Barry Scheck: Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?

The question

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

The Guardian's The Q&A has retained this Proust-derived prompt from at least 2007 through 2026, and ABC independently put it to the Obamas in 2011.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Barry Scheck

Defence lawyer; co-founder of the Innocence Project

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here

I haven't met one of these exonerated individuals who can sleep. Virtually all of them have some form of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Frontline, PBS, 4 December 2002 source ↗

Others on this question

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen English interior designer and television personality

I am crucified by my modesty: it’s terrible.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 8 October 2022 source ↗

My personality.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, September 2014 source ↗

Not getting to the point.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 6 September 2025 source ↗

Vick Hope British television and radio presenter

I can’t say no. I am a people-pleaser, and it means that I burn myself out because I take on too much.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 6 August 2022 source ↗

Mistaken identification is the single greatest cause of the conviction of the innocent.

Recorded Frontline, PBS, 30 October 2001 source ↗

I haven't met one of these exonerated individuals who can sleep. Virtually all of them have some form of post-traumatic stress disorder.