Awkward.

Over the years, awkwardness has gone from being portrayed by the media as generally negative trait to a cute, kitschy quality that sets someone apart and inspires many humorous situations. George Michael Bluth, Michael Scott, and Dan Humphrey all make it look cute and quirky on screen to us sheeple, probably because they themselves are attractive or lovable young men in the first place. But as a result of awkwardness now being a positive thing in TV shows and movies, so many young people now claim to be awkward themselves. "Ha, I just tripped over that rock! I'm awkward." Or, "Wow, I didn't know what to say to my significant others' mother! I'm awkward." My favorite: "I love watching Juno because I'm awkward, just like her!"

Oh, I'm so cute with my puppy-dog face and snug-fitting hoodie

As someone who is actually perpetually awkward - and uncomfortably so - I am irked to no end by this phenomenon. Go find another problematic character trait to complain about - y'all are stealing my thunder here! Awkwardness in real life is rarely, if ever, cute. Trailing off sentences, toeing the line between funny and offensive, not being able to carry on a conversation, lacking the confidence to say what you really mean - in my opinion, these are the things define awkward people, and they are more painful than funny 99.9% of the time.

My most awkward memory in recent times: I attempted to make an insightful comment in the first day of my winter quarter Sosc class that inadvertently turned out comparing mentally retarded people to cheetahs. After I realized what my words implied, I tried backtracking and explaining my point again but it really made no difference - the damage was done. People had registered my words and were already glaring at me or looking at me with shocked expressions. The class remained silent for a few seconds afterwards and my teacher tried to do damange control by re-stating what I'd said in a more politically correct way. "Uh, what Rose really meant to say was that..."

It was awful and I didn't dare speak up for the rest of the discussion. I can look back on it now and sort of laugh at myself/not take it too seriously but believe me, at the time it was awful and nowhere near cute at all.