Unsure if this counts as a quote but here goes.
If you can’t handle me at my worst, you don’t deserve me at my best
Absolute fucking nonsense.
The worst part of this quote is that, in the original, she (Marilyn Monroe) actually framed her “worst”:
>I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.
So in the context it sounds more like “here are my flaws - take me or leave me, but you won’t change me”. Which sounds reasonable. But without that context it sounds more like “I’m entitled because I like to pretend that I’m above other people”.
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I’ve seen this before but is that truly the origin? On the Wikipedia page, the quote(s) do not seem to allude to taste or buying preferences at all but rather to customer service. I’ve tried searching but I haven’t seen any primary sources state that the original quote, or intent, was with the inclusion of “in matters of taste”.
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Okay, I have a sneaking suspicion that it’s kind of an apocryphal reverse-explanation to counter currently all-too-common abusive behavior towards service personnel. I think it’s just an old motto that once made more sense than it does today when it’s been in use for over a hundred years.
I feel like I’ve never seen or heard of anyone good using that quote. I’m sure it makes some sense if used in genuine good faith. The quote would make sense applied to someone with a disability, for example, by interpreting it more along the lines of having to deal with the person not always being outgoing and maybe even sometimes needing extra help.
But no, I’ve only ever seen shitty (or at least allegedly shitty) people use that quote, to justify their shittiness. The “worst” they refer to is usually bouts of anger or abuse.
My least favorite is
Just be yourself!
Even in grade school I knew this was hogwash. I didn’t act the same in class as during recess, or in church as when at the dinner table. Exactly which me was I supposed to be? When someone asks, “What am I supposed to do?” They are really asking, “How should I behave?” And if you’ve never been on a date before, or this is your first job interview, then it’s not obvious.
A: “So, how did the interview go?”
B: “Not so well, he threw my resume away, in front of me, and ordered me to leave.”
A: “What? Why?”
B: “Well, I did just as your said, I was being myself. I walked in, gave him the ol’ finger guns, then started with my best fart joke.”
A: “Why the hell would you do that at an interview?”
B: “Because that routine always slays in the dorms and I was trying to be myself.”
ask yourself: is it possible to be anybody else? no? then this saying is non-nonsensical!
I don’t know, as a ttrpg’er, I’m being someone else every two weeks for three hours are a time. ;)
Anybody on the autism spectrum just laughs sadly, shakes head quietly, when told ‘just be your self’
“Do or do not, there is no try”
The rallying cry of the kind of person who thinks every hobby has to become a side hustle.
I feel like that quote is better interpreted as “you haven’t failed until/unless you give up.” There is also value to “don’t go into something without committing to it,” but damn not everything has to be a fucking job.
Let’s not let those people “have” Star Wars quotes. Same thing when Nazi trash in America tried to co-opt the “Ok” hand sign, Hawaiian shirts, etc. I was a bit dismayed by how fast people were willing to cede those things away. My take is: They can’t have them, don’t give up so easily.
You tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is, never try.
This is what I wanted to say but didn’t have the words for. Thanks.
Capitalists on a nutshell
I am surprised no one yet has posted the infuriatingly worthless expression of affectless sympathy:
thoughts and prayers
As a nonnative speaker, the first time I heard the expression was on Bojack Horseman and it confused the hell out of me.
Thing is if prayers did anything, life would be way better (utopia)
If prayers were always effective, life would be both better and far worse. You’d be surprised at the horrific things people pray for.
And some of the “good” things we pray for go against what we desperately need.
So you think you can tell heaven from hell?
- Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd
Very true. It’d be so bad
I agree most of the time, but when I have to sign a sympathy card at work for someone i barely know, what the hell am i supposed to say?
I can’t change the work culture so i just say something generic like that most of the time lol
Btw I’m not even religious
Religious bs
‘‘what doesn’t kill you, make you stronger’’ it’s just so overused and saturated
“pull yourself up by the bootstraps” it’s literally impossible
I always thought that was the point of the phrase.
I think it was when it was first coined, but it’s been used unironically for awhile.
It is. It was initially used as a paradoxical statement.
It’s weird that it’s still used unironically today (and in fact feels like it’s made a relatively recent revival). Like, you’d think they’d at least switch to a phrase that makes sense.
“The customer is always right” conveniently missing the second part: “…in matters of taste and style”.
Also misinterpreting “customer” as an individual rather than as the aggregate of customer demand.
I don’t think that’s the original quote, but rather came later to try and improve the clearly flawed quote. Searching, I found https://grammarist.com/phrase/the-customer-is-always-right/, which says the original quote is the rather uninspiring “Rule number one: the customer is always right. Rule number two: If the customer is wrong, please refer to rule number one”.
That said, I do agree with you completely. I think the quote is just so obviously flawed, as customers abuse the heck out of it. Treating it as applying to aggregates makes way more sense. e.g., if customers want a pink doodad and you only sell doodads in black… well, then you’re wrong and should start selling them in pink.
As a corollary, I also like the quote that has been often attributed to Ford (but checking, it seems unproven if he actually said it), “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” I like that quote because customers often frankly don’t actually know what they want. I’ve had countless times myself where I didn’t know I wanted a product until after I learned about it. And myself, I’m a software dev. This quote constantly applies to my field. The idea of users not knowing what they want is an extremely popular meme in the field (example). Users often need expert guidance to identify what they actually want and what a practical solution might look like.
“live, laugh, love”
I don’t see it anymore after leaving the hell that is Reddit, but I saw “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes” multiple times in every thread.
I haven’t seen “fuck around and find out” since the old Reddit days, either.
Thank goodness for that. Another comment that was posted over and over and over in every thread.
“Equal rights means equal lefts” or whatever tf it was, especially during the Depp/Heard thing. Basically condoning hitting women. But then if you disagree with it, it gets spun into endorsing women abusing men. Reddit comments can be fucking gross.
I mean I get that if used in a context where a person does something with great risk attached and with few and rare good possible outcomes (stupid games). And then they get a bad outcome (stupid prize).
For example Jackass-like stunts.
Usually as a way of being racist, too.
“Don’t be evil.” -Google
Both hate and laugh it.
Agreed. This sounds good but immediately falls apart at the first scrutiny. It’s the same with “Don’t be a dick.” Everyone nods their heads and thinks, “Oh, that’s so obvious!” Of course, everyone agrees because they’re imagining what they believe is ‘evil’ or ‘being a dick’ and just assume everyone else agrees. Imagine their surprised-Pikachu face when they learn that other humans use different criteria.
But, if you think you can sum up thousands of years of ethics and legal theories with one pithy sentence, then go for it.
Not see it. But I hear this one.
“it’s always in the last place you look”
No shit Sherlock. Why would I keep looking after I found it?
I always thought that was the joke?
I must say, in retrospect it kind of seems obvious, but this has somehow blown my mind
And it is a false statement:
sometimes you stop looking without finding anything so in those cases it isn’t in the last place you look
so the clam “It’s always in the last place you look” is obviously false.
otherwise you could say up front “I’m only gonna look in one place!” and then you would HAVE to find it in this last place you look!
One time I kept looking just to prove that statement wrong. I think I was 4yo.
What people really mean when they say this is
it’s in the last place you think to look
This again is a misnomer because, not just because you stop looking… but because people find it hard to admit things are lost. All part of the half serious, half ridiculous psuedo science of Findology (disclaimer: my own blog)
Embarrassingly it took me years to realize what that quote meant. I had always interpreted it to mean that the item is found in an unexpected place. But of course what it really means is that you stop looking once the item is found, therefore that’s the last place you looked 🤦
“We only use x% of our brain.”
Simply not true as shown since years by neurology
There are moments where people use more of their bran at once than they usually do.
We call these moments “seizures”.As an epileptic married to a monitor tech, we both had a good laugh when I shared this.
Thanks stranger.
This reminds me of the “you eat X amount of spiders in your sleep every year”. It’s also been debunked so many times and I see it popping up from time to time.
Even more ironic, this was created by some professor (?) to prove that starting fake viral facts was easy or something…
Man, I always thought that one was suspect. If I eat 10 per year and have been alive 40+ years, then surely one of those times I would have woken up.
Oh, and X% of dust is dead skincells. There is a good Veritasium video on this clai.
If you just add the words on average, suddenly it sounds more realistic, because who knows if there’s a guy somewhere sleepwalking in a spider infested place
Good old Spiders George
I’ve almost never heard anyone quote that, but I’ve heard numerous people arguing against that statement. So much that I’m wondering it it has mandela-affected people to think it’s a more common misconception than it really is.
I do remember it being more common back when I was in high school, and also there was a movie which mentioned that which could have helped with that
I also havent heard it being said seriously for years though
Right, it was the plot for the movie Lucy, where the protagonist increased the brain capacity beyond 10% and upon reaching 100%, she turned into an USB drive. I remember that now.
Such a good movie with such bad writing…
I don’t know who has to hear this but
I don’t know who has to hear this but
that’s a phrase, not a quote.
Who says you can’t quote a phrase?
“God is testing you.” “God has a plan.” “God never closes a door without opening a window.” “I’ll pray for you.”
Or any other religious bullshit. Keep that shit to yourself. I’m living in the real world.
Anything on a decorative sign meant to hang in a house. Examples include “Live, Laugh, Love” (which has already been mentioned) or something about wine.
This is a me problem, but it makes me cringe when someone has to explicitly write out who they are onto a sign.
I feel like that should be shown and not said. To me, it feel ingenuous when it’s written onto a sign
