The Invention of Normal (Part 2)
Normality wasn’t discovered - it was invented. From hunter–gatherer variation to the 1800s 'average man' and the Industrial Revolution, society created the idea of normal to produce compliant workers and pathologise difference.
When you look at history, ‘normal or average’ has never really been a thing. Human beings have always been different - with natural variation accepted as part of life - until the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s and 1800s.
Going back to hunter-gatherer times, you can see how variation was woven into community life. The very words ‘hunter’ and ‘gatherer’ show that people had different roles that suited them and contributed to the group. The same was true in empires like Rome or ancient Egypt: society had its hierarchies, but there was still space for very different roles - scribes, farmers, soldiers, priests, artisans. Control certainly existed, but it was framed through religion, politics and loyalty, not through the idea of one ‘normal’ way to be human.
Even today, we technically still have different roles in society - teachers, doctors, builders, artists, carers. But the difference now is that the way we’re expected to function within those roles has been standardised. We’re measured against the same narrow model of productivity, resilience, and adaptability, no matter what our natural variation is. Instead of shaping the role to fit the human, society shapes the human to fit the role.
Control has always been present - but the way it’s been exercised has changed with time.
- First through force: physical domination, violence and punishment kept people in line
- Then through faith: religion and morality framed obedience as virtue and rebellion as sin
- Eventually through science: statistics, medicine and psychology claimed to define what was ‘normal’ and cast everything else as defective
Each shift made control more invisible - moving from the sword, to the soul, to the mind.
The Birth of ‘The Average Man’
In the 1800s, Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet began measuring human traits like height, weight and intelligence. He found that most people clustered around an average, with fewer at the extremes. From this, he invented the idea of ‘the average man’ - and treated the average as the ideal.
Out of this also came the deeply flawed Body Mass Index (BMI), which we still use today - a measure based not on health but on statistical convenience.
Eugenics and ‘Breeding Out’ Difference
Around the same time, Francis Galton (Darwin’s cousin) developed the theory of eugenics. Galton took Quetelet’s ‘average man’ and argued society should actively breed for desirable traits and eliminate undesirable ones.
It’s not so far removed from some of the gene-editing debates we see today. While gene therapy has real benefits, it also raises questions about control and morality: which genes are deemed ‘unacceptable’ and should we have the power to change nature? If we’re selecting eye colour or eliminating natural variations, isn’t that the same eugenic logic in new clothes?
The Beginning of ‘Normal vs Defective’
This was the foundation for what autistic scholar Nick Walker later called the Pathology Paradigm: the belief that society is divided into ‘normal’ people and ‘defective’ people who must be fixed.
I’ll explore this paradigm more deeply in Part 4, but for now it’s important to see where it began - with the invention of ‘normal’ itself.
Why the Industrial Revolution Mattered
Why did society need this idea of ‘normal’ in the first place?
The Industrial Revolution created a new kind of work: factory labour. For the first time, economies needed people who were standardised - able to perform monotonous, repetitive tasks on strict timetables, without complaint.
Formal schooling emerged from this need - not primarily to educate, but to train children to sit still, follow bells and fit the mould of the future worker. Those who didn’t fit that mould were shamed, punished and invalidated until they either conformed or were pushed to the margins of society - which still happens today.
Normality wasn’t discovered, it was invented. And it was invented for one purpose: to create compliant workers.
But what happens when natural neurotypes and natural variation don’t fit this industrial mould?
That’s where trauma and environment come in, which I’ll explore in Part 3.
Want to step outside the myth of normal? Join me in Offscript on Skool - a space for honest conversations about the systems that shape us.
References
Porter, T. M. (1986). The Rise of Statistical Thinking: 1820-1900. Princeton University Press.
Quetelet, A. (1835). A Treatise on Man and the Development of his Faculties.
Eknoyan, G. (2008). Adolphe Quetelet (1796-1874) - the average man and indices of obesity. Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation, 23(1), 47-51.
Galton, F. (1883). Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development. Macmillan.
Walker, N. (2014). Neurodiversity: Some Basic Terms & Definitions.
Bowles, S., & Gintis, H. (1976). Schooling in Capitalist America. Routledge
Rachel Shaw
