Top 10 Trending Topics of 2014

2014. Wow, what a year. A year of selfies, controversy, major sporting events, heartbreaking deaths and some incredible moments. Here is the definitive list of the top 10 most talked about moments of the year, as found in Twitter and Facebook trending topics.

10. Sochi Winter Olympics

After a slow beginning of suspected terror threats that thankfully never materialised, unfinished hotel rooms and a stubborn snowflake that failed to open up during the opening ceremony, this years Winter Olympics was an absolute triumph.
Most talked about moments included American figure skater Ashley Wagner’s horrified expression when her routine score came up lower than expected and the Ice Hockey, especially the incredible women’s final where the Canadians shocked the Americans by beating them 3-2 in overtime despite the Americans having surged into a 2-0 lead.

9. Michael Brown/Ferguson

The United States exploded into controversy in early August when an 18-year-old black man Michael Brown was shot dead by white police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, in disputed circumstances. This sparked mass protests and acts of civil unrest right across America as many believed that the victim was surrendering and due to the longstanding racial tensions between the majority-black population and the majority-white city government and police force. Social media understandably was awash with protests and solidarity from around the globe. Palestinian Mariam Barghouti advised “Always make sure to run against the wind /to keep calm when you’re teargassed, the pain will pass, don’t rub your eyes! #Ferguson Solidarity.” Whilst Cairo-based, former Human Rights Watch researcher Scott Long remarked “Ferguson now looks like police assaults in Egypt. Our world is melding into a single military regime.”

8. Super Bowl

The 2014 Super Bowl was considered by many to be a pretty damp squib as far as the match went, with eventual champions the Seattle Seahawks thumping Denver Broncos 43-8. But as, of course, the Super Bowl seems to be more about the half time show and advertising spots nowadays, the most talked about moments included ‘Broadway’ Joe Namath’s fur coat, Bruno Mars’ halftime performance and the Coca-Cola advert featuring “America the Beautiful” sung in various different languages.

7. Malaysia Airlines

Malaysia Airlines were involved in not one, but two of the most tragic stories this year. The first being the crashing of flight MH17, eventually presumed to have been shot down. The second, one of the more mysterious events that occurred this year, was the disappearance of flight MH370, prompting many theories online the most popular of which were that the plane was shot down during Military Ops and that the plane had fallen victim to alien abduction.

6. Conflict in Gaza

The conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians on the Gaza strip reached what was possibly it’s worst state in years in 2014. Israel’s wanton destruction of multi storey buildings were war crimes, and their blockade of the region is stopping essential resources from getting to the Palestinian people. The most talked about moments of the conflict this year were the heartbreaking picture, taken by NY Times photographer Tyler Hicks, showing the faces of a few of the Palestinian civilian victims killed by Israeli rockets and Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu fueling the fire by claiming that Hamas was using the images of “telegenically dead” civilians to further damage Israel’s public image.

5. Ice Bucket Challenge

The most successful and talked about charity ‘event’ of the year was definitely the ice bucket challenge, where ordinary folk and celebrities each throw a bucket of ice water on to their heads, to promote the awareness of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis disease, before nominating 3 of their friends to do the deed. The most talked about challenges included the Foo Fighters ‘Carrie’ parody, Patrick Stewart’s in which he wrote a cheque, then picked some ice cubes out of a bucket and had a glass of scotch and Charlie Sheen’s where he poured $10,000 over his head which he then donated straight to the charity.

4. Robin Williams

2014 saw the death of many well loved figures in popular culture including Philip Seymour Hoffman, Joan Rivers and Ghostbusters star Harold Ramis, but none hit quite as hard as Robin Williams’ suicide in August, he had been suffering from depression for some time and the world was universal in it’s mourning for such a well loved actor. One of the most shared tweets was the reaction from The Academy which simply stated “Genie, you’re free.”

3. Scottish Referendum

This year was the year that the people of Scotland had been building up to for some time, the vote on their independence. In a fierce battle which lasted right up to election night, the ‘no’ vote triumphed in all but 3 regions giving an overwhelming message that we were ‘better together.’ The top tweets on both sides of the argument included Andy Murray’s late night backing “Huge day for Scotland today! No campaign negativity last few days totally swayed my view on it. Excited to see the outcome. Lets do this!”

2. Ebola Virus Outbreak

The largest Ebola epidemic in history began at the end of last year in Guinea, and spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Spain, the US, Nigeria and Senegal across the course of the year, with at least 15,145 cases and 5,420 deaths reported, leading to mass hysteria throughout the globe. Bob Geldof and Bono re-released a new version of Band Aid with altered lyrics to try and raise money to combat Ebola, but these altered lyrics were seen as somewhat controversial leading to some people including Fuse ODG, Lily Allen and Ebola survivor William Pooley describing them as cringeworthy, offensive and the undignified images portrayed in the video accompanying the song. Furthermore, the Ebola Fighters have just been awarded TIME magazine’s person of the year 2014.

1. World Cup in Brazil

Ah the football world cup, a worldwide phenomenon coming every 4 years to celebrate our beautiful game of Football. This year at the adopted 2nd home of the sport, Brazil, was as incredible as any of the previous 19. The eventual winners Germany provided the major shock as they thumped the host nation 7-1 in the semi-finals, but other popular moments on social networks included the 5-1 thrashing of Spain by the Netherlands (including Robin Van Persie’s stunning diving header) and Tim Howard’s goalkeeping masterclass during America’s unfortunate 2-1 extra time defeat to Belgium.

So there you have it, the top 10 most talked about moments of what has been another incredibly eventful year in news, sport, entertainment and cultural events. There has been an awful lot of controversy, tragedy, crazes, and huge sporting events making the headlines this year. Here’s to 2015, where hopefully the majority of controversial events can be replaced by humanity showing it’s better side.

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