Why does everything have to be the best or the worst?
One thing that struck me after the US Men’s Basketball Team won the gold medal was the quick comparison to the 1992 “Dream Team”. Instead of just saying this team was good we automatically had to compare it to another era and to see if we could say that this team was the best. This happens all over the place now from pop culture to sports to politics. Everything has to be compared to another era, to another film, to another musician, to another event. Things can’t just be, they have to be the best or the worst or the greatest or horrific.
The mixture of our news cycle, talk radio culture, and the need to over analyze everything, have combined to create this climate. I know that I have slipped into this and tossed out the phrase “the best” a little too often. I actually have tried to cut down on doing that because I know how ridiculous this sounds. However I wasn’t very successful, last week after I got done masturbating in the shower I proclaimed that it was the greatest shower masturbation session of my entire life. Although I do not keep complete records and thus it may not have been, in fact there might have been an incident in 95 when a bottle of Head and Shoulders… never mind. My point is that I needed to stop doing this. (Saying things are the best not masturbating in the shower.)
To cure myself of doing this I decided to rate everything for like two days. Every single thing I did I decided to rate it against the other events in my life. When I rated things they couldn’t just be average or good or fair they had to be the best or the worst in comparison to other events in my life. Trips to the bathroom, phone conversations, bike rides, getting the mail, all of it was something I thought about in my head and compared it to past events.
When you start doing this you absolutely realize how ridiculous it sounds. You can’t compare so many of these events because it is so arbitrary. Was that really the best cup of mandarin oranges I have ever had? Not really. So do I set up a contrived rating system to measure how much I liked that fruit cup and compare it to other fruit cups from the past even though the context in which I ate those fruit cups is forgotten or at best hazy?
After doing this for a couple of days it really cured me of hyperbole, over analysis, and made me just take things for what they were. Now everything is just mediocre wait maybe this wasn’t a good thing.
Was this the best or worst blog ever? Do you tend to rate stuff like this as well?
On 08/26/08 at 12:26 pm
Katie said:
No, I just rate stuff on a scale of sucky to non-sucky. That way it’s not the best and it’s not the worst either. This blog was non-sucky at its worst.
On 08/26/08 at 12:35 pm
The Rocketman said:
Actually, I’d say it’s the most average blog ever.
On 08/26/08 at 12:42 pm
Bobby Finstock said:
Right in the meaty middle of mediocre
On 08/26/08 at 2:44 pm
sarah said:
yea we definitely need to lean more to the “ehhhhh s’ok” scale.
On 08/26/08 at 2:46 pm
Meghan said:
Best of the Worst of the Best?
You can’t just say ‘good’ anymore. Good is Bad, or at the very least not that ‘great’.
Don’t try to get away with saying something is great, because then you have to explain why it was ‘awesome’ (or wicked awesome).
Even if it was awesome, you have to dice up another word and say it was ‘un-fucking-believable’!
On 08/26/08 at 3:43 pm
Carolyn said:
Weirdly enough, you actually have a pretty good point.
My sister always gets annoyed ’cause I’ll be telling a story, and I tend to say things like “it was the funniest fucking thing ever”, etc etc and it even gets on my own nerves occasionally. I’m gonna try your little experiment.
On 08/26/08 at 3:46 pm
Carolyn said:
It’s all about sensationalism eh. Nothing’s interesting if it’s not the best or the worst or the hottest or the funniest or the nastiest, etc.
Ew, did I just try to make a semi serious comment on your blog?
On 08/26/08 at 5:04 pm
Bobby Finstock said:
I think you just did
On 08/26/08 at 8:42 pm
Carolyn said:
I just accidentally punched myself in the boob.
On 08/27/08 at 8:43 am
matty said:
I don’t know, but I read this on my phone during what might have been the best shit of my life.
On 08/27/08 at 10:21 am
Matt Savage said:
I think it’s simply a part of human nature to know the best and worst, it’s part of our logic system or something.
Someone once asked me what I thought the most famous painting in the world was. Obviously, I answered, The Mona Lisa. Everyone says the Mona Lisa. Why? It’s not that great of a painting. Personally I think it sucks, but it’s still the most famous. The reason? Because something had to be the most famous painting, so why not the Mona Lisa…
On 08/27/08 at 11:39 am
Alejandro said:
I tend to categorize things as in good, great, excelent, and it sucks. But i do it on what i think about it, i dont compare to another, thats why i like lots of movies that other people dont, when i go see a movie, i go to be entertained.
On 08/27/08 at 11:47 am
Duane said:
I have a friend who does the same thing. Everything is “the best” when she’s talking about something, even if I happened to have been there for whatever she was talking about and I knew otherwise. She’s gone to movies with me and done nothing but check her cell phone while it was on and then talked the film up when it was over. What, it was the best five minutes of a film you ever actually watched?
On 08/27/08 at 4:06 pm
Taylor Blue said:
At least this blog makes me laugh…that makes it good.
On 08/27/08 at 10:54 pm
Jeff said:
This is your worst post ever.
On 08/27/08 at 11:04 pm
Booby Finstock said:
Ever… I don’t know man I have had some really shitty ones
On 08/27/08 at 10:55 pm
Jeff said:
And this is my worst comment ever.