Not long ago, our Billy Haisley wrote a post shitting on Major League Soccer. When you rip on American soccer, you can rest assured that a tidal bore of American soccer fanboy defensiveness is headed your way. It's almost as if they're all huddled together outside your house, waiting behind the shrubbery, fully coordinated and prepared to leap out the second they hear anyone speak ill of the sport ("No one ever scores in soccer borrrrrring LULZ") and counterattack with a squall of bitchcakes attitude and cherrypicked factoids. YOU'RE JUST IGNORANT, ASSHOLE.
And so it got us thinking about a very specific kind of fan: the bitchy fan. You know the one. I'm not talking about typical bad fans like Yankee fans or Cowboys fans. Those are your standard asshole bandwagon fans. There is a small but important difference between generic bad fans and the thin-skinned, eternally aggrieved fans of the kind that American soccer produces. These are people who cannot let any criticism of their favorite sport/team/movie/ideology stand. They are WAITING to be outraged... waiting for the moment when they can defend their favorite thing like it's a wounded baby they're shielding with their own body. They are the deranged spokespeople whom their sport never asked for, the dickhead bouncer who makes you say, "I don't think I wanna go to this bar anymore." They are, let us posit, bitches.
But which fanbase is the bitchiest of all? Ah, that's where YOU come in, dear reader. Here now are 64 insufferably bitchy enthusiasts of all stripes, each with own distinct form of delusional paranoia, all of them bewildered as to why anyone would ever dare insult the thing they love so much. We did not limit ourselves to fans of one team, or even to the sporting world. In this bracket (click the above image to enlarge) you will find fans of individual teams, entire sports, film directors, political movements, and more. It's up to you to decide which fanbase is the bitchiest of all. So let's break down the bracket right now. We'll commence voting later in the week.
Sports: The "Best Fans In Baseball!" Regional
1. Soccer fans
American soccer fans believe that soccer ought to be the most popular sport in America, but is not because of stubborn, jingoistic assholes like you, who refuse to give soccer a chance. You probably complain about soccer without ever watching it, and therefore nothing you say holds any weight. Do you hate low scoring, dives, crypto-fascist fans, and/or grotesque oligarchs? Well, clearly you're just some mouth-breathing rube who has to be babysat at all times by made baskets and cheap touchdown passes. And if you say one more thing about how you don't like the offsides rule, you can go to hell.
(juggles Adidas ball between knees)
(makes unintelligible rallying cry for some asshole EPL team)
2. Mixed Martial Arts fans
All other sports are for pussies. MMA is the only real sport. I'd like to see an NFL guy step into the fucking Octagon! Then we'd see what he's made of! Any criticism of MMA is met with the exact kind of hypermacho dumbfuck meathead reaction that keeps people away from the sport in droves ...
It never occurs to MMA fans that there is a ceiling to the popularity of any sport in which Joe fucking Rogan is the main ambassador. Oh but it's the fastest growing sport in the Northwest Territories or something.
3. All hockey fans
NHL fanboys believe vehemently that all other sports have inferior playoff formats even though the NHL season is two months too long and the playoffs are so endless that you can pick any team with relatively healthy players and a hot goalie out of a hat and hand them the Cup. They will happily remind you that hockey would be the most popular sport on Earth a) if ESPN weren't so mean, b) if the 1995 lockout had never happened, c) if Gary Bettman weren't a complete idiot, and d) if you weren't a prick. Oh, and there's this ...
Take Wes Welker Syndrome and apply it to an entire sport. That's hockey fans.
4. Duke fans
I guess winning consistently with grace and honor earns you nothing but scorn these days. SMH. What does it say about modern society when we celebrate gangsta rap but make a villain out of Coach K? Am I living in Bizarro World here? The collective hatred of Duke acts as a referendum on our skewed priorities as a nation.
5. Boxing fans
Excuse me, did you just say boxing was in decline? Well, let me just point you to the latest pay-per-view buy numbers, ASSHOLE. Does a $50 million purse sound like the hallmark of a struggling sport to you? THE MIDDLEBANTAMFLYMITEWEIGHT DIVISION HAS NEVER BEEN STRONGER.
(lists 80 boxers you've never heard of, then Mayweather and Pacquiao)
6. St. Louis Cardinals fans
7. Lacrosse players
Any joke about lacrosse as a sport for rich preppy dipshits will be immediately countered with the "ACTUALLY THE SPORT HAS NATIVE AMERICAN ROOTS JIM THORPE PLAYED IT MEW MEW MEW" defense. This defense will be made by a white kid named Chad from Wilmington, who tried to fingerblast your sister last week. Chad has never met a Native American, not even when he went to Foxwoods that one time with his bros. Dude this place is in the middle of nowhere.
8. Boston sports fans
FACKIN' ALL OF YOU AHHHH JUST JEALOUS BECAWSE YOU DO NAWT HAVE THE FACKIN' RINGS! VIVA LA STOOL!
(puts in 50-pound dip)
When you take on Boston sports fans, you do not understand what sports fans in that town went through prior to their remarkably lucky stretch of titles. You do not understand the city. You don't even understand sports, really. Why don't you just get the fuck out of sports? You'll never be sportier than they are. THEY WATCH OLD LARRY BIRD VIDEOS. Your hatred of Boston springs from petty jealousy. You WISH you had teams this good, and you WISH you lived in a town where sports meant this much. Their love is better than your love.
9. NBA basketbloggers
Want a Twitter fight that ends up going nowhere? Well then, just follow one of the many (far too many) FreeDarko wannabes out there. It's time for you to think about the NBA less as a sport than a metaphysical journey in which fluidity and a 1961 Ornette Coleman album and Kevin Love's outlet passes—which you OBVIOUSLY don't appreciate enough—combine to create an entirely new paradigm. Now let's talk about what DeMarcus Cousins MEANS. Not DeMarcus Cousins the man. But the IDEA of him ...
10. Oakland Raiders fans
We do jokey previews about every NFL team every preseason and Oakland Raiders fans are the only ones who end up threatening us, en masse, with physical violence. And mind you, this is just for pointing out very basic, unassailable facts about the Raiders, namely that they've had a shitty record lately and are a poorly managed franchise. No one of sound mind is going to dispute those things, but in Oakland that merits at least 15 threats to rape your wife.
11. Kobe Bryant fans
Currently the NBA's best player. RIGHT NOW. AT THIS MOMENT. Even when he's unable to play. Say the word "Colorado." Go on. I fucking dare you.
12. MLS fanboys
Different from general soccer fans in that they are at constant war with both a) soccer haters and b) soccer fanboys who view MLS as an inferior product. You people in that latter group are filthy traitors and the reason soccer can't get any footing here in the U.S. How can you say you support the sport when you won't even watch an American team with American players on your home soil? ET TU, GUY IN THE MAN U SHIRT?!
13. Notre Dame fans
Like Duke fans, but with even less to stand on. It's not Notre Dame's fault that they occasionally struggle to compete when THEY HAVE SUCH HIGH STANDARDS, YOU KNOW. You try beating out a bunch of SEC cheaters when every Notre Dame student must be personally vetted by Jesus to ensure proper chastity and must also have a GPA of at least 3.9 with an AP course load well above 78 percent. The deck is stacked against them!
I've said this before and I'll say it again: Plenty of stupid people go to Notre Dame. It ain't Harvard.
14. Penn State fans
You were all part of witch hunt to bring down JoePa and tarnish the name of a treasured college football institution! You just couldn't stand that one program out there could win with honor and so you and the media vultures decided to tear it all down and rip a community apart. I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY. You killed JoePa! Asshole.
15. Sabermetricians
If you dare to bring up the idea that Alex Rodriguez wasn't exactly a fantastic postseason performer, you will immediately be bukkake'd with stats involving base-out states regressed to reflect underlying platoon splits and their correlation to franchise value appreciation that you don't understand and which contradict everything you said. Were you even aware that the postseason is too small a sample size? Everyone knows that now. You probably didn't even GET that Moneyball isn't really about statistics at all, but about arbitrage and undervalued assets. Do you read at all? Can you read? What's it like to go through life as someone who hates learning?
You will also be accused of not believing in evolution. MIKE TROUT IS A GOD.
16. Redskins name-change people
It's 2014, man! (repeats that phrase 9,000 times to you)
Politics: The Politico Commenter Regional
1. Christian Conservatives
Constantly under siege. You people don't know oppression until you're the member of the ruling majority and have permanent gerrymandered footholds in a majority of states. THE GAYS WON'T STOP PUSHING THEIR GAY AGENDA DOWN MY THROAT! They're opening my mouth and putting their gay penis in there and ejaculating hot talking points right down into my belly! The town hall won't put on a Nativity display because atheists are assholes! Hollywood is run by Jews! Radical Islamists are coming to bomb me ... sometime!
And of course the worst part is that, as a historically dominant segment of society, you're not allowed to complain. Talk about anti-Christian discrimination and you just get laughed at. But it's real! Why are you laughing? STOP LAUGHING. THIS IS IMPORTANT.
2. Vegans
Goof on vegans all you like. They'll have the last laugh when you're 56 years old and dying of a coronary embolism. Because you see ... mankind was never meant to eat meat. We were meant to eat ferns and twigs and roots and pebbles. Not only do you murder an animal when you eat meat, and not only are you stealing from a baby calf when you siphon away its mother's milk, but you are actively killing both yourself and the world at large. YOUR WAY OF LIFE IS NOT SUSTAINABLE. Do you know much coal was burned to bring you that pork chop?
/feeds wheatgrass juice to malnourished four-month-old infant
Have you ever tasted a strawberry? No, I mean have you ever TASTED one? Really tasted it? Whole new world.
3. Gun nuts
"They are not friends, they are not frenemies, they are enemies of The People of the Gun."
Out of all the deranged fanbases on this list, it is gun nuts who have their coordinated response down cold. When threatened, they buy all the guns, store all the guns, prepare to USE all the guns, and then threaten you online with said guns. Gun owners are peaceful law-abiding citizens. Now come try to take my gun and I'll shoot you in the fucking face. LAWS BE DAMNED.
4. Breastfeeding advocates
Are you feeding your child formula? Well, why not feed them bleach while you're at it? Did you know you just cost your child half an IQ point and $1,298 in potential future income by NOT breastfeeding? Breastfeeding is a wonderful, natural thing. Women who don't breastfeed are failures. All public laws should revolve around the accommodation of breastfeeding. This civic center has no breastfeeding ramp!
5. Twitter feminists
Of course the sports blog would put feminists on here, in a list about so-called "bitchiness." More unchecked privilege talking, completely unaware of its own intersectionality. So what if Lena Dunham got photoshopped to look thinner in Vogue, huh? I will happily toss aside a core feminist argument about mass media perpetuating unhealthy and unattainable body ideals to seize this sweet opportunity to feel more feminist-than-thou for at least two or three tweets.
6. 9/11 truthers
Well, I guess you folks will just believe any tripe that the media spoonfeeds to you, eh? WAKE UP, SHEEPLE. Maybe you should try researching your opinions for a change. If you looked into ANY of this, you would know that only a carefully sequenced set of charges could possibly have created the kind of perfect internal structural collapse that the neoconservatives and the military-industrial complex were hoping for, so that they could seize Afghanistan's strategically vital ports and shift us over to a monetary standard based on donkey meat. THIS IS ALL A MATTER OF PUBLIC RECORD, DUMBASS.
7. Dawkins-style hardcore atheists
Prove to me that God exists. Go on! Prove it! You can't. You're nothing more than a fucking lemming who bases his ethics on some old fairy tale. I laugh at your naiveté. You will die cold and alone and falling into an endless black void and I'll finally be proven right, which is the most important thing! I bet you think A-Rod is a choke artist, too.
8. White pride types
Every unabashed racist is convinced that he, and he alone, is brave enough to say what he assumes is on the mind of EVERY OTHER white person. Come on, white people! Have some pride in your race! You know white people didn't get to the top just by accident! Secretly, silently, you know what I'm talking about ...
9. Abortion absolutists
This one started an office argument and delayed publication by a few hours. I'll just let you imagine which side I'm talking about here, so we can move on.
10. Libertarians
Take a 9/11 truther. Now apply that kind of paranoia to every aspect of your political leanings. The nice thing about libertarians is that they can take radically liberal AND radically conservative defensive stances. They're not puppets of big business the way these politicians are, mannnnn. Then again ... if a CEO wants to pay his workers five cents an hour and have them whipped with rattan canes, THAT'S WHAT FREEDOM IS ALL ABOUT.
11. Marijuana reform advocates
Stoners only get worked up when the subject of pot is brought up, and they fail to see the inherent cycle of inanity in that fact. Mention that pot's medical benefits are WILDLY overstated (I tried smoking weed once for back pain and it only made the pain more annoying) or that smoking pot actually can lead to all sorts of bad things ranging from sluggishness to shooting bath salts into your eyeballs (I think), and suddenly Floyd on the couch over there morphs into a professor at Kenyon. "Like, you don't even know what you're talking about, man. Pot is from the earth. Here, read this pamphlet, brother."
12. Animal rights activists
These are people who don't bother with pretending to be subtle or friendly with a counter argument. They make no effort to hide their disgust. Oh you like meat? Well then you're a MURDERER.
/hires dim bulb actor to get naked for billboard
13. Edward Snowden fans
"Isn't there something a little off about a guy stealing all the government's secrets and then hiding out in, well, Russia?"
"NO. NO, THERE ISN'T."
14. Celebrity Scientologists
15. Naderites
Do Naderites still exist, or have they been formally subsumed into Pearl Jam's fanbase? I assume they still cling to the idea that they didn't ruin the 2000 election and that every politician who isn't Ralph Nader is just another pig feeding at the trough, and that it's more dignified to vote for a third party candidate with no hope than to try to shape party politics from within. Or maybe they joined the Occupy tent city (population: 6 1/2) currently stationed outside the latest IMF meeting.
16. Men's rights activists
Part of the reason MRAs are seeded so low here is because I still believe the entire movement is just a delightful prank. I mean, these guys clearly doesn't exist in real life. That's just a joke, right?
Culture: The "Worst Episode Ever" Regional
1. #TEAMBREEZY
Our Greg Howard nominates Team Breezy for the No. 1 overall seed in this tournament, and it's hard to argue with him (my personal choice for overall one-seed is in the Park Slope Food Co-Op region). Here's just a smattering of evidence ...
The best part is that all of these people are likely under the age of 15, so they're gonna be here on Earth for quite a while! You'll be dealing with Team Breezy long after all the Beatles fans and Deadheads have died off.
2. Comic book fanboys
Anyone who doesn't count Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth as a piece of literature on par with War and Peace or Moby-Dick is just plain ignorant. And what about Maus? IT HAD GENOCIDAL ALLEGORIES.
But sure, just go ahead assume that your average comic book lover is still an overweight, jobless asshole who sells Topps cards for a living. Ignore the fact that comic books are read by the likes of Michael Chabon, and Quentin Tarantino, and Seth Cohen. (Seth Cohen ended up with TWO chicks, I'll have you know.) Ignore that ComicCon is now THE launching pad for all major Hollywood movie franchises. Ignore that Watchmen is one of the greatest works of art of the 20th century and be just like that crazed, ungrateful, snake-worshipping Alan Moore, who disrespected the entire superhero genre himself. JUDAS.
3. Trekkies
The inferiority complex of Trekkies stems from the fact that they are often viewed as outcasts among outcasts. They are a more virulent strain of nerdy dipshit: fatter and uglier and somehow even more socially withdrawn than a Star Wars fan or a Battlestar Galactica fan. And Trekkies hate the fact that J.J. Abrams made Star Trek more popular by essentially making it as un-Star Trek like as humanly possible. That's not the REAL Star Trek. Where was the searching for new worlds? And Spock is getting laid now? RIDICULOUS. America's persecution of Trekkies led to the downfall of Trek itself! KHANNNNNNNNNN!!!! (BTW, How ridiculous was it that they tried to hide the fact that Benedict Cumberbatch was Khan? I mean, were we to believe he was just some average terrorist?!)
4. Beliebers
Every Justin Bieber arrest, every video of Bieber pissing into a mop bucket, every dickhead text to Selena Gomez: All of these ongoing embarrassments act as tests of loyalty for the 50 million nutjob panty-wetters who follow Bieber on Twitter and await his marching orders to kill. Do you DARE join the haters and leave Justin now, when he needs you the most? WELL THEN YOU NEVER LOVED HIM AT ALL, YOU BITCH. I will stick by Justin to the end, even if he kills 64 neighbors in a horrific grenade "prank." No one loves you like I love you, JB!
5. Video gamers
When Roger Ebert passed away, he was probably relieved that, in entering the afterlife, he'd never again have to have an argument with some fucking idiot gamer about whether or not Halo is "art."
Keep in mind that you don't even have to insult gamers to make them angry and defensive. Imagine going on XBox live and trying to compliment an opponent.
YOU: Hey, nice shot.
HIM: Yeah, I know. Better than your fucking sorry skills. FUCK YOU.
Listen to these people through a headset and you will want the sun to flare out and engulf us all.
6. Woody Allen disciples
Dylan's lying! Mia's a bitch!
/adjusts personal ranking of Woody's movies on an annual basis
7. Beyoncé fans
They're so batshit insane, they even get angry at Beyoncé. And not even when Beyoncé is being mean. But when she's being fan-friendly and releasing new material. Time to bust out this chestnut ...
Beyoncé has empowered women the world over, which means that if you rip on Beyoncé, they will acquire superhuman strength, grow each fingernail an inch, and rip the flesh off your body. And God forbid you speak ill of Beyoncé around a single white woman. You will end up hanging from the ceiling with jumper cables attached to your ballsack.
8. Dylan lovers
Similar to Beatles lovers in that any criticism of Bob Dylan (terrible voice, meandering songs, etc.) is met with, Well, your favorite band wouldn't even EXIST without Dylan! You can't deny how influential he was! Wait, what are you doing? Are you really denying his influence? You really want to do this?
/smashes you on the head with a banjo
Like Springsteen lovers, Dylan people will also go out of their way to point out that Dylan is as good as ever when that's CLEARLY not true. Tim Marchman: "Every so often he puts out a record just as shitty and unlistenable as everything he's been doing for 40 years and people swear it's great." But Marchman, Love & Theft was just as good as Blood on the Tracks, if not better! Bob's still got it! You young kids out there don't know what real music sounds like! Sit there while I fetch the turntable.
9. Deadheads
In the compiling of this bracket, Tommy Craggs argued that Deadheads are chill, but I spent my entire high school and college career arguing with shithead Dead fans who treat every volume of Dick's Picks like it's a fine Cabernet aging in their cellar. "You have to hear how Jerry transitions into 'Uncle John's Band' here. He only did this at that Akron show." No. Fuck you. All the drugs in the world aren't gonna convince me that this is anything but the boringest music on the planet. Rip on the Dead and these people will just shut right down before you. They'll look at you like you're a corpse.
10. Dave Eggers lovers
Oh, I guess you don't care that Dave supports young writers and has donated a significant amount of book royalties to worthy causes! You know, it's really sad that we've devalued sincerity in such a swift and cruel manner. Maybe if you'd ever written a book, you'd have more empathy. Let me respond to your criticism of Eggers's work in graduation-speech form.
11. Adults who like Harry Potter
Hey wait, I'm one of these people. What's wrong with liking Harry Potter at age 37? It's not just for kids, you know! J.K. Rowling is a successful adult-fiction author as well now. What are you, some fucking snob like Harold Bloom who won't read anything unless it aspires to be Milton? Well, you're a dick. The themes in Harry Potter are universal. UNIVERSAL, dammit. I'd like to see Milton write a character one tenth as interesting as Snape!
12. The View Askewniverse
Point out that Kevin Smith hasn't made a good movie in 19 years and you will get the thunder brought down on you by the New Jersey Jort & Hockey Sweater Association:
13. R. Kelly supporters
This is too low of a seed and I apologize in advance because R. Kelly fans are split into two distinct groups: 1) music critics who insist his music is some kind of brilliant deranged performance art when, in fact, it's just shitty music made by a terrible man, 2) R. Kelly fangirls who are just as crazy as Team Breezy but would prefer being urinated on to being punched in the face. Like Beliebers and Woody Allen fans, R. Kelly fans treat his accused crimes as nothing more than the fabrication of jealous haters and disgruntled former employees. WE STILL LOVE YOU, R. KELLY! PISS ON US!
14. Juggalos
It's become a cottage industry in journalism for reporters to go to the Gathering of the Juggalos and discover just how fucked up and bitterly hostile Juggalos are to the outside world. The only reason they don't rank higher in this region is because I suspect, deep down, all Juggalos know how stupid they look with that makeup on. Every angry laugh and every demand for exposed titties is really just a flimsy way of masking the fact that Bobby's dad drank too much.
15. Star Wars buffs
Defensive in that they treat every bad Star Wars creative decision since 1999 as a deliberate assault on their childhood. Why are you casting that Girls guy as your Sith lord, J.J. Abrams? Is it because you hate me? It is, isn't it? I WANT SOMEONE WHO UNDERSTANDS JUST HOW MUCH STAR WARS MEANS.
16. "Prestige" TV fans
The Sopranos was the best show ever until The Wire was the best show ever until Breaking Bad was the best show ever and if you have not seen any of those shows than you are like a college student who has never read Shakespeare, and White Twitter will have you sent to re-education camp. What were you busy doing, reading a book? BOOKS ARE FUCKING GARBAGE. They can't begin to compare to the Dickensian journey Vince-David Simon-Chase took viewers on.
Everyone knows this is the Golden Age of Television. If you can't appreciate a television program where a white anti-hero goes around being conflicted about being a white anti-hero, while veering off on several needless plot detours, then you're probably some hillbilly from flyover country. If you had read the Sepinwall recap, you'd understand why David Chase threw in that 80-minute dream sequence. You probably watch NCIS. Did you know that's the most popular show on TV? I'm offended by that idea.
Lifestyle: Park Slope Food Co-Op Regional
1. Pit bull owners
With all apologies to Team Breezy, we have pit bull fanboys as the top seed overall in this tournament. Pit bulls are big strong animals that can rip your face off with a single bite, so you'll pardon me if I don't trust you, some asshole stranger walking down the street, to keep Cujo there in line. You're like a gun nut with a household budget for Puppy Chow.
/waits patiently
/50,000 death threats appear in the Deadspin tips inbox
/"Maybe YOU'RE the breed that should be extinguished"
2. Anti-vaccination nuts
You let a doctor vaccinate your child? Why not feed the kid a bucket full of autism and cut out the middleman? Didn't you see Dallas Buyers Club? Let's undo years and years of meticulous scientific research and historic medical breakthroughs made by Jonas Salk because the lady from Singled Out said so. Makes perfect sense.
(By the way, I think it's perfectly natural to regard both doctors and pharmaceutical companies with a healthy amount of skepticism. But there's a clear difference between skepticism and an irresponsible disregard for preventive care. Not that these nutjobs see it. I get all my medical advice from People magazine.)
3. Cat owners
"Did you know cats are smarter than dogs? They're smarter than humans, really. And they eat mice, too! I never worry about mice anymore and that's a good thing because my carpet is LITTERED with old Bugles and Haagen Daaz lids."
The best part is when cat owners tell you cats have great personalities, and then you look to see if the cat has a personality and it's been spending the past nine hours hiding behind a fucking radiator. And the worst part is that the Internet has only emboldened cat owners. Lemme tell you something, cat people: Just because LOLCATS was a thing for four minutes doesn't mean the world is coming around to your viewpoint. I never even liked LOLCATS to begin with.
4. New Jerseyites
I'm still of the mind that New Jersey natives are people who got stuck in traffic on the Turnpike and had no choice but to give up and settle in Perth Amboy. But if you rip on Jersey for all of its obvious shortcomings (dirty, ugly, gross people, dirty), people from that state respond with WILDLY misplaced pride, like they just survived eight decades of Balkan war conflict. They've been tryin' to keep Jersey down for year-uhs but we're still here-uh! We're survivuhs! FUCKIN' JERSEY RIGHT?!
Call a New Jersey person an asshole and he or she will immediately turn that into an admirable character trait. Hey, I'm not afraid to tell it like it is, namely that you have a cunt for a mouth.
5. Cyclists
Not only are cyclists assholes who routinely ignore traffic signs and cause logjams on otherwise lightly traveled roads, but every response they have to criticism is underlined with the attitude that "I am a better person than you because I ride a bike." Oh, you're in a car? Well then you're a world-polluting dickhead. And why can't you be patient enough to go 15 mph for half a mile of pavement? You're lucky the cyclist gave you a few minutes to slow down and ENJOY life. Every cyclist has been nearly sideswiped by some car going 60 mph, and that is how they now view every other driver on the road now.
Special mention to "vehicular cyclists," who use the road even when there's a bike path right to the side where conflict can be easily avoided, on principle.
6. CrossFit enthusiasts
Imagine all the proselytizing of an annoying yoga person. Now make that person a frat bro. There you have it. Spencer Hall:
1. That they're being taken for a ride by HQ, who just makes this shit up with no design whatsoever
2. That they call themselves "the fittest people on earth," and yet win nothing
3. INJURIES
4. Their diets are bullshit
7. Apple fanboys
YOU: (logs onto tech message board) Hi, I'm having a bit of trouble with my Windows 7 PC. It starts off very fast but then, a few minutes after I boot it up, it begins slowing down considerably. I've tried rebooting and emptying my web cache and running Disk Defragmenter and creating a partition for my D: drive so that it acts as an independent hard drive and I've tried resetting the TCP/IP address and rebooting the computer in Safe Mode to run Malware bytes and then emptied out the recycling bin AND my download folder, which actually had some stuff I wanted to keep but was taking up a lot of room. So far, nothing has worked. Does anyone have any ideas?
APPLE FANBOY: Yeah, buy a Mac. (walks away from computer blowing off finger guns)
8. Glassholes
There can't possibly be a group of people with a more misplaced persecution complex. Think about the chutzpah it takes to buy a $1,500 pair of tech glasses, which you can take on or off at any time you like, and then feel like a VICTIM because you couldn't wear them in an $85 prix fixe restaurant. It's like, "Oh my God! This Coach store won't take my Platinum Diner's Club card! THAT'S SLAVERY!"
And the best part is that no amount of shit-throwing will keep Glassholes from reconsidering what spoiled, shitty people they are. You, Mr. Late Adopter, are just trying to thwart progress. Soon you'll give in and join in the cyborgization of the American population. DON'T FEAR THE FUTURE.
9. Magic the Gathering players
Turns out they handle being rejected by women poorly!
10. Beer snobs
It takes a lot of skill to turn a subject everyone likes (beer) into something utterly insufferable, and yet here we have it. You don't even have to be knowledgeable about beer at all to become a defensive asshole of a beer snob. When Will Gordon ranked Yuengling low on his list of cheap beers here at Deadspin, I raged like someone just falsely accused my best friend of arson. Tell a beer snob you like (insert random normal beer here) and you will immediately be accused of being halfway to Guy Fieri. Did you really not mention anything from Rogue brewery in your top five list? Why are you even drinking beer at all? That beer you like is water/piss/wine cooler/cider/gay.
11. Chicagoans
Listen, Chicago, it's not our fault that you built a gorgeous city with pristine architecture and friendly people and fun bars and amazing restaurants in the coldest, windiest goddamn spot in the Union. I walked five blocks in Chicago last spring and nearly got blown into space. So don't go trying to override that fatal flaw by being as defensive and territorial as humanly possible when people bitch about your town. And don't try to convince me that your pizza is good because you've been trying to make this argument for YEARS and no one gives a shit. No one is gonna give you the satisfaction of winning that battle because thin-crust pizza tastes really good and doesn't make me feel like I just swallowed a bear.
12. Car enthusiasts
Oh, you don't like cars? Hmm. (Subtext: You're a pussy. You're not a man. What kind of man doesn't like cars? They're big and fast and look at this calendar I have of Carmen Electra humping a Porsche! What kind of man doesn't like to spend his Sunday lying on a dolly, working on the ol' Camaro? What kind of car do you drive? I bet you drive a Honda. That's a perfect pussy car. Automatic transmission, right? PUSSY. Pay to get your oil changed? PUSSY. The fuck happened to this country? Men in this country used to enjoy getting their hands dirty.)
13. Paleo dieters
No no no, it's not that douchey! Really! It's a just a 28-hour hunger strike followed by a raw steak dinner and half an egg yolk. You will be AMAZED at how good you feel. I mean, right now, I feel like I could jump over my townhouse. I can actually shoot lasers out of my hands. This is what HUMANS were meant to do. We've been ignoring thousands of years of evolution and hunting and gathering to eat fucking donuts! YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW BADLY ALL THAT REFINED SHIT IS GUMMING UP YOUR SYSTEM.
14. Cincinnati chili fans
Seeded low here because you have to understand that these people have probably never been out of Ohio and therefore have ZERO understanding of what normal food actually tastes like, which is how they end up worshiping at the altar of Yangtze River sewage heaped onto a plate of cold Rotini spaghetti. It's like arguing with Nell. These are people of the woods. You can't expect them to be civilized.
15. Longform magazine journalists
Constantly under siege from cynics and critics and people who don't get THE CRAFT. Any criticism of their latest tenderly written profile of that girl who was in the Tron reboot is immediately treated like some kind of invitation to a pistol duel. Still massively insecure about their job status and the overall health of longform journalism even though a new award-grabbing longform essay is posted to Twitter every five fucking seconds. Constantly lusting for Pulitzers even though their namesake was even sleazier than today's gossip sites and happily ran made-up shit in his paper.
16. D.C. natives
It's not lame here! We swear!
/takes you to Georgetown restaurant with $35 shrimp cocktails and 90 assholes wearing penny loafers
Time for you to complain about the bracket in the post below.
Round 1 voting: sports and politics regionals; culture and lifestyle regionals.
Round 2 voting: looking for Cinderella
Round 3 voting: The Mean 16