Pop Culture
10 Reasons to be Glad the Nineties Are Over
The Australian, 24 January 2000
A few weeks into 2000 and the fuss is over. Whether the 20th
century ended last year or this one (and if you could care
less, you really must get out more), we are free of all those
lists of the greatest, best -- whatever -- of the past decade,
century or millennium. Finally, we can live our lives without
thinking of 10 ways to go about it.
Unlike the 10 Commandments, most of these lists were meant
to encourage debate. Still, some of them were so ludicrous,
so pointless, that we were too stunned to construct an intelligent
argument. So until the end of this year, when pedants salute
the real end of the millennium, here are 10 most appalling
lists.
10. 10 Famous People who Slept with Their Dogs
Not nearly as scandalous as it sounds, but if you really
must know who was unsanitary enough to allow their pets in
the bed, it's all there in The Book of Lists series, along
with such gems as 10 Famous Events that happened in the Bathtub,
23 Typical Jobs Rated According to Boredom and The 10 Most
Landed-upon Monopoly spaces. (No, I didn't make that up.)
These books, edited by the late Irving Wallace and his family,
were best-sellers in the seventies and eighties. Wallace's
children, David Wallechinsky and Amy Wallace, continued to
enlighten us with The Book of Lists: The '90s Edition, which
probably helped start the list-making craze. They should not
be forgiven.
9. Cosmopolitan's 60 Most Successful People under 30
Specially designed to make Cosmo readers feel like underachievers.
Exactly what "successful" means is difficult to
gauge, but year after year, there are very few people on this
list who aren't actors, musicians, sportspeople or Good News
Week regulars.
8. Most other celebrity lists
Yes, there are many other celebrity lists on the racks, all
trying to outdo each other in dopiness. No sooner did New
Weekly give us the world's "coolest" people than
Who Weekly, surpassing even Cosmo, chose the 21 "hottest"
stars under 21. (Yes, they found that many.) Then TV Week
boasted, on its cover, "TV's 16 Sexiest Stars",
raising the question: what sort of number is that? And what's
more: why was there nobody from The Bill?
7. 101 Ways to Survive the Y2K Crisis
OK, so maybe the Y2K crisis could have been worse, and maybe
it was good preparation that saved us from disaster - but
who really believed that, if the clocks struck 1900, we would
suddenly return to 1900 (or even 1300) technology. This book,
by U.S. crisis manager Steve Tomajczyk, was one of many that
assumed we would do just that. Enough said.
6. The Coolest Parents
Britain's Motorola mobile phone company commissioned this
survey in October, asking 10- to 16-year-olds to name the
world's coolest parents. As any kid could tell you, this is
an oxymoron. (Well, many kids don't actually know what "oxymoron"
means, but you get the idea.) Number two on the list (after
Posh Spice and Devid Beckham) were Brad Pitt and Jennifer
Aniston, who are not even parents (or married, for that matter).
It just goes to show: parenthood really is uncool.
5. BBC Online's Greatest Composers of the Millennium
The people vote. Fine, but who was number one? Bach? Beethoven?
Stravinsky? Well, Paul McCartney actually. Suddenly, asking
the "experts" made a lot more sense. Nothing against
Sir Paul, but anyone who wrote Silly Love Songs deserves to
be demoted to second place, at least.
4. The 50 Grossest Movie Scenes of All Time
There have been plenty of movie lists, many of them rather
silly, but the British magazine Total Film excelled itself
in 1998 by listing the most awful, disgusting scenes in movie
history, placing them in a special sealed section (allegedly
to protect sensitive eyes, but really so that people would
be forced to buy it rather than just browse at the newsagent).
Only essential for those who want photos of Monty Python characters
exploding in restaurants, or aliens tearing out of people's
stomachs.
3. Almost any list of the "all time" greatest
songs
Many historians, in their ignorance, believe that human civilisation
is a few thousand years old, and that pop music has been recorded
for just over a century. According to commercial radio, however,
"all time" only began around 1956, which might explain
why Stairway to Heaven always rates so highly (but still doesn't
explain Hotel California). One of the few exceptions was when
BBC Radio 2 polled its listeners last year on the best songs
of the century. As the average Radio 2 listener is 52 years
old (unlike the average commercial radio listener, who is
perhaps about nine), a few songs by Cole Porter, Irving Berlin
and the Gershwins actually made the list. So did My Heart
Will Go On, but you can't have everything.
2. Time's Most Influential People of the 20th Century -
the Internet list
The published list was bad enough. (Bart Simpson and the
guy who stopped the tanks at Tiananmen Square made it, but
not Stalin or Neils Bohr.) The Internet list, voted by readers,
provided an excuse for special interest groups to band together
and flood the site with votes. Cartman (an obnoxious brat
from South Park) ranked number 3 for a while, until the editors
ruled that he wasn't eligible, being fictional and all. Jesus
Christ was number one, but was disqualified for dying before
1900 (despite protests from his fans, who pointed out that
he returned to life). Elvis Presley won instead.
1. The 10 Most Appalling Lists
OK, this is pure self-promotion. I've always wanted to be
number one in somebody's list.
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