7 Reasons Why Listicles are Fucking Terrible and Badgers I Found On Google

You all know what a listicle is. If you’re on this site, you know what a listicle is. If you’re reading this, you know what a listicle is. If, by some odd miracle, you don’t know what a listicle is, I apologise in advance for defiling your virgin eyes with this piece-of-fucking-garbage genre of what I’m ashamed to call journalism. But if you’re a normal internet user and not an innocent grandparent trying to figure out where you put the carrier pigeon, this is a drop in the bucket of literary shit you’ve absorbed in your web surfings. And some of you, like myself, have probably come to a stunning realization. Listicles. Are. Terrible. Now, just a sort of disclaimer, most of this is going to be me shitting on this particular genre because of my own personal opinion of the listicle. However, there are a few grievances I hold with the listicle as a form of dialogue, and those will be incorporated as well. But most of this is going to be shitposting. Like, 99% of what you read will be adrenaline-fueled, blind hatred of the goddamn listicle condensed into little pixels. Also, badgers, because why the fuck not.

1. The name is stupid

Via images.onset.freedom.com

Honestly, who the hell thought that “listicle” was a good name? Setting aside the juvenile portmanteau of “list” and “article,” was there just some dude who went “Yeah, this is fine, this word doesn’t sounds like anything at all, nope”? It’s not like it sounds like something you would find plastered on the front page of UrbanDictionary:

Listicle:

- The reproductive sacks of a man flowing listlessly in the breeze

- The form of writing that middle school student news editors and middle-aged recluses use to sound intelligent

2. They’re opinionated

Via exoticanimalsforsale.net

You’re probably thinking, “Well, what isn’t these days?” And that’s a valid point: a lot of what exists in journalism today is, to some degree, biased. But there’s a difference between taking a stance and making an informed and intelligent statement on a specific topic and listing ten reasons why Jim from The Office is a fucking babe and “oh my god why can’t I have that?”. A normal article allows a discourse, at least much more so than listicles do: the latter tend to be so niche and singularly focused that they can’t really be considered part of the dialogue of whatever community they appeal to, since they don’t talk but parrot back what that audience is already saying.

3. They use a terrible rhetorical style

Via people.westminstercollege.edu

The listicle style is basically the mongrel, bastardized version of actual persuasive and argumentative style. There’s a main claim being made and reasons that support that claim, but it’s not like people go, “Hey, I think this thing, and here’s ten reasons why!” The people who make them know that they’re going to appeal to people who already agree with, or at least have some interest in, whatever they’re talking about, so there’s no reason for them to actually flesh out what they’re saying.

4. They generalize

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All of them. Every single one of them makes some half-cocked assumption and rolls with it into the pits of hell

5. They’re fucking everywhere

Via animalcorner.co.uk

EVERYWHERE. They’re like the gangrene of the internet, turning these wonderful digital mediums for conversation into necrotic clickbait shit. And it’s as if the body itself is just rabidly reblogging this clickbait until FaceBook is almost as bad as my email’s spam folder.

Almost.

6. You have to use BuzzFeed to read and write them

Via photos.smugmug.com

That’s right! You get to visit the wonderful BuzzFeed.com and immediately get bombarded by a wall of the internet’s own vomit! Doesn’t that sound peachy?

7. If it’s not BuzzFeed, it’s Clickhole

Via spirit-animals.com

And not even this badass motherfucker is down with that.