My Top Ten Celebrity Cringes Of 2011

2011 was a year of uprisings, natural disasters and political change. It was also a year of absolutely cringeworthy moments in pop culture. Here is my top ten:

1. The Royal Wedding. Daily Mail pundits with their hands down their pants gasping to see whether the royal clothes horse had her hair up or down. The memorabilia. The people who ACTUALLY CARED. And then the press attention lavished upon Pippa Middleton’s bottom. The junior Middleton, who resembles George Galloway in a girdle, now has a 400,000 pound advance to write a “party planning” book.

2. The Justin Bieber paternity debacle. In case you missed it, a grown-up lady claimed she shagged young Bieber in a backstage toilet and is now incubating his spawn. For the love of god.

3. Sinead O’Connor’s divorce. Or rather, the emo blog post explaining (sort of) the whole weird business. As Sinead says, she is indeed a 21st Century woman. And what could be more 21st Century than writing an awful blog post about your breakup with passive aggressive references to your man’s awful family?

4. Peter Kent‘s Durban performance. To hell with the Kyoto agreement, to hell with the environment and to hell with Canada’s international reputation. Now that the Harper Government have a majority, not only are they doing awful things, they’re sending people who actually look like James Bond villains to do awful things.

5. On that note, Justin Trudeau‘s “unparliamentary behaviour.” Okay, actually I cheered a bit. And then I cheered a lot. Then I put the YouTube video on Facebook. Peter Kent IS a piece of shit and it was about time someone mentioned it. What made me cringe was the apology afterwards; of course Trudeau Junior had to say sorry, but did he have to quote Trudeau Senior?

6. Charlie Sheen’s chemical-induced “bi-winning” interview. Only moderately improved by the inevitable dubstep version.

7. The Abramovich/Berezovsky sideshow. Two Russian oligarchs fighting over whose ill-gotten gains were more ill-gotten, in a London court, much to the amusement/disdain of everyone in Russia. And perplexity of everyone else.

8. James Murdoch’s totally believable select committee testimony, asserting that he had absolutely no idea what was going on in his own mafi…media empire. And another thing. Why on earth would he ask what his money is being spent on? That would be rude.

9. The talking dog video. Of all the viral nonsense I’ve been subjected to via YouTube in 2011, this invoked the lengthiest string of expletives.

10. And finally, the Conrad Murray/Michael Jackson trial. I realize our neighbours to the south have a unique approach to law and entertainment and the distinction between those two things, but for the love of god. Why put trials on TV? I don’t want to watch a heavily medicated guy looking somber in a badly lit room, and neither do you.

Contact the author here: miriam@morningquickie.com