Your January detox begins here

It was T.S. Eliot who claimed that April is the “cruellest month” but surely that honour goes to January. Forget about “lilacs out of the dead land” or blathering on about the archduke’s sled. We’ve already had the usual bad news about rail prices, fat kids, thin supermodels, astrology nonsense, MMA knucklers, unpopular journalists, and some crazy schemes to squeeze us all into Spandex bottoms by February. The entire news cycle on the hungover side of New Year resembles a great celestial wind up, which, of course, is precisely what it is…

There’s a good reason why January is considered the most depressing month of the year: it is the only time we have to unravel all the unrealistic expectations set by Christmas. It’s a spiritual detox that rids our bodies of all that horrible festive goodwill. It’s a time to put aside the cute penguins in Santa hats and historically inaccurate visions of Victorian Christmases. January is when we crash back into reality. It might feel bad now but you’ll be healthier for it come February.

It’s why the story of Logan Paul is already providing this week’s healthy draught of something deeply unpalatable. It’s the news equivalent of fig juice. Logan Paul is the self-styled “goofy dude with BIG goals”, a Youtube “star”, who posted a video from Japan’s Aokigahara Forest, that infamous suicide hotspot, where Paul and friends found a dead body hanging from a tree. They proceeded to cover it with typical lightness of touch, which means Paul looking suitably unmoved/gormless in front of the dead body whilst wearing a lime green comedy Shrek hat.

There are big questions that might be asked about Youtube culture and an unregulated media but really that isn’t for now. The Logan Paul story is perfectly timed to hit January at its sorest point. It is a story meant for all who return to work begrudging their morning commute, hating their job, and, quite possibly, the new underwear they were bought for Christmas, only to be greeted by some unreasonably young and happy millennial with comb-forward hair that starts three feet behind his pimple-free forehead. What’s more, he’s raking in the Youtube money by visiting places you might never be so lucky to visit … Is it any wonder if you end up asking yourself these familiar annual questions?

Has the disparity between exposure and talent ever seemed this great?

Are idiots getting younger these days?

Why do stupid people seem 50% more stupid in January?

Even when they’re apologising, they manage to do it in a way that leaves you wanting to shove the last of the seasonal stuffing up their nostrils. “I’m often reminded of how big of a reach I truly have & with great power comes great responsibility”, said Paul, humbly. He was quoting, depending on your sources, either Voltaire or Spiderman, yet another quote by Voltaire springs to mind: “Common sense is not so common”. Or, perhaps, another from the comic book Spiderman: “Let me ask you, and be honest, are you stupid? Or really, really stupid?”

The answer, of course, is that he really, really is that stupid. And that’s what January is really about. It’s about resetting our measures; providing a baseline for what’s to come in the rest of the year. It’s why we spend our hours piling the hate onto whatever we feel is crass, overvalued, or simply wrong. That might mean you’re spending all your spare time on Twitter railing against Toby Young or Owen Jones, or, like me, glowering at The Times where Deborah Ross described Joseph Conrad’s imperious, sublime, and unequalled Heart of Darkness as “impenetrably dense and difficult to follow and can only be managed by taking frequent breaks to do something more fun-filled and entertaining, such as emptying the cat litter tray or dragging your nails over a blackboard.”

Deep breath! Inhale the good air. Exhale the bad…

And if that doesn’t get you back to normal after Christmas, the papers offer you a chance to get annoyed with Richard Branson, Storm Eleanor, the NHS, bitcoins, the Royal Mail, Celebrity Big Brother, Manchester City, Priti Patel, school meals, Jose Mourinho, Apple, The House of Lords, selfies, Qatar, Chris Grayling, Trevor Sinclair, Woburn Safari Park, or, failing all that, a newer, slimmer Gordon Ramsay.

In other words: welcome to 2018. It’s like we’ve been here before…