« "This is what a feminist who exploits women looks like" | Main | THE FAR WEST »

November 2, 2014

The top 10 most fatuous phrases in the English language

6. Wrong side of history
If someone says you’re on the wrong side of history, it is their smug and stupid way of telling you that you are wrong and they are right, no more. Conservatism is always on the wrong side of history because it is innately opposed to profound social change. Social change is always good, you see, even when it is utterly calamitous or pointless or unnecessary.

7. Bravely fighting cancer
An odious phrase, patronising and meaningless. All people with cancer are bravely fighting the vile disease. All people with cancer who have decided not to fight it, but instead to acquiesce, are also brave — perhaps even more brave. In truth, ‘bravery’ and ‘fighting’ have nothing to do with it.Rod Liddle:The Spectator

Posted by gerardvanderleun at November 2, 2014 2:50 PM. This is an entry on the sideblog of American Digest: Check it out.

Your Say

But... but... MLB says we should Stand Up To Cancer! Because all those people who died of cancer were just too weak and got bullied. If only they'd stood up to it!

Posted by: Christopher Taylor [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 2, 2014 7:36 PM

Fighting cancer, most of the time, means allowing the medical establishment to turn you into a guinea pig. I wouldn't wish it on anybody and as for me I'll cure it with lead.

Posted by: ghostsniper [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 2, 2014 7:53 PM

"Bravely" anything is pretty much guaranteed to be bullshit. It's usually applied to 20-year-old actresses displaying the unparalleled courage to show their tits or get tattoos.

Posted by: Rob De Witt [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 2, 2014 11:00 PM

If you don't have cancer, you don't know what you will do. Everything is a choice you don't have to make.

I have cancer and had one operation. It's back. What I'll do is up in the air now since more information is needed. But you better believe that everybody is going to die, some fast, some slow, some easy some painfully. After the Nam, I stopped thinking about 'Future' and started living 'Present'. That takes care of all problems.

Posted by: Vermont Woodchuck [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 3, 2014 3:09 AM

VW, I'm with you. I have cancer, multiple myeloma; it attacks white blood cells and plasma, and it is found in bone marrow. I will never be "free" of it. Best they can do is give me chemo, put it in remission. One fine day it will rear up again and kill me.

Taylor, you and ghost don't know jack shit about having this fatal disease. All you show me is brave talk that will fold like a house of cards if you ever get stricken with any cancer. I hope you don't but spare me the posturing and joking about it.

Since I got hit my attitudes have shifted. I don't get bothered by little things anymore. I figure I am living in stolen moments, life given me by the grace of God.

The bad days I have now are better than the good days I used to have.

Posted by: chasmatic [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 3, 2014 5:34 AM

A couple more stupid phrases:

Better to let 100 guilty men go free than convict one innocent man
My. Ass. That's what we have the appeals system for, OK?

Even if this only helps ONE person, it will have been worth it!
Are you fucking kidding me? If you spent millions of dollars on some "cause" with the promise it would help many, and this is the result, you get to go to jail, in my book.

Posted by: DonRodrigo [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 3, 2014 6:46 AM

"Taylor, you and ghost don't know jack shit about having this fatal disease. All you show me is brave talk that will fold like a house of cards if you ever get stricken with any cancer. I hope you don't but spare me the posturing and joking about it."

I think you grossly, violently misunderstood my point. I was mocking the name "stand up to cancer" because it implies that if only people had fought back they would have beat it or something. You don't "stand up to" a disease, its not a bully that needs defying. Its a ridiculous name and movement.

I apologize in the sarcasm wasn't evident enough in my post.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 3, 2014 8:09 AM

Chas, you're right, no one knows what they'll do until after they do it. I watched the medical establishment destroy 4 people very close to me and hope I have the balls to not go there. I'm not afriad of dying but I'm horrified about being medically tortured to death.

Posted by: ghostsniper [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 3, 2014 2:05 PM

Taylor and ghost, please accept my apologies if I read you wrong. Some topics trigger me and then I write faster than I can think. Anger is a secondary emotion triggered by fear or pain and in many cases it clouds one's vision.

yeah, I don't care for the insipid slogans that only serve to minimize the core problem, and there is no rebuttal for them.
Try coming home to a wife that has had a double mastectomy and she has to undergo chemo, all her hair falls out and she lives with the specter of the cancer returning. (A dear and close couple, friends. You can see the light has dimmed behind their eyes even with prayer.)
Try looking at a husband that has lost two inches of height in a year's time and has the equivalent of osteoporosis. he ain't so lucky as the mastectomy girl, ten percent of the myeloma is there for life. (me; they say I have from five to ten years and they won't all be good years.)

We're all in this together.
"You may not know this, but there are things that gnaw at a man worse than dyin'." Not my words, I borrowed this quote from somewhere.

Posted by: chasmatic [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 4, 2014 5:51 AM

In 2000, I was given a 5% chance of surviving cancer. I did a year of every other day chemo while maintaining full time work status so I could keep my insurance.


Cancer gives a while new meaning to the word "suck"


But, was I brave... Nope, I cried like a baby when I found out, especially since my first child was due a month later. I was scared, depressed, and felt very very alone. People will avoid you for no other reason than they don't know what to say.


There is nothing brave about that, and there is no such thing, in my opinion, as "fighting" it. It just is. The surgery and drugs work, or they don't. It is what it is. You live, or you die. It isn't like you can take it on in a boxing match or a game of Mario Kart, and you can't simply shoot it or kick the crap out of it. You certainly can't reason with it or beat it in a battle of wits.


Like I said, it is what it is. You live, or you die. Nothing brave about that.

Posted by: Mike [TypeKey Profile Page] at November 5, 2014 1:59 PM

Post a comment




Remember Me?

(you may use HTML tags for style)