What Not to Not presents a speed-run guide to sabotaging culture: taking selfies with mummies, mispronouncing every name, and sprinting past the plaques like they owe you money.
A museum is supposed to be a cathedral of quiet awe, where history whispers from plaques and artifacts murmur centuries of stories. But if reverence sounds boring, don’t worry—there are faster ways to ruin the whole experience. Here’s your five-minute demolition plan, guaranteed to make curators weep and audio guides lose the will to narrate.
Step 1: Treat the Mummies Like Instagram Props
Why simply marvel at the miracle of preservation when you can frame Tutankhamun’s sarcophagus with duck lips and a peace sign? Bonus points if you say something like “He’s giving major crypt-keeper vibes.” That eerie silence wasn’t meant for contemplation anyway—it was meant for your ring light.
Step 2: Mispronounce Every Ancient Name with Confidence
Museums are full of tricky names—Sumerian kings, Mesopotamian goddesses, Impressionist painters. The worst thing you could do is quietly look up pronunciations. Instead, stride through the halls loudly butchering them with gusto: “Cleo-petra, the original girlboss! Vincent Van Goofy! PICK-axe-oh!” Nothing deepens cultural credibility like weaponized certainty.
Step 3: Speed-Read the Plaques—Or Don’t Read Them at All
Time is money, and museums are long. Why endure those tedious 200-word explanations? Just glance at the title, nod sagely, and declare, “Wow, so ahead of its time,” before bolting to the next room. True mastery is finishing the entire museum in less time than it takes others to study one display case. Congratulations—you’ve reduced centuries of human achievement to a bad airport layover.
Step 4: Commentary, Always Commentary
Every exhibit is improved by your personal TED Talk. Point at a fossil and mutter, “Honestly, I’ve seen worse at my uncle’s grill.” Stand before a Monet and announce, “Looks like my toddler could do that with finger paint.” Culture isn’t about humility or reflection—it’s about establishing dominance through hot takes.
Step 5: Exit Through the Gift Shop, As If That’s the Point
And finally, the museum’s climax: not the Rosetta Stone, not the Bronze Age figurines, but the keychain aisle. Why wrestle with the vastness of history when you can buy a glow-in-the-dark dinosaur eraser and be on your way? Nothing says “lifelong memory” like a tote you’ll use twice.
The Twist
Of course, the joke is that everything above is the opposite of what you should do. A museum is one of the last places where time slows down, where silence is not emptiness but invitation. If you lean in—actually read, actually listen—you may find that a 2,000-year-old vase has more to say about human longing than an entire social feed.
So, if you really want to ruin a museum in under five minutes, make it all about you. If you want to not ruin it, do the harder thing: vanish a little into history, and let it astonish you.
Did this make you laugh (or cringe)?
If you know someone who speed-runs museums, share this post with them. History deserves better—and so do their Instagram followers.
