Does anyone else ever get truly deeply disturbed ( not in the eldritch sense but like upsetting sense?) by how often human language is butchered? I don’t mean slang or dialect, I mean saying that held proper meaning being conveyed and perverted to mean the exact opposite of what they once stood for?
Examples of half sayings that lost so much meaning:
- the customers always right: “the customers always right in matters of taste” meaning don’t yuck someone’s yum, not let average customers become abusive
-blood is thicker than water: “the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb” the relationships you forge and choose are more important than shared family.
- eye for an eye: “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” meaning you’ll reap what you sow and too much karmic action costs everyone something in the end
-Jack of all trades: “a jack of all trades and master of none” meaning a little bit of experience across the board but at no point did anything stick enough to allow masterful precision of that activity or field - HOWEVER even this version is altered from the original “jack of all trades but better than a master of none” crediting your experiences and ability to pick up from a wide array of experiences and create useful knowledge from them
-imitation is the sincerest form of flattery: great minds think alike: “ great minds think alike,but simple minds/fools seldom differ” usually used in a complimentary fashion. But can also mean that perhaps you only agree because neither are capable of deepening the complexity of the thought.
-curiosity killed the cat: “curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back” usually used as a scare tactic but truly meaning that the things you may learn can create new life and reignite interest in you
