My Least Favourite Year

I was thinking of titling this entry as just, "Fuck You, 2016." But it seems somebody beat me to it. It was a really bad year. When people have mentioned that it was a bad year, some have tried to dismiss the concept by saying that it was just a bunch of celebrity deaths. If you are one of those people, I invite you to contemplate how you came to ignore the world beyond celebreties, yet dismissive of their mortality.

But was this really the worst year? On the scale of human history, clearly not. There were no plagues. There were no world wars. No major cities burned to the ground. No civilizations collapsed. Well, one began collapsing, sure. But still, this is no 476 (fall of Rome,) but a mere 330 (partitioning of the Roman Empire into East and West.)

So let's limit this discussion to my lifetime. With the help of Wikipedia, here are the contenders for Worst Year In My Lifetime, along with their credentials for the title.

1979

• Iran revolution, hostage crisis
• Sid Vicious dies
• Mardi Gras is cancelled due to police strike
• Salvadorian civil war begins
• White Night riots
• Margaret Thatcher takes office
• Skylab crashes
• Jimmy Carter's "Malaise" speech
• Lord Mountbatten assassinated
• The Who concert crush in Cincinnati
• USSR invades Afghanistan
• Chinese One Child policy is introduced

1985

• New Coke
• Ozone hole discovered
• Bangladesh cyclone
• Air India flight 182
• Brixton riots
• Mexico City earthquake
• Steve Jobs leaves Apple
• Volcano in Amero, Colombia
• Dian Fossey murdered
• Numerous plane crashes

1994

• Nancy Kerrigan attacked, media loses its shit
• Silvio Berlusconi elected
• Rwandan Genocide
• Kurt Cobain dies
• Ayrton Senna dies
• OJ murder/arrest
• Andres Escobar murdered (Colombian footballer who scored own goal in World Cup)
• Baseball strike
• Ronald Reagan's Alzheimer's announced
• Newt Gingrich becomes Speaker of the House
• Russia enters Chechnya
• Whitewater investigation begins
• Mexican Peso crashes

1995

• OJ trial begins, media really loses its shit
• Cult attack on Tokyo subway
• Selena murdered
• Oklahoma City bombing
• Christopher Reeve paralized
• Busiest hurricane season in 62 years
• New Jersey Devils introduce the Neutral Zone Trap
• Srebrenica massacre
• Steve Forbes runs for President - is unsuccesful
• Second Quebec referendum
• Yitzhak Rabin assassinated
• Calvin and Hobbes ends

2001

• George W Bush takes office
• Earthquake in Gujarat, India
• Taliban destroys Buddha statues
• Mir crashes
• Berlusconi re-elected
• Aaliyah dies in plane crash
• September 11
• Anthrax attacks
• Patriot Act
• Enron goes bankrupt
• Shoebomber incident

2016

• Numerous celebrity deaths
• Ammon Bundy and friends occupy federal wildlife refuge
• North Korea gets into space
• Siege of Aleppo
• ISIS bombs Brussels
• North Carolina bathroom bill
• Panama Papers
• Syria/Libya refugee crisis
• Rodrigo Duterte elected in the Philippines
• Flint water crisis
• Zika virus
• Bastille Day attack in Nice
• Dallas police shooting
• Brexit
• Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando
• ISIS bombs Istanbul
• Numerous black people shot by police
• Colombian people vote down peace treaty with rebels
• Hurricane Matthew hits Haiti
• Berlin Christmas market attack
• Donald Trump elected President

So I think you have to agree that 2016 was, indeed, the Worst Year Ever (in my experience.) Because the Wikipedia year-in-review was still incomplete at the time of writing, I had to complete this list by adding more events from memory. It was truly depressing how many times I thought the list was finished, only to remember, oh, right, that happened this year as well.

But it's over now. So I want everyone to try harder next year. 2016, don't let the metaphysical door hit your chronological ass on the way out. 2017, you may have a low bar, but we're still expecting a lot from you; you have a lot to make up for.