I have my first ever work Christmas lunch this afternoon, which means 2017 is fast ending and I am gearing up for my annual hibernation. Before I do, though, I have to finish the Indifferent Ignorance Awards 2017. This year’s awards are trickier than I thought they would be, because there is almost too much material to choose from! I have my personal favourites when it comes to books, films and all that… but when it comes to the main awards: the Homophobic Dick Award, the Ignorant Fuck Award, Greatest Social Media Moment, etc., I am stuck. I blame the Trump administration and Brexit. And the Internet, because I would be way less informed about those things if I didn’t have broadband. I’d probably also be happier.
Anyway, I’m writing to you all today and asking for you to submit your suggestions for the following categories:
- The ‘I Can’t Believe I’m Living Through This Shit, Although it Will Probably Kill Me So At Least There’s That’ Story of the Year I’m considering the Muslim ban, when Trump retweeted Britain First and the entire UK general election
- The ‘I Witnessed this Shit Live and Wish It Had Killed Me’ News Story of the Year Trump’s inauguration, the general election and possibly Weinstein?
- Outstanding Achievement for Distracting Me from the Horror of the Year for Five Minutes The Women’s March, my trip to Asia, Blue Planet II and books by Adam Silvera are all strong contenders here
- Outstanding Social Media Moment Frank Iero posted some gems on the Internet this year, but so did everyone I follow. Twitter might be the world’s largest example of confirmation bias, but when it’s funny that’s a joy to behold
- Indifferent Ignorance Homophobic Dick Award I’ve never given an award to an entire government before, what do you reckon?
- Indifferent Ignorance Ignorant Fuck Award Contenders are Trump, Trump and… Trump. I feel like this award was created for people like him, but in the spirit of competition I feel like there should be more contenders. SUGGESTIONS PLEASE.
For inspiration, here are last year’s awards.
I’m going to call it a vote, but in reality if you all could hit me up in a comment, I’ll make an Executive Decision about the ultimate winner some time between now and new year.
Francesca's Thoughts 
Hmm, for the ‘I Can’t Believe I’m Living Through This Shit, Although It Will Probably Kill Me So At Least There’s That’ Story of the Year award – surely it’s got to be the brexit negotiations? quite literally, they’re likely to kill us!! or rather kill all of us who don’t have the riches that put us at the top of the pile. Actually, you could make that politics in general, though specifically right wing politics/government. They’re killing us off as best they can – whilst retaining enough of us to do the menial tasks.
as for the ‘I Witnessed this Shit Live and Wish It Had Killed Me’ News Story of the Year – problem is that you don’t really want to give any kind of award to Weinstein. Or to Trump really. Weinstein deserves to rot in hell. He doesn’t deserve to be given such a prestigious award – even if he doesn’t know it. Do we want to give this man more publicity, or by talking about him, somehow give him an ounce of credibility as a person? Though I guess we don’t want to give anything to Trump either. I, for one, am kind of glad to see this year of Trump – to realise how fucking stupid people are! It shows just how far we have to go to get this planet on anything remotely resembling an even keel. But then again – to have seen the inauguration, and everything he has done since, to see his take on things, to see how many people he has convinced and got them believing his crap. Maybe that is worthy of this award. But again, UK politics have closely mirrored it, though the fact the GE wasn’t the landslide the Tories thought was a sight to behold.
Outstanding Achievement for Distracting Me from the Horror of the Year for Five Minutes – sorry but you can’t give yourself an award for your trip to Asia. I’m thinking there must be an animal story, something cute that was a great distraction. The giraffe that took forever to sprog? The #MeToo reaction to Weinstein, and abuse generally – that was quite a distraction
Outstanding Social Media Moment … tough one. got to be something on twitter, cos FB drives me to despair! but twitter is often awash with brexit and politics … or is that just cos i follow too many politicians? Ed Miliband has actually had some excellent twitter moments. surprisingly. the twitter backlash against KTHopkins – that’s rather nice (maybe she should get one of the first awards?), but maybe not outstanding. just trundled through my “likes” to see what’s made me smile … this … https://twitter.com/AyrtonLittle/status/940759951332560897 or this – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-42217521 . Both of them are beautiful positive moments
but we could also go with trump’s covefefe moment? or the Time person of the year tweet, where he was obviously stitched up. Or even the brief time his account was suspended. that was a stroke of genius by the perpetrator(s)
Indifferent Ignorance Homophobic Dick Award – could be Trump, but i wish it wasn’t. Why do we have to give him all the awards? I know – cos he’s a complete fucking arse! I don’t think you can strictly say the government in their entirety are homophobic – they have 19 LGBTQ MPs (as do Labour), and I don’t think that many of the rest are homophobes. The DUP perhaps! But the govt, in themselves, as a body – don’t think awarding them the IIHDA will withstand scrutiny. But the DUP should maybe be considered for one of the first two awards – joint award between them and the govt!! But let’s face it – Trump has done so much to work against the LGBTQ community. He has got to be the most prominent homophobic dick!!
finally – the ignorant fuck award … it’s such a shame you don’t know my ex hahaha. no, but seriously, we have to find someone that isn’t Trump for this award. There are so many contenders in the tory party. But should we be trying to find someone who isn’t a politician, or somehow connected to politics. I mean, you’ve got Katie Hopkins again. But it just seems like this should go to someone who we think is an ignorant fuck but could redeem themselves. Don’t want to give any kind of recognition, any validation to people like her who are absolutely despicable. Rees-Mogg, Hunt, Farage, Johnson. They all deserve it. All of Trump’s cronies – they deserve it. Couldn’t you make it into a group award? For all the right-wing, fascist, bigotted, nazi-supporting bastards out there? Or just Trump. As the figurehead. Give it to him.
hope that helps!!
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I’ve had this open while writing the post. I won’t spoil it because the blog will be up this afternoon, but excellent ideas. I had forgotten about the DUP (I imagine we all should) and I totally missed that kid getting into Harvard. You know what, people seem all right, really. Possibly next year I should bring back the Six O’Clock News but with nice stories?
Also I am very sorry but I could not in good conscience include your ex. If you ever want to live vicariously, though, I write a series called ‘Everyday Acts of Murder’… and welcome suggestions.
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