you can't think, AT ALL.

IDIOTS.

I've had the misfortune of meeting people who are convinced fossils are either a) a scientific hoax or b) planted by satan to lead people astray from the lord.

[workerbee222]

How many buildings comprise the Smithsonian?

If skeletons and mummies are inappropriate for your little ones, aren't there SIX OTHER BUILDINGS you could visit?

Or here's an idea, take the kids to see live animals at the zoo?

[Ezio]

How many buildings comprise the Smithsonian?

If skeletons and mummies are inappropriate for your little ones, aren't there SIX OTHER BUILDINGS you could visit?

Or here's an idea, take the kids to see live animals at the zoo?

But what if scary lions or tigers are by the exits?

[Antisocial_Worker]

Thankfully, out of all the museums and the like that I've visited, it's been rare that I've seen anyone being an idiot in one. However...

Vancouver Art Gallery -- I suspect that people misbehave on a regular basis in this art museum because as the lady at the counter was selling us our tickets she apologized in advance that we might find the museum lacking and said, "So if you don't like it, please don't come back and kill me." Either too many people had been irate already that day or she needed to up her dosage.

Tennessee Aquarium -- Witnessed a screaming fight that involved an entire family of rednecks which caused one of them, a woman, to run off to weep in private behind the jellyfish tanks.

Biltmore House -- Saw a man whip out his wallet and demand to know how much it would cost right then and there to buy the house and grounds. Heard someone ask how much the house weighed. Heard a teenage girl complain about the indignity of being forced to march around this terrible place built with slave labor (it was built from 1890-1895, long after slavery was abolished), and heard her companion reply, "God, I am like so high right now!"

[Phantasmagoria]

Vancouver Art Gallery -- I suspect that people misbehave on a regular basis in this art museum because as the lady at the counter was selling us our tickets she apologized in advance that we might find the museum lacking and said, "So if you don't like it, please don't come back and kill me." Either too many people had been irate already that day or she needed to up her dosage.

I would guess she'd had people coming back and whining "Why don't you have more to do for KIDS?" (no matter how much you have for kids in any museum or gallery, it's never enough to be satisfactory, even if it's a museum designed mainly for kids)...

Or how about, "Don't you have anything that isn't art? Art is so BORING!" (So why are you in an art gallery?)...

Or even "Your layout is so CONFUSING, why can't you change it?" (To which I believe the correct reply is, "Of course, madam, I will raze this historic building to the ground right this minute and rebuild it to your exact specifications")...

Or, from art snobs, "Such and such gigantic incredibly well funded specialist museum in another country has work by Mr Incredibly-Rare-and-Valuable-Artist-Who-Painted-Three-Things-Ever... I was HOPING to see his work here, I am VERY DISAPPOINTED that you don't have it, AND your cleaning lady didn't know ANYTHING about the obscure painting in a corridor, and she was really RUDE to me. She wouldn't listen when I tried to educate her about it, as she was trying to haul a vacuum, four bin bags and a mop bucket up the stairs!"

Why yes I have spent a lot of time in museums...

[Sapphire Silk]

Back when I was an undergraduate, I volunteered for about two years at one of the Smithsonian museums in D.C. It was fun and eventually it helped me get a temporary full time federal job which was probably the funnest job I've ever had so far.

I am so green with envy. I wanted to try for a job like this, but the GS rating was so low I couldn't make my bills (even an LPN back then made more than an entry level federal employee).

- Parents complaining about anatomically correct nude human statues in the evolution hall

- Mom angry at us after her kid saw a model of the HIV virus and asked her what HIV was.

- People offended by evolution exhibits sending their kids to argue with museum guides. Honestly people, I can deal if you don't accept evolution but don't send your 8 year old to annoy me.

Good lord. They did know where they were visiting, right? Although, I've often wondered if there are people who go to the Creation Museum to fuck with the museum staff there . . .

Look, I don't particularly care what your stance on abortion is, museum visitors, its not the fault of the museum volunteers that we have fetal skeletons on display.

- I'm standing by one of the displays, and this woman with a baby calls me over. She points at the infant skeleton and asks me if its real.
Me: Yes, it is.
Baby lady: THIS IS SICK!!!!
Me: Okay...?

People like this don't realize that we know most of what we know about obstetrics from dissection: miscarriages, and women who died during their pregnancies or during childbirth.

But then again, these people don't understand how the scientific method works.

-One day at the exhibit, mom comes in with crying kid. Apparently he's too scared to walk past the skeletons and asks how they can get out without seeing them. Well, the only way out is past the mummy hall. And he's scared of those too. So mom glares at us like we designed the place to scare her kid.
Look, lady, just cover your kid's eye and run. (No joke, parents have had to do that before)

It is kinda funny, and not so sucky. Kids are sometimes overwhelmed by exhibits like these, and all the monster movies on TV don't help.

Mom: "Well that looks like intelligent design to me! Where's Jesus?"

The more I thought about it, the funnier it got. What, did she want a few thousand year old skeleton nailed to a cross in the display too?

It would be a fake. Jesus ascended bodily into heaven forty days after the Resurrection. Although, she probably just wanted a representation of Jesus, which doesn't make sense in a museum of actual artifacts.

If the skeleton of Jesus was ANYWHERE on public display it would be in Vatican City, not DC.

See above

Re: the fetus skeletons: hang on, does she think babies were killed to make museum exhibits?? Regardless of whose skeleton it was, they died of some other cause before they ended up in a museum. D:

See my comment above. These people seem to have a problem with anything "grisly" being on public display. In which case, visiting a museum on Natural History is probably not the best place to go. They should probably stick to the Air and Space Museum.

Unless of course, they persist in the fallacy of "If God intended us to fly, he'd have given us wings."

shopgirl15, I have a couple of serious questions about the Smithsonian:

- Do you have any baby skeletons of Jesus?

- Why do you have only fossils of dinosaurs? Are they too hard to keep in captivity or something?

My brain just exploded.

The koan in IT circles is "There are no stupid questions... but they are the easiest ones to answer."

I love this. It is so true.

As a former DC/Alexandria resident, thank you to you and the countless others who make those wonderful museums a world class institution. Much appreciated.

(Side note: I never really thought the Hope was the best gem in the room, except for keeping all the other people out of my way while I looked at the really interesting stuff.)

Ditto, on both counts. I consider myself lucky to grow up in the DC area, where frequent family trips to the Smithsonian were eagerly anticipated by the whole family.

And while the Hope Diamond is a great specimen, there are better and the other gems are MUCH more interesting, colorful, and beautiful.

Biltmore House -- Saw a man whip out his wallet and demand to know how much it would cost right then and there to buy the house and grounds. <snip> Heard a teenage girl complain about the indignity of being forced to march around this terrible place built with slave labor (it was built from 1890-1895, long after slavery was abolished), and heard her companion reply, "God, I am like so high right now!"

Unless that guy is a Vanderbilt, he doesn't have a fraction of what it would take to buy that house.

That was a joke btw, Biltmore was a luxury mansion built by one of the Vanderbilts, hence the name. It's still owned by a Vanderbilt, and is on 8000 acres. The Vanderbilts were among the "Captains of Industry" or "Robber Barons" of the Gilded Age, which happened AFTER the Civil War.

[Argus]

Although, I've often wondered if there are people who go to the Creation Museum to fuck with the museum staff there . . .

Yes.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2...tion-museum-1/