12 Lists of Christmas – Things to say goodbye to

2015 has been… well, one of those years. So many historic things have taken place, from the Ukraine ceasefire to Tim Peake’s journey into space, but in the end, it’s the small things that make or break a year. So here’s b**p’s pick of the ten things we most want to say goodbye to in 2016.

1. The Dress – This is a bit of a blast from the past, but it’s lost none of its annoying qualities since February – is it white and gold? Or is it purple and blue? I personally don’t care, and hopefully most of the world have better things to do than spend hours staring at a dress to see if its colours change. But stare they did, with the scientific community pitching in to figure out that in the end it was just a very, very poor picture.

2. Left Shark – Once again, this is a bit of a relic from earlier in the year, but there was a time when you couldn’t move for memes, costumes and even the occasional copyright battle over a dancer who, according to the choreographer who instructed him, was only doing his job to the letter. Now let’s leave it all alone before it happens again next year with another shark or even something else – a dancing mongoose, maybe?

3. Starbucks’s Red Cup – Of course, the cup isn’t really the issue here: it’s the mad American evangelists who come with it, preaching fire and brimstone over the fact that – shock horror – there isn’t an image of Christmas on their coffee cup. I personally don’t really know what they were expecting: an entire nativity scene in cylindrical form, maybe. Perhaps with the different figures made out of the Starbucks product range, with a double espresso as the infant Christ.

4. “What are those?” – This trend has just become wildly out of hand. Calling the same phrase out in a staccato American accent was perhaps understandable when it was in its original form of only talking about shoes, but now it has entered the realm of just being shouted randomly then it gets just a little annoying. If I did really care about what someone’s shoes/pens/glasses came from, I certainly wouldn’t ask them like that.

5. Man Buns – Perhaps if this little trend had gone the way of the Mohican and the emo tuft and remained simply a subculture fashion statement it would be far less of an annoyance than it is today. But instead, the hipster topknot has become far more popular than it deserves, making boys and men all over the country look utterly pretentious and half-way between Karl Lagerfeld and Johnny Rotten. This bit of fashion sacrilege should be banished back to the boho New York commune from whence it came.

6. Donald Trump – It’s the man everyone loves to hate. Slowly destroying the credibility of the Republican party one word at the time, the Man with the Tan has held forth on almost every subject, insulting vast swathes of the population every time. But even as he alienates people all over the world, his popularity grows and he gets one step closer to the White House. So let’s please say goodbye to Donald Trump in 2016, and hope he never gets a chance to speak in public again.

7. Netflix & Chill – I mean, this one in itself isn’t an inherently bad trend – it’s just beginning to wear thin a little. Netflix & Chill has joined this year’s pantheon of internet memes which have bred together and produced cross-breeds – along with John Cena, Ainsley Harriot and Pepe the meme frog. If we’re not careful, we’ll soon find ourselves exposed to “John Cena and Pepe Harriot Netflix & Chill” all over the internet, and that’s something that all of humanity doesn’t need.

8. “John… Cena!” – Now personally I’ve never quite understood who this man is, what he does, or why so many people love shouting his name for no apparent reason. But shout they do, and change Wikipedia pages to have his name in various official positions, and apparently revere this man because he spends his days throwing people off stages. Unfortunately, it is now running the risk of becoming an actual cult, something which the world would do well to avoid.

9. Pepe – Ah, it’s good old Pepe the meme frog. Now anyone who hasn’t seen this emotionally unstable little fellow has clearly been hiding under a rock for the last year, seeing as he now graces nearly every social media platform imaginable, doing almost anything that might be needed to express an emotion or action. Now this in itself isn’t too bad – it’s when Pepe becomes crossed with John Cena or Netflix & Chill that we really need to start to worry.

10. The Kardashians… Again – It seems like every year I sit down to write this I am saddened by the fact that I still need to put this repulsive little clan on this list for another year. The embodiment of the “fame for fame’s sake” generation, they do nothing except take selfies, have lip fillers and show off random body parts in the media. They certainly don’t provide anything for society, which is why I want to say once again that we should banish them from the limelight until they learn to contribute something other than softcore porn to the world.