Editorial

Cancel Culture, Coronavirus And Endless Virtue Signaling: Here Are The 5 Worst Things About 2020

(Credit: YouTube Screenshot AuntieTay https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHgcl7Xr8Iw)

Font Size:

It’s safe to say that 2020 really wasn’t a good year for anybody but there are five things that happened this year that were almost completely unbearable.

Cancel culture wasn’t invented in 2020, but it has evolved into something nobody expected this year. Or maybe you did expect it. Then March hit, and we got the lovely coronavirus pandemic. The coronavirus pandemic is special in the way that it gave us multiple terrible things in 2020. Celebrities were also insufferable like they are most years, but this year they were insufferable in new ways.

The number one worst thing about 2020 is probably spending over half of the year wearing a face mask. Now, it’s important to wear them in certain situations and they provide some protections from coronavirus, but let’s face it. They are not fun to wear. You get acne. It’s sometimes hard to breathe depending on the material. If the straps are too tight on your ears, you get a headache. I could go on, but we all know that they suck.

Coronavirus has also made the list in a different way. The TV shows and commercials now feature coronavirus and in the worst ways possible. “Law and Order: Special Victims Unit,” “Grey’s Anatomy” and any regular evening sitcom all feature coronavirus. The characters wear face masks and it is as if we are watching our own personal hell in the TV shows we use to escape reality.

Just check out this Match.com commercial.

I mean, come on. We can’t come up with anything more creative than coronavirus jokes at this point? We’ve done nothing all year but work from home with endless amounts of time to be extra creative.

Continuing on the list of worst things about 2020 is the behavior of celebrities. For some reason, this year they have been extra awful. The coronavirus pandemic has brought out a holier than thou side of celebrities that we knew was already there, but didn’t think could get any worse. (RELATED: Here Are All The Celebrities Who Have Lost Their Minds During The Coronavirus Quarantine)

“Everybody stay home and do your part to stop the spread.”

“Here I am with all my closest friends and family on a trip for my birthday.”

If you don’t know what I’m referencing, Kim Kardashian flew all of her closest friends out to an island to celebrate her birthday.

It’s almost like celebrities don’t think we see all the things they do when they literally share their lives with us on social media.

Throwing this is with celebrities as well, but that period of time when they were trying so hard to entertain us from home. Actress Gal Gadot even shared that terrible lip synching music video to John Lennon’s “Imagine” that ended up being the most cringe-worthy Instagram post out of everything shared in 2020.

This should have been the year that celebrities just took a back seat.

Speaking of social media, 2020 was the year that everyone discovered Instagram Live. This makes the list because it was truly a terrible moment in 2020. Nobody ever cared what anyone was doing, but there was a time period during quarantine where every brand, celebrity and maybe that old friend from high school went live on Instagram. It was truly the worst part of quarantine.

Honestly, social media all around was pretty terrible this year. Nobody had anything to do, so Twitter really became everyone’s personal diary. Not to mention everyone became a commentator to the 24/7 news cycle. I hope we all take a break in 2021.

2020 was also a huge year for activism and for pushing your beliefs onto other people. Protesting is good. It’s one of the most American things you can do with your time. However, virtue signaling was definitely one of the worst parts of 2020. People expressing their opinions to show you that they are a great person, but not actually doing any actions. They definitely didn’t donate to any causes they believe in or volunteer for any charity programs. Instead, they continuously posted graphics with statistics showing that they care about the issues in the world.

Now, let’s talk about cancel culture. If we had any home that society would grow out of this terrible habit, we were all wrong. Cancel culture went from bad to worse to really f*cking awful in 2020. There were so many instances of cancel culture that I can’t even name them all.

There was the Central Park Karen story where the woman called the police on the black man in Central Park. She was obviously charged with filing a false police report, but on top of that she lost her job and the dog she was walking in the park. The victim in this story wouldn’t even cooperate with police in the investigation because he felt like she’d already suffered enough consequences, according to previous reporting.

There was also the New York Times food writer Alison Roman who was placed on temporary leave after she criticized Chrissy Teigen and Marie Kondo. Were her comments nice? Certainly not, but should she have pretty much lost her job over it? Also, no. (RELATED: NYT Columnist Suspended After Comments About Chrissy Teigen, Marie Kondo)

Most recently, a high school student held onto a video of a girl saying a racial slur back in 2016, then posted it online this week after she had chosen to attend her dream school, the New York Times reported. The student was removed from the college cheer team within two days of the video being shared online and the university encouraged her to withdraw from the school, according to previous reporting.

If anything needs to stay in 2020, it is cancel culture. We could also do away with virtue signaling, celebrities who really don’t get it, coronavirus as a whole and social media. Let’s be a better society in 2021.