Whenever the royal family does really weird nonsense I just remind myself that as an American, I gave up my right to have an opinion about their activities a few hundred years ago.

I get it, we left the discussion. We excused ourselves from the table very dramatically and now, I just assume I don’t get it because, like, of the ocean that separates us? The different accent and maybe all the weird chicanery they get up to seems normal in that cool voice, right?

However, the line I draw is at the hats that get worn.

I’m pretty sure Brits and Americans evolved to have the same kind of eyeballs, which means everyone is seeing what I’m seeing. And no one tells the royals to cut it out — that seems evident. That’s the ultimate instance of not telling your friends that they have spinach in their teeth. Their hats may be apart of their culture, but most are silly! Who's even designing those things? No one is laughing because they're super rich, we're laughing because they're all ridiculous, and they need to get those things off their heads immediately!

Anyway, all babies are cute, of course. But those poor things — they don’t even know they’re growing up into a life of the strangest headgear ever. Even the crown isn’t that cool of a look...

15 This Confection

I really want to believe that maybe, hundreds of years ago, royals wore hats that actually resembled hats in some way, and I just came in mid-way. Then I look at any picture of history and remember there’s no way the outfits got less ridiculous when we venture back a few centuries.

If anyone was going to wear a hat somehow more ridiculous than this one, it would have been this woman’s ancestors 200+ years ago. That’s when people walked around with taxidermy birds in their hair and fake landscapes. (Why did I include the word fake? Obviously they’re fake. Landscapes should never be atop someone’s head so what tiny sliver of a chance is there that they’re real?)

Anyway, I could lie to myself and say these crazy hats are the culminations of generations of normal hats but that’s not the case. These hats have always been weird and I’m sure it’s only getting much, much worse. Say goodbye to knowing the actual shape of Meghan Markle's head because soon enough she’ll be wobbling under three-feet of tulle and what looks like a stack of dishes that’s made from the finest cloth you can find. Just a weird modernist sculpture that costs as much as a year at college.

14 When You're Dwarfed By Your Hat

Are these women wearing such gigantic hats in order to make themselves look smaller and daintier? Or is this like how a cat puffs itself out and how tiny dogs hang with big dogs (usually by riding on their backs — at least in my imagination. So please don’t ruin that for me) to make a small pup look larger and more intimidating? I really don’t know. I am genuinely asking because I’m totally befuddled.

On one hand, her head is probably normal sized but there’s just no way to know with this hat in the picture. Are the royals terrified of the common people finding out their heights? Whether because they’re very small and slight or because they’re real life giants? Is this so they have to cover their tracks by making sure there’s nothing in the frame of a picture that hints at what’s to scale?

I’m sorry that I have so many questions but if you can look at this hat and not walk away with a dozen burning questions, then you and I are quite different. Also, you almost definitely fall asleep way easier than me, so congrats. I’m jealous of the contentment you live your life with.

13 A Playground For Your Head

I’m a little overwhelmed with where to start.

For one thing, please imagine that this hat is somehow larger. Imagine that these arcs and spirals are actually 20-feet-tall and made of something very durable, like iron. You got it? See, now that would be a terrific playground. There’d be so much to slide down and climb on. The back part gets a little dangerous and there’s definitely the fear that this whole contraption is just the tongue of a slow-moving monster fish, but it could be fun.

You could burn some time hanging out on this hat if it was slightly larger.

Okay, now forget the fun playground. (I know, I'm sorry.) Imagine that this hat was the size of an actual hat. There’s really no point in that, it’s just somehow calming to me that this hat would correctly fit a human’s head. It’d almost be a miniature of this hat if it shrunk to appropriately fit atop a human, so that’s fun. Everyone loves miniatures! Oh, except the royals when they’re hat shopping. Then you need everything to be too big to wear, but small enough that no young children could play in it. But it should also be large enough that those children could daydream about playing on the hat and be totally preoccupied by that fantasy.

12 This Massive Overload

It's the pink hat that really looks like the gateway to an underworld. I don’t know what happens after we die, but anyone who's travelled through that head-mounted portal does.

I get that it’s a cute frilly bow-thing atop that weird, tiny Quidditch hoop she’s wearing, but those things really look like horns to me. I’ve never seen such a horrifying thing that makes me question my own mortality that’s also in a pastel shade of pink. Those two usually don’t go together.

Then there’s the roosting tropical bird in cobalt blue... I hope the bird got to sleep through all this but I really doubt it — it seems like a lot of commotion. That color is beautiful, but all these hats are a great color. It’s everything else that follows the color that’s the issue. You can have a dress that’s a great cobalt blue that’s also shaped like a house and your little head is popping out of the chimney.

That dress might be a pretty color but it’s still a super weird house. That’s exactly how I feel about these hats. Although I really feel like it’d be refreshing to drink nectar from the top of the blue hat.

11 An Entire Aviary

I don’t know why we’re not supposed to see this women’s face but this hat really accomplishes that. At the angle the photograph was taken, we see the lower two thirds. But if you were walking along, you’d have to be exactly eight inches shorter than her to see her face.

How is this different than a middle schooler with their beanie pulled down below their eyebrows? Or that same middle schooler a few years later with a ridiculous eye-covering side part that seems to rival everything we know of physics?

What is with hiding your face and squinting out from behind your outfit? And how do you see out of either to avoid getting hurt? If aliens saw these hats and surmised that the hats were the dominant species and humans were their little servants that they parasitically rode, I’d get that. I kind of think that too. This is such a case of the clothes wearing the person and not the other way around. It just sends out a bad message to hats everywhere that they can push us around and hurt our necks and get away with it. Everyone’s worried about robots taking over but I’ve got my eye on the hats.

10 Less A Hat Than Just A Branch

If you’ve never seen a woman wear a branch on her head, now’s your chance. It’s probably your only opportunity, so really drink it up. Now you know what one looks like. Happy? No? Whatever, I can’t help you. I'm sorry your happiness was contingent on a lady wearing a branch on her head — that’s a super weird niche interest and honestly, you’re not going to find a ton of people who are also into that.

I’m not being mean, I’m just being real with you. Someone has to.

But let's get back to the hat. I’m also proud of this woman for not letting her branch tip over and I’m extremely confused as to why no bird’s landed or nested on this, but I don’t approve of this as a hat. Hats shouldn’t have the wingspan of a monster falcon. I really only use the word wingspan, which shouldn’t fit this context but somehow does, because of the way those branches span out. Do you have a better word? Are you at all emotionally equipped to explain what’s happening here? Cool, then you’re probably from the UK, but I’m definitely not ready. I definitely don’t know the lingo so wingspan it is.

9 Just An Alien Who Loves Love

I’m going to make a really loaded statement and say I dislike this hat the most.

There’s a lot to choose from but I know what I like when I see it and this isn’t it. I’ve made my choice — I’m not afraid of commitment. I gave the other hats heat for their size and overall ridiculousness, but I’d take an abstract-shaped hat any day over what looks like a headband from CVS.

I’m sure this is a designer hat that’s worth more than my own life, but it really looks like the junk an overly wacky teacher comes into school wearing on Valentine’s day.

Cupid was a fat baby, not a weird alien. You don’t need to invent imaginary figures just to make public school al little more manageable. This hat really seems like it came from the dollar aisle and like it’s made of a felt that’s terrifying to touch. The other hats are super weird, but none of them look like cheap dress up in the way that this one does. Does the home base heart have weird sequins? Of course it does. What would a cascading heart headband be unless it’s shellacked in rhinestones? To be truthful, maybe this headband wouldn't look that bad if it was a different color? Wait... you know what... no. It's still awful.

8 A Fedora To Rule Them All

This one hurts, it really does. It burns a little. The others didn’t feel like personal assaults, they just seemed like weird displays of hats.

This one is aggressive and it's pointed and violent. I’ll tell you why, though. I associate fedoras with men I don’t want to talk to. All the men I've met with fedoras are weird AF.

For all these men who talk about how "nice" they are, the nicest thing they do is a wear the equivalent of a traffic cone on their heads to communicate that I should keep moving and not even ask them for directions. I wouldn't even ask a fedora-wearing man for help if I was bleeding out.

Oooh, and you’ve got a huge feather in that sign you’re wearing? Thanks for being such a great communicator, guy on the bus.

So to see a woman wearing the most vile fedora I’ve ever seen… I didn’t expect it and I really didn’t want it. I just feel betrayed. I didn’t think women treated other women like this. I thought we stuck together in at least some way, to some degree. But this… Yeah, I’ve lost a little faith in an international sisterhood. The polka dots aren’t what’s breaking my heart exactly, but they are what’s trampling it into a fine dust of smithereens.

7 A Great Way To Hide Your Phone

I would really, really like to think that this hat was specifically designed for undercover agents who also attend British royal galas. Of course, that would mean we’re in my ideal world and this hat would never exist in my dream world.

That cheek piece is the perfect place for your earbud or even a whole phone. You could hide an old school Razer phone in that little cheek adjacent cubby.

The oils on your face and phone would definitely lead to a break out if you left it in for a while, but you’d have someone to talk to, and it’s not like we can see that third of her face anyway.

This hat is like a Phantom of the Opera mask except lower, a little farther back, and in silver. It’s a strange disguise and a horrific hat that seems to be made of wicker, but it’s one way to hide the dirt behind your ears. Speaking of wicker, so many of these hats remind me of second hand furniture and it’s blowing my mind. I really think our only hope of dissuading people from wearing these ridiculous hats is to show them the furniture section at my local Goodwill and let them connect the dots.

6 One Way To Carry Snacks

Now I feel like the universe is playing with me because I’ve never met a neon green item that I liked. This is just rubbing my own discomfort in my face. It’s just the worst color.

The only person who should wear neon green are cartoon characters, toxic sludge in cartoons, and poison dart frogs that are super venomous. But never human women, unless they’re crossing guards responsible for the safe passage of children. That’s an important enough job to justify such an ugly color.

This hat feels like a European update on the sombrero filled with chips in the brim and salsa in the center. This hat is perfect for delivering little biscuits and macaroons can rest on the fluttery bow part. Oh, what did you say? This hat is supposed to exist on its own and not in proximity to any snacks? Well that’s ridiculous. If that’s the case (which I highly doubt — surely someone’s worn real food as part of their atrocious hat at some point in British history) then I simply don’t understand why this terrible hat exists.

It’s a head mounted plate, right? Wow, I’ve truly met my match and it’s in a tacky green hat. I should have seen this coming.

5 When The Unthinkable Happens

I never thought anyone could ruin Kate Middleton’s face, or just make her look less attractive, and yet it’s happened.

She’s so beautiful — it’s like the sun where I can’t look directly at her and this hat was the cloud that darkened the sky.

It might have just floated across for an instance and now it’s a thing of the past, but I’ll always remember that darkness. This hat somehow defies inhuman beauty and takes us all down with it. It adds up that even the most gorgeous woman would look slightly worse while wearing a satellite on her head, but I really never thought it would come to this.

If nothing can set you against these hats, keep in mind someone made a hat to specifically hide a portion of Kate Middleton’s face. I don’t care if she had a forehead pimple that day — I bet it was the most beautiful pimple. If she had a zit, I want to see that zit so I can learn from it and have my zits be more like her zits. What else is there to say about this hat? It’s a crime and I’d rather focus on the survivors of this hat than the evildoer itself, who is the hat.

4 A New Low

I really thought I had found my least favorite hat. I was so foolish. So naive. As if there was one worst hat and not a zillion bad hats, each equally horrific in different ways. When will the madness stop!?

I don’t just dislike this hat because it’s an awful multi-media art project in what barely looks like a horse, I dislike it for so many other reasons. Mostly because it looks like those weird grocery-store, overly doughy, sugar cookies with the overly sweet icing. They’re not the bake-and-slice cookies, although I’m pretty sure those just get by on people’s sentimentality and not their actual flavor. It’s those cookies that are just as bad as not eating a cookie.

People keep insisting those cookies are good and I don’t know why they’re trying to maintain that lie. What would you realize about yourself and this world if you just admitted that there are bad cookies out there and those weird flavorless ones are in that category? Just like this hat, those cookies are straight up gross. Can we talk about this insanely skinny horse? Why is its waist so tight? I’m so relieved this isn’t a real horse because it’s clearly ill.

3 When Your Hat Is A Snake-Skin Tooth

Guys, she’s wearing a giant’s molar as a hat. We all know that, right? This is proof that giants exist and you can also adhere snakeskin to a tooth, somehow. I don’t know what strange conference led to a designer and a dentist meeting, but it happened.

There’s a furious giant out there somewhere with the worst toothache  in the world, who just woke up at the dentist office for giants, and he’s about to storm this gala looking for what’s rightfully his.

I’ve never understood how cavities work or most anything about mouths, but I have to assume the inside of this tooth was so rotted and hollowed out that she was able to fit it on her head. And then throw on a few spiny feathers just to be safe. What’s a British royal hat without any feathers that look like they were purchased half off at a craft store? Why, you could wear the silliest hat and without a spray of plumage, it’s practically not silly at all. I can’t wait for a giant to pick her up in their huge fist, pop that veneer tooth back in their mouth, and just down her. Maybe they should floss with the feathers since oral health clearly isn’t their strong suit.

2 A Great Way To Tell Everyone You're A Villain

This is the most super villain-y of the hats and I don’t dislike it. At least one person is letting their hat tell us how they feel about world domination.

This woman obviously jet-packed in to whatever horse race she’s attending and I bet she’s the coolest person here. Oh, a widow’s peak made of a royal blue hat? Throw it on my face!

The thing about these hats is they don’t create angles on people’s faces the way contouring does, which is to enhance your natural features. These create angles on people’s faces that don’t exist, shouldn’t exist, and can’t exist. I really doubt this hat maker knew a human would wear this and not that it was going to be the decoration on a skyscraper. Or a cubist boat. This hat just takes no consideration into the human form. If it turned out that this hat was made by someone who had never seen a human being, I wouldn’t be all that surprised. I'd be definitely more interested than I am now but not as confused. Actually, that would answer most of my questions about these hats. Because what kind of designer has never seen a human being before?

1 Tastefully Depressing

There's something about this hat that makes me want to get on the dance floor and do the saddest Conga line ever.

It's so celebratory and yet depressing and it's making me feel a lot of things I don't understand.

I want to weep while I’m dipped by a man in a mostly unbuttoned silk shirt looking at this. I just want to bust out a really morose cha-cha. I swear this hat’s feathers (or bristles? Are we sure this wasn’t just pulled from a feather duster?) were stolen from the world’s saddest peacock.

I know that this is a hat she’s wearing, but I swear it’s the latest technology in dusting from Swiffer. I swear if we just turned her over and used her like a little broom, I could have the dustiest of spooky mansions spick and span in no time. Those not-quite-feather things look like they could pick up so much debris! They’re almost like a whale’s baleen but softer… (ew, soft baleen). That’s as useless and icky as a super soft toothbrush.

Look, when I see this hat I think about a lot of different inventions, some of which exist and some of which someday might, but I definitely am not reminded of a hat.