The question

What is the harshest thing anyone has said to you?

Originally asked

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

A fixed Guardian Q&A prompt asked directly across respondents and years.

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

Others on this question

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When I was a child, a member of staff at Wood End Assessment Centre [a former children’s home in Wigan] bellowed: “He copies them poems off of Bob Marley records.”
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 14 October 2023 source ↗
Julian Lloyd Webber British cellist and conductor
When the surgeon told me I wouldn’t be able to play the cello again, in 2013. I have a herniated disc and it’s pressing on a nerve in my neck. I announced I was stopping playing in 2014. I absolutely did not want to stop.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 15 July 2023 source ↗
Racial and homophobic slurs – the F- and N-words. When I moved to London, people screamed the F-word from their cars, and that stings.
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 21 December 2024 source ↗

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Question What is the worst job you have ever had? Craft & work
When Rufus first came out, it was all white guys and myself, but then the band changed and Tony Maiden, Bobby Watson and Andre Fischer came in. This guy booked us for a gig in Illinois, based on our original album cover, and when we got there he said that there were too many black people in the band. He actually put some white guys on the stage with us.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 May 2024 source ↗

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