Everyday phrases, translated

[synthesis]

Have you ever noticed how certain phrases seem to come up in everyday speech fairly often, and they always unintentionally mean the exact same thing?

A well known example:


"I'm not racist, but..."Translated: "Please don't call me out on this racist thing I'm about to say, because I'm sensitive, but not to people who don't look like me."

Others...


"It's the principal of the thing that matters!"Translated: "I'm making a big deal over something incredibly insignificant."


"I'm just doing my job."Translated: "I'm either doing something nice, or, far more likely, doing something unconscionable, and I don't want to have to think about what a terrible person I am."


"You should have been clearer!"Translated: "I'm an idiot, or I completely ignored everything you told me on multiple occasions, or both. Either way, I'm going to blame you for something that is patently my fault."


"Just calm down."Translated: "You might be overreacting, but it's probably more likely that I'm a patronizing asshole who is dismissing everything you say out of hand."


"When all is said and done..." or "At the end of the day..."Translated: "I have no idea how to connect the first point I made with the second point, so I'm just going to make the leap and hope you don't notice."

What else?

[MarxSchmarx]

Have you ever noticed how certain phrases seem to come up in everyday speech fairly often, and they always unintentionally mean the exact same thing?

A well known example:

Translated: "Please don't call me out on this racist thing I'm about to say, because I'm sensitive, but not to people who don't look like me."

Others...

Translated: "I'm making a big deal over something incredibly insignificant."

Translated: "I'm either doing something nice, or, far more likely, doing something unconscionable, and I don't want to have to think about what a terrible person I am."

Translated: "I'm an idiot, or I completely ignored everything you told me on multiple occasions, or both. Either way, I'm going to blame you for something that is patently my fault."

Translated: "You might be overreacting, but it's probably more likely that I'm a patronizing asshole who is dismissing everything you say out of hand."

Translated: "I have no idea how to connect the first point I made with the second point, so I'm just going to make the leap and hope you don't notice."

What else?

Hm... I think this is being rather unfair. The "i'm just doing my job" and the "I'm not a racist but" stuff I agree with, but the rest of it I'm not raelly sure.

The principal thing doesn't really bother me. I mean that was kind of Kant's point. Frankly it's refreshing when people bother to stand up for what they believe.

As to the "at the end of the day" criticism, I don't think it means "I can't form a logically coherent argument". Rather, I think it is an appeal to a very basic articulation of "common sense" in the face of arguments that may make us accept absurdities instead. For instance: "At the end of the day, all the merits of utilitarianism pale in comparison to the absurdity of pressing a pleasure button giving 1 million rabbits mild pleasure at the expense of saving a human child". I personally find arguments like that rather compelling.

Finally, "you should have been clearer" I think applies absolutely. I personally reflect on my own writing/statements etc... precisely with this criticism: can I have made my point better? If so how? You have to realize most people don't have the time to read what you write carefully and in the most sympathetic light. And truth be told, why should they?

To me, it comes down to respecting the reader/receiver of your message. The burden is on you, not them, to convey what you have to say effectively. I think it is a pity that this same standard isn't applied to atrociously written works like, say, Spinoza.

And frankly, my personal view is that, at the end of the day, this is the biggest problem the contemporary left faces.

[synthesis]

About "the principal of the thing," it's more referring to instances like when people spend four hours in line or on hold in order to get less than a dollar refunded to them because they think the product cost too much or it was faulty, and then justify the massive waste of time and/or overreaction because "it was the principal of the thing."

"You really spent four hours tracking down that guy from Craigslist just to get him to take his free couch back? Why didn't you just leave it out on the curb?"

"It was the principal of the thing! He should have mentioned that it smelled like spooge."

Or whatever.

[synthesis]

I should stress that the OP wasn't supposed to address anything about RevLeft. Just stuff offline, in your day-to-day life.

X: "Why did my computer break down after you fixed it?"

Y: "I told you three different times that it would break down if you kept visiting all those sketchy porn sites and/or downloading all that spyware."

X: "Well, you should have been clearer!"

[synthesis]

X: "Communism sounds like a good idea in practice, but at the end of the day, people are just too self-interested."

Y: "Well, if it's the end of the day, I guess you must be right, even though the first half is not linked to the second half in any logical way."

[L.A.P.]

^lol

[Comrade Jacob]

"Anarcho-Capitalism is the way to go if you think otherwise you should go to North Korea"
=
I can't stand on facts so if you think your government should change you should go to a struggling nation that has sightly similar opinions, I will ignore the irony of me getting annoyed when people tell me to go to Somalia.


:laugh: