Top 10 Top 10 Lists That Don't Really Deserve To Be Top 10 Lists

We're coming up to the end of the calendar, which means only one thing: the mediasphere wants more lists. Yes, MORE lists. Endless, endless lists: Best Songs, Most Culturally Poisonous Films, Top 10 Everything, et cetera. MORE LISTS! And this year even more so than usual, because it isn't only the end of 2009: it's the end of the '00s.

(Speaking of which: how did we manage to live through an entire decade without being able to name it?* The Aughts, the Zeroes, the Noughties, the Nothings? – no. This was The Decade That Nobody Could Agree On The Name Of. When Generation Z grow up, how are they going to label their childhood nostalgia? We're not making it easy for them . . . And even worse, what the heck are we going to call the next decade? Are we really going to call it the "Twenty-Teens"? Seriously? I'm freaking out, man)

So, people like lists. You know this. It appeals to the human instinct for pattern recognition, I guess: people like seeing things ordered and labelled, we like to know what's important. That's why "Best Of" lists are always among the most popular blog posts, right?

But on the other hand, I'm kind of sick of Top Tens. The lists are almost always hopelessly subjective – which is fine – but they're also usually pretending to be objective and authoritative, which pisses me off no end. That list you just wrote up, that list you just read, over on that other blog? Please, internet, stop taking that list seriously. A list is not a table of statistics. It's a mixtape. For goodness' sake.

With this in mind: here's my Top 10 List of Top 10 Lists That Don't Really Deserve To Be Top 10 Lists.

10. Top 10 Albums Of 2009 That I Kind Of Thought About Buying But Then Didn't

9. Top 10 High Concepts Improvised In Less Than One Minute

8. Top 10 Song Titles That Are No Longer Hits When Rephrased As A Question Instead Of As An Assertion

7. Top 10 Ambiguous Sporting Team Nicknames

6. Top 10 Pop Culture References That Will Make Me Feel Nostalgic For My Childhood, I Hope

5. Top 10 Pseudonyms Used By Undercover Ticket Inspectors On Melbourne Public Transport

4. Top 10 Least Respectable Titles Of Philip K. Dick Novels

3. Top 10 Sports That I Expect I Will Never Play

2. Top 10 Actors That I Can't Remember The Name Of, But Then When I See Their Faces I Go "Oh Yeah, I Know Them"

1. Top 10 Best Numbers Between 1 and 10

I'll actually be posting all these lists between now and the end of the year. No, wait – there's barely 10 days left in the year, that won't work. How about I post these Top 10 Top 10s between now and the end of, say, January? Or, at least no slower than once per week? Sure, at least!

Yeah, that's right. Watch me.

See you soon :)

*& cheers to M("F")V for reminding me about this, just the other day

Like A Tiger

I do not care about this recent Tiger Woods affair car-crash whatever thing. I also did not care about the Premier of South Australia having an affair last week, or whatever that was. I mean, I don't think I ever used to care about "celeb adultery shock!" stories, much – but lately I've been more than uninterested, I've been damn well anti-interested, to the point that celebrity sex scandals are actually repelling my interest.

Is it just me? I know that famous people's extramarital affairs used to be much more of a big deal, years ago, because extramarital affairs used to be much more of a big deal in general, years ago . . . Until the 1970s, divorce was always scandalous and/or nigh-impossible; sex scandals could literally bring down a government. Fair enough these stories were well newsworthy, then.

Today, though . . . how is adultery still worth a broadsheet's front page? Is it really news? I mean – what's the divorce rate, these days? I'm 28 now, and I'm almost the only person I know whose parents aren't divorced. Only a minuscule fraction of marriages last from the vows 'til death without being interrupted by adultery and/or divorce. Shouldn't it be a hell of a lot more newsworthy when famous people don't have an affair and/or break up?

This is the gist of my rant: adultery is BORING. Adultery is ROUTINE. Adultery is EVERYWHERE, even if some people still refuse to admit it. So can't we just assume that most famous married people are having affairs, and then forget about it? With rare exceptions, adultery has no bearing on anything that the famous person is actually doing in the public sphere. And it's none of our business, right? Look, I enjoy reading about (some) famous people, I totally understand the impulse to learn the "private" details of their lives; it's a neat thrill, sometimes. But adultery just isn't doing it for me, anymore. Adultery is dull, predictable and petty; it's not exciting, it's not even sexy. It leaves me feeling vaguely glum. I'd rather know what Tiger Woods eats for breakfast than know the state of his marriage, and I don't really care what he eats for breakfast. I don't even play golf.

I DO NOT CARE about Tiger Woods's marriage.

However. I did find this Chinese news report rather intriguing:

(via Pajiba)

The Onion's version of events is compelling, too.

Am I in a minority of one, in not caring about celebrity adultery? Am I being too old-fashioned, or too new-fashioned, or just daft?

/end rant

Horsypocrisy?

Here's a question. Is it hypocritical to simultaneously hold the following two opinions?

1. HORSES ARE SCARY AND I DON'T LIKE THEM

Seriously. They're big – bigger than a human! – and they have big heavy hooves with which to kick. You can't trust an animal that you couldn't take one-on-one in a fight. (See also: bears). People try to use horses for transportation and they get kicked at or thrown off, all the time. If you're kicked or thrown off, you're likely to break your head. Horses are unpredictable, nasty, wild, flighty beasts which will hurt you as soon as look at you.

Also, they bite. They smell bad. They aren't very smart. And they leave crap everywhere.

2. HORSERACING IS CRUEL AND SHOULD NOT BE

Now, you take an animal and dress it up in bondage gear. You "break" it psychologically, because that's the only way it will accept another animal sitting on its back. You make it run around in circles, hitting it repeatedly. If it falls over and breaks its leg while you're doing this, you kill the animal, because it's cheaper to kill it than to let it heal and be lame. The justification for all of this? You can make money, by gambling on which horse will run fastest. (Not fastest in general, but fastest over a particular distance and under various unnatural conditions).

The usual reasons we do things to other animals – food for sustenance, clothing for warmth – are relatively justifiable, at least if you accept an essential superiority of human need. But horse racing? How is this not sickeningly cruel, unusual and unnecessary?

- Sunday Night Thoapsl