The 15 Worst Inventions & Innovations of the Decade

Here are fifteen things we'd be better off as a whole with had they never been created...

#15. HEINEKEN LIGHT. Great, just what douchebags needed: Their own beer to chase Jaegerbombs with. But kudos to Heineken. First, they convince the common beer purchaser that their brand is high quality and enjoyable. Second, they water that shitty product down and market it towards the only people dumb enough to spend premium prices on it.


#14. PARKING FOR EXPECTANT MOTHERS ONLY. I don't have a problem with this in theory, but sooner or later we're not going to have any good parking spots left. At the very least, stores should also consider "Parking for the Hungover Only".

#13. EVITES. If you can't count how many of the 9 people you invited over for fondue and wine spritzers without having to log onto an internet page, that’s your problem. The reality is, an email's just fine, and it's not going to steal your friends email addresses and sell them to spam-marketers.

#12. LIVESTRONG BRACELETS. I hate cancer as much as the next dude. But there's something so off-putting about wearing an "awareness" bracelet. It's lilke people who wear them stare at your naked wrist like "What, you don't care about autism?" or "So you're not doing anything to prevent Child Abuse?"

#11. SMOKE FREE CAMPUSES. Three best times for a cigarette: With a beer, With a coffee, and after having relations. Three activities widely practiced in college: Beer, Coffee, Sex. I'm not saying smoking should be allowed in the dorm rooms (though God it was fucking awesome going to school in the 90s) but at least allow a poor fella to duck outside with a red solo cup and a Marlboro light after hooking up.

#10. MANDATORY AMERICAN FLAG LAPEL PINS. Newsflash: If you have to show your patriotic by flaunting the flag, you miss the entire point.

#9. FREECREDITREPORT.COM. There's a lot of competition for worst commercial campaigns of the century: Anything be Geico (how'd that caveman sitcom work out), the Yogurt Loving Women (This is first-kiss-good. No, it's Indigo Girls-Concert-Good), and of course, The Gap. However, nothing's been more annoying than the Free Credit Report jackass and his catchy jingles. What makes matters worse, at the end of each annoying commercial, they say "Requires Enrollment in Triple Advantage". So it's not even fucking FREE. But that’s America in the Aughts: We believe something just because you say it: Clean Air Act, Leave No Child Behind, Iraqi Freedom, Free Credit Report.


#8. DOWNLOADABLE INTERNET JUKEBOXES. Loving music and drinking the way I do, you'd think I'd love this idea. But alas, not a chance in hell. First off, it's completely undemocratic (and uniquely American) - for extra money, you can leapfrog people who requested a song before you. So much for throwing a $5 in, selecting 18 songs and anxiously awaiting "You Give Love a Bad Name" to tell you that the next hour's on you. Secondly, a bar's jukebox used to be part of it's character. Certain songs remind me of times spent at certain bars, like the Marshall Tucker Band's "Can't You See" or the Allmans "Melissa" at the Mountain Valley Brew Pub, or anything off of "Who's Better, Who's Best" at Andy's Corner Bar but that’s all gone now, cause if I have $2 I can play the Canadian National Anthem wherever I want, and if I double down, I can play it before you're request.

#7. TEA PARTIES. Look, I'm as populist in nature as they come, and I distrust ALL authority. I think the founding fathers were the REAL Greatest Generation and the American Constitution is the most beautiful document in history. But what you've seen this past summer was nothing more than a glorified Klan rally. A bunch of wackadoos who 5 years earlier were all about deficit spending and nation building looking for an excuse to protest the fact that The President of the United States has a funny name and doesnt look like them. Don't believe me? 3/4 of them didn't believe that the President was born in the United States and they thought he was a Muslim.


#6. TAILGATE BANS. It's begun. Our last bastion of liberty is under siege. The only public place where it's acceptable to enjoy an adult beverage in an open container, grill over an open fire, and pee on the side of an Escalade is the target of college and professional parking lots. On the university front, it's the same minges who brought you smoke free campuses and required that you asked permission to get to second base. On the pro level, surprise, it's all about money. They're realizing that you're drinking a $10 twelve pack outside and not a $12 pint inside. And your flame broiled cheeseburger cost you a buck instead of a cold microwaved one left over from last week's game. You wanna protest something Teabaggers? Here's your chance.

#5. CROCS. Those plastic shoes with holes in them. I can see how they make life easier for a parent. No laces, safer than a flip flop and cheap. But that should end with enrollment in kindergarten, not your 50th birthday party. Note to adults who wear these things (and I'm using the movie theater definition of adults: Over 12): You look like a jackass. And we're laughing at you.


#4. THE COLOR-CODED TERROR ALERT CHART. Really? If you ever once fell for this shit and took it seriously, or said to yourself "Oh no, we've moved up to Red", do us a favor: Get a vasectomy, get your tubes tied, whatever. Just PLEASE, for the love of humanity, DO NOT PROCREATE! America, the world, can not possibly afford you in the gene pool anymore, we have enough problems.


#3. UNCONVENTIONAL MORTGAGES. Yup. I got one. Nope, I never should have been able to buy a house with $300 in my checking account. Lucky for us, we've been able to make our payments on a vastly overpriced house. But many Americans haven’t been, and that pretty much brought us to the brink of a depression. Greedy, sniveling cocksucking banks.


#2. MAGNETIC RIBBONS. Like rubber bracelets on steroids. Turning the interstate into one massive shitpile of causes. Alright, we get it, you adopted a pet. What’s your fucking point? Do you think that the person in the car behind you is going to make the decision to rescue a mutt from the pound because of the ribbon magnet on your Honda Pilot? Do you think somebody's going to walk past your car in the mall parking lot and think "Shit, we're in a war. I guess I should support our troops." Furthermore, do you think just throwing a magnet on your car is going to provide armor to the troops, stop stray cats from being put down or end terminal illnesses as we know it?



#1. REALITY TELEVISION. I know we've had reality television before the decade began, most notably rubbish like "The Real World" and "Survivor" (A giant tip of the cap for those of you who tuned into those, inspiring network execs to green light everything else). But this is the decade where (like everything else, thanks to money) reality television took off. We watched Flava Flav court Drago's girlfriend. We watched fat people exercise. Sometimes they were famous fat people. We saw Mini-Me pee in the closet of the bedroom he shared with Peter Brady. We are now tuning into see a glorious cadre of douchebags litter the Jersey shore.


But the worst of the worst, without a doubt, is the abomination known as American Idol. When I was a kid, we didn't crown our champions of music by sending a text message about who we thought won a karaoke contest. It would be one thing if these cover-bands would just win, get paid, and go away but that’s not the case. They invade every aspect of our culture. They're in our movies. They date our overrated quarterbacks that can't perform in December. We hear them in the supermarket. They simply won't go away!






For all of these turdlings on our television screen, I can't help but declare that Reality TV was the worst innovation of the decade.