Stupid Sayings

Dr_Toad said:
I'm sorry, that makes absolutely no sense to me. Would you be kind enough to rephrase it or clarify in some way?
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Sure. The stupid saying was "If I can do it, anyone can."
I maintain that those who say this usually discount a number of factors, such as luck, help and the uniqueness of their own position, which would make it impossible for everyone else to do what they did.
Whereupon you demonstrated that your own success was the result of your own cleverness, opportunity, the co-operation of a superior; being in the right place at the right time. Such a combination of serendipitous events are not presented to everyone, even if they did start out clever, which everyone isn't.
Thus: your having done it in no way indicates that anyone can.
 
The people who tell you to get off the fence do so for one of two reasons: to enlist you to their side, or to present a clear target for them to aim at.
Waffling, indecision and equivocation can be annoying in an argument.
I've annoyed lots of people by seeing by both sides, but now I'm told I've become "a fanatical atheist". No fence here!
 
Jeeves said:
The people who tell you to get off the fence do so for one of two reasons: to enlist you to their side, or to present a clear target for them to aim at.
Waffling, indecision and equivocation can be annoying in an argument.
I've annoyed lots of people by seeing by both sides, but now I'm told I've become "a fanatical atheist". No fence here!
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And I think many people are so stuck on believing 1 way or the other that they just cannot handle the fact that some people are not that way. Often it seems people deal better with someone who believes the opposite of them than with those who do not believe either way.

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Yes. Polarization has become such a staple of our present political and ideological climate (If you don't support our policy, you're with the terriss!) that one is expected to wear one colour or the other, to take up sides.
If you express a longer perspective, a third alternative, a critical view of both arguments presented, reluctance to declare adherence, sympathy for the side not chosen or even so much as a qualm about some aspect of the side you have chosen, people regard you with suspicion.
"You're in danger of overthinking this." or "Whatsamadda? PC police didn't sign off on it?"
I can live with that.
What's harder to deal with is: when I show any degree of partiality, I am automatically presumed to be committed to that point of view. Posters presenting the antithesis regularly adjust my phraseology to correspond with their idea of the camp I'm supposed to represent.
 
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I have known him for 40 years, We have been friends for 50 years, etc


Referring to someone they have not seen or communicated with for 35 years.
Same as saying I have lived in Baltimore 40 years tho I have not been there in 36 years.

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Can I say "I've known LA for 20 years" on the basis of having spent two months there in 1995?
Or "I've travelled extensively in 23 states" because we drove to California and and Florida?
 
You hear what you want to hear.


This is 1 of those which is probably valid sometimes yet is very often not. It is also 1 of many things it seems people learn which apply to some people some times yet they somehow assume it applies to everyone. I do not know the origin but whatever validity there is seems like an aspect of cognitive bias.
I am tempted to say "A little learning is a dangerous thing" but that is much abused as well.

“A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.” - Alexander Pope's poem An Essay on Criticism, composed in 1709.

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Perfectly valid in context and a wise observation.
Many people think reading a wiki page makes them experts on some complex subject.
It was that type Pope intended to address, not the curious sampler who makes no pretensions to expertise.
 
StrangerInAStrangeLand said:
You hear what you want to hear.


This is 1 of those which is probably valid sometimes yet is very often not. It is also 1 of many things it seems people learn which apply to some people some times yet they somehow assume it applies to everyone. I do not know the origin but whatever validity there is seems like an aspect of cognitive bias.
I am tempted to say "A little learning is a dangerous thing" but that is much abused as well.

“A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.” - Alexander Pope's poem An Essay on Criticism, composed in 1709.

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"jack of all Trades(often omitted)-master of none"

i often need to hold back a Laugh at people using it like a throw-away comment when they encounter someone with skills that rival their own on subjects they rarely & barely know.

i have met some people who can effectively master any trade they choose and have mastered several different trades.
so i know for a fact the saying has on the whole been bastardised to serve the frail Ego of men.
 
Jeeves said:
Where are the ROTFLUIC emoticons when you need them?
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Hell, I haven't felt like a teenager since I was forty. And that's a good while ago...

My knees didn't bitch at me, I could still fall and roll out of it, and my hair was still brown. And not migrating around from the top of my head to strange places like my ears and my back.

Y'all forget that I said that, please. At least you younger ones. For a few years, anyhow. :D
 
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