Why People Don't Steal at Theme Parks — and What It Reveals About Human Nature

Ever noticed how at theme parks and airports, people willingly leave their most valuable belongings completely unattended, and no one steals them?

You queue for a ride, toss your phone, wallet, and bag onto a communal shelf with hundreds of others doing the same. No cameras. No security guard. And yet, when the ride ends, everyone returns, collects their stuff, and walks away.

Or at the airport, you place your belongings on a conveyor belt and watch them disappear into the scanner. Or wait at the baggage carousel, surrounded by hundreds of nearly identical suitcases. Technically, you could just take any bag you want. But you don’t. Hardly anyone ever does.

Why?

Not Because We’re Saints

It’s not because people are paragons of virtue or perfectly moral beings. And it’s not because stealing is difficult or risky in those moments.  It would actually be surprisingly easy.

But we don’t do it.

Because in that moment, there’s only one thing that matters:

Getting our own stuff back.

When you're standing there with your phone, wallet, and keys out of reach, the only thing your nervous system cares about is reclaiming your sense of security, order, and control.

You could take someone else’s gear, but then you’d still be without your own. And that’s the true source of stress. It’s not that you’re so righteous… it’s that your bandwidth is maxed out just managing your own needs.

In short:

We don’t take what isn’t ours, not because we can’t -  but because we’re too preoccupied with reinstating our sense of peace.

Not because we’re incapable of theft.
Not because we’re saints.
But because our primary concern isn’t hurting others - it’s holding ourselves together.

When forced to choose between protecting what’s ours or messing with someone else’s, there’s no real choice at all.

We’re not wired to cause harm, we’re wired to survive. And survival starts with personal peace.

More than anything, we crave comfort. Safety. Control. And stealing, even when the opportunity is obvious, threatens that. It introduces complexity, guilt, risk, and drama. It spikes our nervous system and divides our focus. Most people aren’t up for that kind of disruption. Not because they’re virtuous, but because they’re already overloaded.

We don’t have room for that amount of chaos, especially not when we’re barely managing our own inner chaos.

Everything We Do Is an Attempt to Bring Ourselves Peace

That’s the deeper principle here.
All behaviour; even the strange, shameful, or destructive stuff, is simply a strategy to meet a need or protect a fear.

We are not our behaviour.

Stealing is rare not because humans are incapable of it, but because in that moment, it doesn’t serve the person doing it. It doesn’t help them regulate, settle, or restore peace.

And the fastest route to internal safety is to protect what’s mine, not to take what’s yours.

This is true far beyond airports and amusement parks.

It’s true in conflict.
In relationships.
In leadership.
In parenting.
In politics.

Once we understand that all behaviour is an attempt to self-soothe, we can stop being surprised by it, and start being curious about it instead.

What need is this meeting?
What fear is this protecting?

That’s where compassion begins.
Better still, this is where real change begins.

So next time you’re at an airport, a theme park, or any other place where trust seems to hold society together, look again.
It’s not moral superiority keeping everything in order.
It’s the very human instinct to preserve our own peace.

And that instinct, when harnessed wisely, is the very thing that can heal us - not just individually, but collectively.