2025 New Year's Resolutions for Everyone Else
Because making resolutions for yourself isn't as fun
Another year has gone by and it was a doozy, with so much bad behavior that it warrants the return of my New Year’s Resolutions for Everyone Else.
If you’re new to this feature, the back story: More than 10 years ago, on an old blog, I began a tradition of making resolutions for other people. I made resolutions for everyone from celebrities to politicians, businesses to specific friends/family members, society as a whole, etc. Over the course of the year, I’d collect a list of possible resolutions and then release the final cut in late December, sometimes early January. You can read the 2024 resolutions here.
And now, on with the show!
New Year’s Resolutions for Everyone Else: the 2025 Edition
Go paperless (Maryland Comptroller). Every month I get mail from the Maryland Comptroller letting me know that there’s an installment payment due on my tax debt. I do not need all that paper because we already set up the installments to be withdrawn from my bank account. All I need is an email notification. Jump into the 2000s and offer paperless notifications, Maryland!
Ban smartphones from elementary through high school (school districts). Smartphones are a huge distraction regardless of your age, and playing phone police in school is yet another behavior to manage when it’s already tough to get kids to sit down and do their work. Banning smartphones from school is a key step for kids to learn how to regulate their use of devices.
Stop talking to spammers (Pops). I know you think it’s fun and clever to engage the spammers who call to claim you’re going to be arrested unless you buy a bunch of gift cards or say there’s a charge on a credit card you don’t even own. But this verbal jockeying is not what I meant when I said you needed to find a hobby outside of watching MSNBC.
Stop pushing weight loss drugs (Big Pharma). These ads for all the weight loss injections drugs are like the new Botox and I am OVER IT.
Restore the original Die Hard movie (Hollywood). I spent Christmas morning watching this 1987 classic film, as you do at Christmas1, and it could use some sprucing up (no pun intended). Give this fabulous action film a makeover with better sound quality and crisper images, please!
Bring back human-staffed cash registers (grocery stores). Even the experts refer to self-checkout as a “great experiment” so let’s end it, hmm? We’re paying higher prices on everything and that should net these grocery store chains some coin to cover the cost of at least two cashiers. Looking at you, Giant Food and Weis, but I know there are many others.
Stop eating or chewing things I shouldn’t (Rooney). On Christmas Day, this cat ran onto the deck, grabbed a leaf in his mouth, then ran away from me because he wanted to eat the damn thing and likely puke it back up intact—as he’d done a couple months earlier. Fortunately I managed to get the leaf away from him and he walked off to go pout for an hour. Then there’s the bits of lint on the bedspread and blankets. Knock it off, Roo!
Rooney being a good snuggly boy and not a leaf-eating monster Believe women (everyone). When a woman says something bad has happened to her, stop parsing the information she provides and believe her. Doesn’t matter whether she is a celebrity dealing with a smear campaign launched by a noxious colleague or a French woman repeatedly raped by her spouse.
Make it easier to see the most recent content (Meta). I see the same damn posts over and over again on Facebook and Instagram all because of their damn algorithms. The post can be over a week old and it’s still showing up in the main feed, and trying to actually find new content is a time suck. No one should have to toggle settings just to see the latest content.
Use AI for good and not evil (everyone). I’m getting tired of the anti-AI discourse, but at the same time I’m tired of seeing heavy reliance on AI for work that could be done much better by a human. Let’s improve AI and set better boundaries for its use.
What New Year’s resolution would you make for someone or something else? Tell me in the comments, but keep it kind and keep it clean.
Die Hard is a Christmas movie and I will die on this hill.