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Award Ceremonies You Wouldn’t Want to be Honoured In

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Lots of us spend our lives chasing an unfulfilled ambition. It might involve climbing a mountain, visiting the South Pole or brewing more kitchen-meth than anyone outside of Breaking Bad. Whatever your dreams are, statistics say they’ll likely remain just that. There’s a reason 90% of English majors never get round to writing their great novel, the same reason most grime DJs never break the ‘outside my mums spare room’ scene: the majority of us are simply too lazy or too talent less to do anything but stay in, reading internet list-articles and eating bag after bag of Cheetos. It makes sense. What worth is a prize if anyone can do what you did? And most of us, despite the odd regret, understand and are, if not cool, then at least OK with that.

Then there are those people and organizations who want to win so bad they’ll do something even if they’re terrible at it. They’ll do it so terribly, in fact, that entire award ceremonies have to be set up to recognize their failure. These are ceremonies you don’t want to be associated with in any way; ceremonies like the:

Darwin Awards

Dedicated to honoring those who remove themselves from the gene pool with acts of extreme stupidity, the Darwin Awards are rarely – for obvious reasons – accepted in person. Started in 1985, but only becoming formalized in 1993, the prize gained some traction in recent years with a series of books mocking the recently-departed. If that all sounds a bit grim, check out the ‘honorable mention’ section. Here those who survived acts of extreme stupidity receive a nod. Our favorite: The guy who tried to make himself explode by swallowing nitro-glycerin and running at a wall.

Carbuncle Cup

Do the buildings you design all resemble ‘a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend’? Do architecture lecturers hold your work up as an example of what not to do? Then the Carbuncle Cup is for you. Started in 2000 by Prospect magazine to honor the biggest building fails of the preceding year, the prize has already claimed BBC’s MediaCity, the Cutty Sark Renovation and the Liverpool Ferry Terminal. Sadly, Anish Kapoor’s Olympic monstrosity only made runner up this year, but we like to think this was an oversight.

 

Ig Nobel Prize

A gentle piss-take of trivial research, the prize rewards scientists who risk life and reputation examining the strange, bizarre and pointless. The brainchild of Marc Abrahams, this simple spoof has since metamorphosed into a vast celebration of all the dafter sides of science. Famous recipients include papers on how to perform colonoscopies to minimize risk of the patient exploding; proof that rats cannot tell the difference between backwards Dutch and backwards Japanese; and proof that humans can sexually arouse ostriches. Lest it all seem too ridiculous, we should warn you that previous recipients have gone on to win actual Nobel Prizes. In science.

Razzies

Ah, the Razzies, bane of mediocre filmmakers and Adam Sandler. Founded in 1981 at someone’s Oscar’s party, they’ve since gone on to become a tradition. Easily the most-famous celebration of failure on this list, highlights include Uwe Bolle’s Lifetime Dishonour Award, Con Air’s Reckless Disregard for Human Life and Property Award, and Adam Sandler’s execrable Jack & Jill ‘winning’ every single category.

Many thanks to the team at Chessington Holidays for this work, you can check out their website here.


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