Is it my imagination, or is "yeah, no..." the new trending phrase? I find it somewhat annoying given that it scrambles the logical truth-value of "yes" and "no" respectively, turning one's expressed thoughts into an ambivalent mush. Ozzy Man over at Ozzy Man Reviews on YouTube says "yeah, nah..." as part of his shtick, so I can at least understand where he's coming from. But "yeah, no..." seems to be everywhere these days. Here's a quote from that consummate public intellectual, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez:
“And it’s this whole tragedy of the commons type of thinking where it’s like because these one, this one specific group of people, that you are already kind of subconsciously primed to resent, you give them a different reason that’s not explicit racism but still rooted in a racist caricature,” Ocasio-Cortez continued. “It gives people a logical reason, a ‘logical’ reason to say, ‘oh yeah, no, toss out the whole social safety net.'”
See the "yeah, no..."?
My problem—my mistake—is that I'm trying to parse out the literal, logical value of the new phrase. That's impossible. It's just a verbal and mental fart, really; the idea is just to go with the flow of the conversation, and "yeah, no..." is little more than a placeholder, a boob-jiggle, a zigzag as far as I can tell: a lengthy substitute for "uh" or "um" or "duhhh."
I guess I'll have to quietly endure this latest bit of linguistic stupidity and hope it disappears down the memory hole with other hated expressions like, "I know, right?"
ADDENDUM: something like this expression has been kicking around for years. While on the train to London from Folkstone, back when I was studying in Europe during the '89-'90 academic year, I found myself surrounded by a group of chatty teenaged French girls. Their ringleader had this one line that she loved repeating: Bon, 'fin, oui, 'fin, non. That, too, became annoying after the fifth or sixth time, but that was her catchphrase, and she wasn't about to let go of it—no, sir. I don't think the purpose of the phrase was actually to show confusion or ambivalence; more likely, it was a humorous attempt at demonstrating mental nimbleness, like the adroitness of someone crossing a stream by deftly hopping along a zigzag of stones. See? I can accept what you just said, then instantly chew it over and reject it! That's how mentally nimble I am! The end result, though, still sounds like confusion or ambivalence to me. But as with Ozzy Man's "yeah, nah," I don't think you're supposed to dwell on the utterance: you're just supposed to let it run in one ear and out the other like the drivel it is.
Someone is thinking way too much about things that probably shouldn't be thought about that much.
ReplyDeleteBut since we're doing that here... just because an utterance cannot be parsed literally, that doesn't mean that it is nothing more than "a verbal and mental fart." Human beings are playful creatures, and we like to play with our language. Besides, I thought you liked farts!
And farts aren't playful? I don't see "playful" and "not deep" as mutually exclusive. If anything, I see a great deal of semantic overlap.
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing that you come from the Hit 'Em When They're Down school of blog commenting in which, for example, a person makes a meal and says, "I realize this isn't my best effort," to which your school replies, "This is not your best effort."
To wit:
ME: "My problem—my mistake—is that I'm trying to parse out the literal, logical value of the new phrase. That's impossible."
ALSO ME: "I don't think you're supposed to dwell on the utterance: you're just supposed to let it run in one ear and out the other like the drivel it is."
YOU: "Someone is thinking way too much about things that probably shouldn't be thought about that much."
Sigh...
But at least I'm in good company:
"What do you mean? Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?"
—Gandalf the Overthinker
Farts can indeed be very playful, and I wasn't accusing you of seeing "playful" and "not deep" as mutually exclusive. But you referred to the same phrase as both "a verbal and mental fart" and "this latest bit of linguistic stupidity." That's probably what prompted my comment.
ReplyDeleteAs for overthinking... come on, man, you know that comment was in jest. Anyway, that was the tone it was supposed to be in. I'm right there with you in the Overthinkers Club. After all, there would be no blogs were it not for overthinking.
In my case, what prompted my blog post was my own annoyance at the seeming prevalence of the expression. I'd say that, even if we take it as some kind of playful utterance, it doesn't seem to have any deep meaning, and it doesn't seem to have much more than a placeholding/delaying function, so that makes it about as substantive as a mental/verbal fart in my book. And given my annoyance at the expression, I'd say it qualifies as a piece of linguistic stupidity. My thinking is that one simply has to weather such expressions when they arise and hope they disappear sooner rather than later.
ReplyDelete