The internet is very kind. It uses bulleted lists to convince us that we’re insane/ madly in love with the wrong person/probably going to jail. If you refuse to admit you’ve succumbed to the listicle trend, stay on your high horse and laugh at us lesser beings. I’ll be the bigger person here and make a shameful confession. Articles without numbered lists aren’t worth my time anymore. I skim through them, find no numbers, and move on. I hope you see where I’m going with this. This post hasn’t been proofread past the first sentence.

At this point, you’ve probably noticed that I lured you in with my clever title. Sorry, dear victim, but I think it’s time to start reading paragraphs again. I’m jealous fed up of lists getting all the views. Half of them don’t even need to be lists – are there really fifteen ways to recognise a not-a-morning-person? And if there are, do you really need to cross off that many symptoms? My advice – if it’s six in the morning and your friend is glaring into space with red eyes and an expression that screams danger, you can assume she’s not a morning person. You need no more warning signs.

The same thing can apply to almost everything else. If the guy next to you on the bus won’t shut up, you know he’s a talkative person. You need no more telltale signs. If you’re meeting someone fat for the first time, don’t say “Hey fatty!” That’s not very nice and you don’t need 26 Things Not To Say To A Bulky Person to tell you that. And in case you need me to break it down, don’t tell a dark skinned person they’d blend into the night sky, don’t threaten to throw your skinny friend in your underwear drawer, and don’t ask a fair skinned person if they hold milk against their faces and smile smugly at the mirror. What’s the matter with you?

Look, we’ve made it past three unnumbered paragraphs! The last time I felt this proud, I could say “ooh” to the beat of Weird Al Yankovic’s chartbuster Word Crimes, later turned into a much hated Blurred Lines. I’m going to wrap this up by congratulating you. And as a reward for staying, here’s a list of reasons why I don’t like listicles.

  1. I can’t write them.
  2. They’re more popular than I’ll ever be.
  3. I want supreme control and they’re taking that away from me.

This post was published in Thought Catalog. The author blogs at http://vitaminbs1.wordpress.com/
 Featured Image by Montecruz Foto