Somewhere along the line (we believe sometime in the mid-90s) it became trendy to wear t-shirts with sarcastic or ironic slogans on them.
The idea was that everyone would get a chuckle out of your shirt and walk away thinking about how clever and witty you must be. Unfortunately, like socialism, this was one theory that never quite panned out in practice. Almost inevitably, we find that people who wear such shirts are the biggest tools around.
So it’s no surprise that everyone now walks away thinking “Ugh, another one of those ridiculous t-shirts” instead of “wow, that’s so funny!” We’ve collected the most irritating of them below for you…
1) “Do I Look Like Your Therapist?”
This shirt is supposedly meant to convey the wearer’s dislike of petty drama, gossip, and small-mindedness. That way, someone who comes rushing in to whine about some trivial problem will pause, see the t-shirt, and know that their whining is unwelcome. The irony, however, is that people who wear this shirt are almost always, without fail, involved in trivial conflicts and would rather gossip than eat. As E.L. Kersten says in his landmark text The Art of Demotivation, gossip and drama “becomes food for their emaciated souls.” So in all actuality, people wearing this shirt are indeed playing the role of armchair therapist to the people in their lives.
2) “I’m Kind of a Big Deal”
Apparently, everyone who saw Anchorman decided they absolutely had to start walking around telling everyone “I’m kind of a big deal around here”, and it was only a matter of time until someone emblazoned the uber-annoying phrase onto a t-shirt. While a little movie humour is all well and good, one is reminded of an old (paraphrased) saying: if you have to tell someone you’re kind of a big deal, then you probably aren’t.
3) “It Isn’t Going to Lick Itself!”
This shirt is always unclassy – always. There is simply no way that any man or woman who wears this shirt can be seen in a positive light. The reason is that it fails to pass what we like to call ‘The Grandma’s House Test.’ It is so blatantly sexual and slutty that you would (or should) feel embarrassed wearing it to grandma’s house. Nevertheless, this shirt is sold at Hot Topic stores and tourist traps around the world, and you can’t go to a mall without seeing at least a few people wearing them.
4) “Yeah? Well At Least I’m Not Ugly!”
A t-shirt spoof on the tired retort, this shirt instantly betrays the immaturity of anyone wearing it. For one thing, “Yeah? Well at least I’m not ugly!” is a stupid, mindless retort to just about anything. It harkens back to high school where the ‘hot’ people flocked together in cliques. Second, who says you’re not ugly? You? Maybe it’s telling that the t-shirt model in this picture is only shown from the neck down!
5) “Marriage Was Her Idea”
Marriage may have been her idea, but when somebody wears a t-shirt like this, one can’t help wondering why. Besides being totally tacky and classless, it’s questionable whether this shirt has ever once made someone genuinely laugh (and no, that forced chuckle your best friend let out doesn’t count!)
6) “I’m Hotter Than Your Girlfriend.”
If a psychological study were done of people who wear t-shirts with annoying or cocky slogans on them, it would likely find that most of them were insecure. The t-shirts that say “I’m Hotter Than Your Girlfriend” are a case in point. While so girls no doubt were them as nothing but a joke, we suspect most of them are insecure about their lack of romantic happiness and are simply using that shirt as a prop to cover it up. Ironically, many girls who wear it aren’t all that attractive after all!
7) “Voices In My Head”
There must be a hundred different t-shirts with some variation on the “Voices in my head” theme, but we’ve yet to find one that isn’t totally lame and annoying. They all make you look creepy and weird and, like the “Marraige was her idea” shirt, it’s hard to say whether anyone has ever truly found it funny. Leave this shirt on the bargain rack at Hot Topic if you don’t want to wear clothing that outs you as an unimaginative putz.
8) “I Hate Annoying People”
Most people wont readily admit to hating themselves, but that is what anyone who wears this shirt is inadvertantly doing. How anyone could wear this shirt in public and expect not to be laughed at is puzzling indeed.
9) “You Say Bitch Like it’s a Bad Thing”
Possibly the most annoying women’s t-shirt ever designed, the “You Say Bitch Like it’s a Bad Thing” shirt instantly communicates to males that you are not worth dating or even associating with. The typical wearer of this shirt is immersed in all kinds of petty drama and considers going to a seedy night club a fun night out. So trust us when we say this: if someone calls you a bitch, it most certainly is a bad thing! No t-shirt can alter this painful fact.
10) “Queen Of the Trailer Park”
Of course, no rundown of annoying female t-shirts would be complete without the deplorable “Queen of the Trailer Park” shirt. It should go without saying that no one should be celebrating trailer park life or trying to associate themselves with it, but it looks like the throngs of trashy women wearing this shirt around town were out of the office when that memo went out. Nevertheless, it’s quite painful to witness it for the rest of us, who realise that the Queen of a trailer park must have a small kingdom indeed!
11) “Stop Staring at my Chest”
If you’re wearing a shirt that says “Stop staring at my chest”, it’s a safe bet that not too many guys were staring at it in the first place. Like so many annoying shirts made for females, this one fails at its lame attempt to be cute and comes off as slutty and airheaded instead. Sadly, that hasn’t stopped hoards of women from wearing them at malls, restaurants, movie theaters, and other public venues. Meh.
12) “Don’t Hate Me Cause I’m Beautiful, Hate Me Cause I Have HUGE BOOBS!”
Think of this shirt as the inbred sibling of “Stop Staring at my Chest.” This shirt is so irritating and distasteful that it hardly needs to be explained, but suffice it to say that any woman wearing a shirt that blatantly tell you to be jealous of their breasts is probably an insecure wannabe who has been skating through life on her looks and little else.
13) “I Ain’t Getting Paid to Entertain”
It shows. ‘Nuff said.
14) “You Can Look But Don’t Touch”
The male counterpart of “Stop Staring At My Chest”, this shirt is no less tacky or classless than that one. Wear this only if you want every woman worth dating to run from you like the plague!
15) “It’s a Vegan Thing, you Wouldn’t Understand”
We think this shirt is wrong: it takes someone who isn’t a vegan to understand how thoroughly annoying the preachiness and holier-than-thou attitudes of most vegans are. Maybe we should be the one wearing shirts that say “It’s a meat-eating thing, you don’t understand!”
16) “Work”
We get it: you hate your job. So do a lot of people. But if you invested half the energy into finding a better one as you do into wearing self-pitying t-shirts about the one you hate, you might be happier (and a lot less annoying to boot!)
17) “Save The Drama For Ya Mama”
Possibly one of the most annoying and stupid slang slogans ever, it has been given a second life in the form of shirts that various idiots from all walks of life wear in public. It’s tough to imagine how anyone thought this would make them look cool, but they are still worn quite frequently!
18) “Leading You On..”
Another shirt that instantly communicates “don’t date this girl, ever” is the “leading you on” shirt. Face it: no one thinks you’re cute, clever, or funny. It’s just the same hackneyed, annoying shirt that wasn’t funny the first time a girl wore it. (Maybe if these girls had honest friends who told them the truth about their wardrobe choices there wouldn’t be enough of these shirts to fill a whole article with. Wouldn’t that be nice?) But we digress…
19) “I Lose.”
Yes. Yes you do.
20) “I Just Botox’d my Brain”
This shirt might be funny, except for the fact that the thought-killing effects of Botox on a brain would wear off eventually, while the person wearing this shirt will no doubt wear it for years. Oh well – looks like it wasn’t the Botox after all!
21) “I Sell Clean Urine”
Are you a drug addict? Are you proud of it? Do you want to advertise this fact to the entire public, including prospective employers, girlfriends, or colleagues? Look no further than this shirt, which conveys your sketchiness to everyone you pass by during the day.
22) “The Guy Beside Me Has No Friends”
Shirts with arrows pointing to other people were funny – in the 70s. Today they come off as hackneyed and unoriginal, and should only be worn in situations where you literally care nothing whatsoever for how you are perceived by others. Of course, that’s probably an enduring, stable trait of anyone wearing the shirts on this list…
23) “Not All Men Are Annoying… Some Are Dead”
One major tell-tale sign of an annoying female shirt (besides blatant sluttiness) are blind disdain for all men. This shirt is a primary exemplar of that with its cynical slogan “Not All Men Are Annoying… Some Are Dead.” Or maybe the non-annoying ones concluded that you were annoying long ago!
24) “It’s My Job to be Annoying.”
Mission accomplished. Why don’t you take a corner office, promote yourself, and give yourself a raise?
25) “Concieted With a Reason”
Cut from the same cloth (no pun intended) as “you say bitch like it’s a bad thing”, this shirt is the ultimate in female narcissism and self-worship. Try as you might, you will likely come up empty in any attempts to find the “reason” justifying the arrogance that the wearer of this shirt is plainly displaying. Let us know if you find one, but we wont be holding our breath!
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magnetite says
Something to muse on there, Hecklerspray. Thanks.
Ironlung says
nice. the pseudo-psychoanalytical text beneath almost champion the slogans themselves.
except No.21. there you just own yourself.
markie says
What, no “Masturbation is not a crime” t-shirts? (always worn by people who look like they think about committing crimes while they wank)
euclid says
What about the ubiquitous “I went to prison for molesting children and all I got was this stupid T-shirt” shirt?
euclid says
Or the semi-famous, “My grandma went to heaven and all I got was tits” shirt?
Sarah says
If I want a list, I’ll read cracked.
Matty says
Some of the girl shirts would be funny on a guy, like the “Hate me because I have big boobs one” or the “Im hotter than your girlfriend”
euclid says
Or the obscure: “Maurice Colgan went to Hecklerspray.com and all I got was brain damaged rants about Elvis.”
Stabby McGee says
Reminds me of the time I saw a man wearing a t-shirt with “Nobody knows I’m a lesbian” on it.
Sadly, I’d left my garotte at home, so that lesbian can thank his lucky stars he had no laces in his shoes at the time.
Siany says
Are there any T-Shirt slogans that *are* good?
anup nayak says
I am sarrounded by ass holes
Solicitor says
You need to lighten up. People have different kind of humors.
this site sucks says
It’s a shame that the hecklerspray staff can’t distinguish between ironic and tasteless one-liners. I’m completely certain that none of these are ironic tee-shirts.
wvobiwan says
What kill-joy web post. Instead of looking down your snooty nose, lighten up and enjoy the people’s 1st Amendment rights. Some tshirts are very clever, some aren’t, but assuming the psychology of the wearer due to their garments is the ulitmate in sanctimonious whining. Don’t bother to reply, I’m never coming back here.,
Epic says
Thanks for the post, but please learn how to use correct grammar and spell check.
Jeesh!!
J Bell says
Two of the comments in particular show a worrying amount of sexism: “the
Jessica Critc's-Critic says
There seems to be a considerable number of complaints here, about “needing to lighten up” and “not being able to tell the difference between ironic-tees and tasteless one-liners.”
Yet not a single fuck has been given.
Feel free to contact Hipster Support Service, and bitch to them about what you think. Your comments, suggestions, opinions, and concerns are always unwelcome.
John wade says
Fuck all of u that wear these shirts or complain bout ppl who wear them fuck every last one of u