The 7 Things That Have Bothered Me in 2009

Thursday, August 27th, 2009
by andrew.pogorzelski

By Andrew Pogorzelski

We live in a world today where information is compatible in the palm of our hands, and with this new power we feel a need to let everyone know it. I think technology is a great advancement and resource but my god, some of the things that people do on the Internet irritate the hell out of me. From obsessive-compulsive Facebookers to self-proclaimed philosophers who dominate the “Twittersphere”, some people just have a knack for getting under my skin (and I hope I am not the only one.)

7. The Facebook Status
Now this only bothers me sometimes. I have no problem with people who post statuses like “at Game 7 of the Lakers” or something cool and interesting that’s worthy of conversation. What drives me absolutely insane is when someone on my news feed has a status that says, “Ryan Smith is at school” or “Annoying Idiot is doing push-ups.” The former of these two is just idiotic and useless. Most high school students are at high school during the day, it’s a known factoid about you. That’s like posting “the sky is blue” every time the damn sky is blue, we all know it is thanks for reminding us. Your input is obsolete, we know your at school so stop reminding us when you go to your place of education five times a day for eight hours. We know!

6. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
I refuse to purchase this game and I never will. Why? Because Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is the most blatant form of propaganda that this generation has witnessed (and yet fails to recognize its effect on society). It takes you through the lives of several soldiers who wage war against (you guessed it), Middle Eastern Arabs! It’s glamorizing the concept to kill people different than you who, consequently, are fighting US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. I highly doubt that the makers of Call of Duty offered insight to the fact that not all Muslims are terrorists. But hey, we live in the US of A and “if you durn’t like it, git out.”

5. “Let’s Save the World!” Facebook Groups
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for charity work and trying to solve all the world’s problems but we have to take a reality check here people. If one million people join your group to Save Africa, nothing will happen. All you are doing by joining these hordes of quixotic tree-huggers is taking credit for other peoples’ efforts. Thousands of dedicated citizens contribute to saving Africa or ending slavery in the Third World, but joining a Facebook group only says, “look at me, I’m helping the world by doing nothing because someone else is actually trying when I sit at home and click a button to show that I’m a global citizen!”

4. Twitter Philosophers
I will be the first person to admit I love Twitter. It’s your chance to exchange things you find funny, interesting, worth reading, musings, anything at all that your little heart feels like posting. However, there is one person who Tweets about the essence of dreams and other crap about finding the truth in our own souls. Take it outside, Socrates.  It’s been done before and if your discoveries were original or truly unique you wouldn’t be posting them for free on Twitter where anyone can take them and reap the benefits. Checkmate, Plato, you’re just not that interesting.

3. Chain E-mails
These parasites have haunted the Internet since the dawn of time. For everything good in the world, there has to be something utterly terrible to undo it. What would the Bush Administration do if it had nothing good to screw up from the Clinton years? Case in point, I could care less that if I fail to forward this message to ten people I will die at 11:11 pm by some gypsy-zombie girl. In fact, I have countered e-mails like this by resending them to their creators. They read a little something like this:

Dear Chain E-mailer,
Because you decided to waste my time, I decided to trace your e-mail to your exact location. If you forward me one more damn e-mail about the Y2K bug coming back, I will break your thumbs…I have people.

2. Facebook Applications
Besides the fact that a.) I do not care about “How Iowa I am” and b.) don’t check them, these buggers are extremely frustrating. I will list the three that I have major beef with and what they say about the people who thought I would somehow enjoy them:

“Friends for Sale”

Fun if you approve slavery, “Friends for Sale” essentially is the market of putting a dollar value of the lives of your closet friends (aka it is a hostage situation in a horrendous Harrison Ford flick.) The people in the “Let’s Stop Slave Trafficking Group” will be furious.

Pokemon

It is not 1998 anymore; I don’t like Pokemon or care if you want to trade them with me. If the weight of the world has not crushed your hopes and dreams of “catching all” the fictional dinosaurs, you may need a therapist. PETA will be on your case for promoting the use of capturing dinosaurs and don’t forget about the conservative Christians.

Mafia Wars

Do I need to explain? The Godfather was cool until Puff Daddy mentioned it as his favorite movie. If an endorsement from Diddy doesn’t destroy excellence, I don’t know what does.

1. Pop-Up Ads
The epicenter of all life’s problems on the web lies here. Want Netflix? A new desktop background? Congratulations, you are the 999,999,999th visitor today! If you give us your credit card number we will swamp you with expenses and buy useless crap off eBay! The pop-up ad is essentially your annoying little brother asking you “are we there yet” a thousand times on a very long car ride? NO, sit down and shut up and you will make everyone’s life easier if you do (internet!).

Photo Credit: (mrwilleeumm)

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