Why Do We Need to Believe There’s Someone Worse Than Us?

In the Maximum of Maximum Security, my sister, who worked there, said the inmates all believed the same strange thing: “There are people worse than us. They’re locked up somewhere else.”

Even though they were officially the most dangerous criminals in the country, they insisted they weren’t the bottom of the barrel. And at night, they locked their own doors, not to protect others from themselves, but to protect themselves from those imagined “worse” men.

Why do we do this, imagine there's someone worse than us? In 1954, psychologist Leon Festinger introduced Social Comparison Theory, the idea that we understand who we are by comparing ourselves to others.

We don’t build identity in a vacuum. We build it in contrast.

We need someone smarter, someone dumber. Someone prettier, someone uglier. Someone more successful, someone more lost.

We aren’t just observing others, we’re using them to locate ourselves.

Festinger argued that comparison gives us orientation, a sense of where we stand. But it also gives us protection. Because if I know where I fit, then I know what I’m not. And that helps guard against shame, despair, and the terror of being completely undefined.

We might think we’re seeking status. But often, we’re just seeking shape.

So even in hell, we build ladders. Because if I’m not the worst, maybe I’m still something. If I’m not the ugliest, maybe I’m still lovable. If I’m not the weakest, maybe I can survive.

It’s not just ego. It’s survival. And sometimes, even locking your own prison door is a way of staying someone, instead of no one.