The question
What is the trait you most deplore in others?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A verbatim standing question in The Guardian's rotating Q&A questionnaire, documented across respondents and years.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Laziness, lack of empathy, lack of humour.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 December 2025 source ↗
Greed, lack of empathy. Same thing.
Cruelty. I don’t see the point.
Bad manners, which extends from people dropping litter to people trawling the hell out of the oceans.
I have a hard time with people who are manipulative.
Speedy, bossy, loving.
If there could be a double of me to look after my child when I’m working.
A glow of wellbeing.
Lemn Sissay. What happened to him and what he’s done with his life is extraordinary.
Years ago, I was trying to get with one of the big agencies and I cobbled together a VHS tape of me in adverts and sobbing in The Bill, and took it United Agents for the attention of Dallas Smith. A week later I went back and said, “Has she looked at the tape?” And they were, like, “Dallas is a he, no he hasn’t and he doesn’t want to,” and handed it back to me.
A missionary in Africa – I think that was Sunday school-based.
Charles Osgood, Sam Ryder, Hamza Yassin, George Takei, Laurie Metcalf, Rory Stewart
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