Everyone makes mistakes, but the scale and impact of one blunder or another is rarely similar. But some mistakes are so monumentally big that they can end large companies, devastated whole countries and even upset continent-wide ecosystems. So perhaps you tripping in public is not that bad, is it?
Someone asked “What was arguably the biggest f***-up in history?” and netizens shared their best examples. So get comfortable as you scroll through, upvote your favorites and be sure to share your own thoughts, ideas and experiences in the comments section below.
#1
Corporations are people. Money is speech.
These simple assertions have guided America toward more greed and more war than any other decision in history. It has set us on the path towards far worse ends than most other single events.
Image credits: Arkmer
#2
Brexit.
#3
Giving religions tax free status.
#4
In American history: Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which made corporate bribery legal. Government no longer served the people from that point on.
#5
Some guy introduced rabbits to Australia in 1788 so that he could hunt them for sport.
Image credits: GotPC
#6
Chernobyl! Only a f**k-up of epic poportions can cause a nuclear incident while doing a saftey test!
April 26th! Annivarsay of the accident is today.
Image credits: Ta-veren-
#7
In retail history, probably Sears not realizing that they were basically Amazon before Amazon. Mail order with warehouses all over the United States. How could you improve that business model?
Oh, the Internet you say? Never heard of it.
Image credits: vicki22029
#8
Blockbuster not buying Netflix.
Image credits: PayasoCanuto
#9
The wrong turn that driver made in 1914.
Image credits: MarcusQuintus
#10
A governor of the Khwarazmian Empire killed a peaceful emissary from a neighboring empire, who had been sent to establish trade relations and political connections between the two powers. The emissary was sent by Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan replied by invading the Khwarazmian Empire, obliterating everything in his path, burning basically the entire thing to the ground, and then destroying any record of the Khwarazmian Empire that he could find. He finished all of this off by diverting the river that fed the country water, causing the land where the empire once stood to become a dry and barren wasteland. Possibly one of the biggest mess ups in history.
Image credits: JackCooper_7274
#11
“Mao’s push to have farmers in China produce their own steel using backyard furnaces, which lead to a wacky chain reaction eventually leading to a famine that killed millions.”
“Mao also ordered the extermination of sparrows in an attempt to protect grain crops. Millions of sparrows were killed, allowing locusts to proliferate.
“The locusts consumed so many crops that there was widespread famine and 45 million people died.”
Image credits: Belyea
#12
Letting politicians trade stocks.
#13
So that one fish decided to try what happens when you leave the water.. That’s when it really started to go downhill!
Image credits: WindpowerGuy
#14
“20th Century Fox let George Lucas keep all the merchandising r⁷ights for Star Wars because they thought it would be a giant flop and noone would watch it.”
“George Lucas is now worth 5.3 billion dollars.”
Image credits: Tobazili
#15
In 1350, the Scots heard that England was having a spot of trouble with the bubonic plague, and decided to launch an invasion that would take advantage of the English, who were dropping like flies and would thus be easy pickings. The Scots invading army lost 5000 men to the plague in very short order. They decided to cut their losses and fall back to Scotland to be safe. Of course they brought the great plague with them, which devastated Scotland too.
Image credits: Sauterneandbleu
#16
Vitruvius not see the potential of steam to Move things with the Heron Engine. Only saw it as a amusing toy.
The Steam Age and Industrial Revolution could of happened in 1st Century Greece.
Image credits: ATA_VATAV
#17
Yahoo not buying Google.
Image credits: FatBirdsMakeEasyPrey
#18
The IPCC decision to go with the more conservative climate change modeling in the 1980s. Essentially the question at the time was ‘does heat accumulate at the poles, or does it dissipate into space’? They went with the dissipation models, even though they were in contradiction to geological evidence, because it had never been directly observed. And now, everything is ‘sooner than expected’ and ‘faster than anticipated.’
Yeah because you guys f****d up. The biggest f**k up in history, by orders of degrees. Haha.
Image credits: Solomon-Drowne
#19
Allowing a handful of people control the vast majority of media.
#20
Not the worst, but that incident where they sent out an emergency alert saying “inbound ballistic missile threat to Hawaii. This is not a drill” always sticks out in my mind. People were seeking shelter in manholes, and it took them 45 minutes to send out a follow up alert saying “just kidding. Everything is ok”. I can’t even imagine.
Image credits: jhumph88
#21
The amazing development of chlorofluorocarbons to replace toxic, ammonia, sulphur dioxide, and chloromethane in refrigerators. It was so successful and safe that it rapidly became the refrigerant of choice. Right up until the moment we discovered that it had been reacting with sunlight to produce radical free chlorines that obliterated the ozone layer causing a massive spike in skin cancer rates (among other things).
Or what about Tetraethyllead! This amazing additive made cars massively more efficient saving huge amounts of petrol. It also significantly increased lead levels around the world and is responsible for a significant decrease in intelligence for people born during the time of its use. Although it’s hard to call this a fuckup, as GM and its inventor Thomas Midgley Jr. were aware of the dangers and played them down.
Wait a minute, the person that invented chloroflorocarbons was also Thomas Midgley Jr. Environmental Historian, J.R. McNeil once claimed that Midgley “had more adverse impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth’s history”.
Midgley had one more fuckup to give, but fortunately for all of us, it only affected him. Later in life he became disabled after he contracted polio. To aid in his mobility he designed a system of ropes and pulleys to aid getting out of bed. He was found strangled to death by his own contraption at age 55.
So I submit Thomas Midgley Jr. himself as arguably the biggest f**k-up in history.
#22
Norway wanted to give sweden 50% of our oil profits in exchange for 50% of Volvo. Swedens government said no as one of their minister meant that “there is no future in oil”. Norway’s sovereign fund (the oil fund) can now purchase every single stock on the swedish stock exchange and still have money leftover.
Image credits: smolymartin
#23
“You can’t be a part of our art school”.
#24
“Netflix offered themselves to Yahoo. Yahoo instead bought Tumblr.
“Heads rolled at Yahoo.”
#25
“Genghis sends three ambassadors (two Mongols and a Muslim) to the sultan to demand the governor be punished. Sultan has Muslim executed and Mongols shaved (a grave insult).”
“Genghis abandons current war with China and invades, capturing many cities who hold no real loyalty to the Sultan and surrender peacefullly.”
“Genghis sieges Otrar, finally fully taking it after six months and executing governor…
“Genghis bypasses 300 miles of impassable desert to invade next city from more vulnerable side.
“Genghis takes thd capital of the empire in five days. Sultan dies hiding in exile.”
Image credits: lorgskyegon
#26
I think the best political f**k-up happened in 1984 when New Zealand’s arrogant prime minister got drunk in his office late one night and called a snap election in two week’s time.
His government was voted out. It became known as the Schnapps Election.
Image credits: Fresh-Hedgehog1895
#27
The invention of plastic.
#28
If Parliment had just given the colonies their own representation in the House of Commons they could have likely avoided the entire revolutionary war and the US would not have formed. We’d likely have like 9 smaller versions of Canada on the east coast with a large Mexico and several interior Native American nations today.
#29
In 1912 China was a functioning and promising democracy (for the first time ever) and it was ruined by one general (Yuan Shikai) who couped the government and declared himself emperor.
#30
The Fourth Crusade.
It started as a crusade for Jerusalem from an invasion through Egypt and the crusaders ended up invading Croatia and Constantinople. This also led to the weakening of the Byzantine Empire and eventually its downfall.
#31
PPP “loans” in the US. The fraud is off the charts.
#32
The Germans smuggling Lenin into Russia during World War I to create a revolution.
#33
Leaded gasoline.
#34
“In 1984 in Australia, the then PM Malcolm Fraser of the National Party called a snap double dissolution election, hoping to catch out the unpopularity of the Labour Party opposition leader, Bill Hayden.”
“Fraser didn’t know that while he was meeting with the Governor General to call the election, Bill Hayden had resigned, and was to be replaced with the massively popular Bob Hawke.”
“Labour won in a landslide.”
Image credits: infinitemonkeytyping
#35
“As much as 1972 was Nixon’s political peak, it was also the beginning of the end. Watergate moved slow and it would take two years of leaks and stories to finally end in his resignation.”
“Nixon’s legacy would have been top-tier had Watergate never tainted it (theoretically).”
Image credits: Poolofcheddar
#36
Mao’s push to have farmers in China produce their own steel using backyard furnaces, which lead to a wacky chain reaction eventually leading to a famine that killed millions
Also Nixon deciding to spy on the Democrats even though he almost certainly would have won re-election if he didnt.
Image credits: anon
#37
From an objective point of view, probably the Khwarazmian Empire pissing off the Mongols.
Hitler invading the Soviet Union was bad but at least after that f**k-up Germany continued to exist while the Khwarazmian Empire got absolutely destroyed and much of its population was massacred.
#38
The Atlanta falcons drafting Michael Penix Jr. #8 overall after giving an enormous contract to 35-year-old Kirk Cousins.
#39
“Then they try to blame it on a combination of ‘improper training’ and their computer software.”
“Why is it so easy to make that huge of a mistake‽ Why aren’t there multiple safeguards and higher-ups involved‽‽”
“The conspiracy theorist in me almost thinks they did it on purpose to test how people would rea
#40
I think we can all agree the biggest f**k up in history is the PlayStation 2 only having 2 controller ports instead of 4.
If they had made it 4 controller ports at the start, there wouldn’t be an Xbox or a Nintendo anymore.
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