On Clichés
Language has its limits: Great philosophers have struggled to articulate the truths they've discerned. Mystics have been rendered dumb by the beauty they've seen. The everyday person has been reduced to exasperation when his neighbor doesn't understand why something is humorous.
Even when language might be sufficient for the task, a person might not have enough aptitude. A man wants to articulate the sensation of returning to a vacation spot he frequented as a child. “Nostalgia” doesn't seem to do it justice, yet that's the best he can do and he knows it doesn't convey the feeling adequately to his wife.
The shortcoming of language give rise to poetry. It also gives rise to silence, like Thomas Aquinas' refusal to write any more after his mystical visions. Those are good effects of language's limits.
Cliches are the bad effects.
Cliches substitute for thought. Too often, a person in debate throws out a cliché, expects it to be treated with the same weight of a proverb, and hopes the matter is ended. His opponent often counters with his own cliché, distinguishes the cliché from the present situation, or concedes the point. Rarely does the opponent dismantle the cliché itself.
Perhaps the essence of a cliché is that it can be dismantled by one of the oldest and simplest, yet most effective, philosophical tools in the shed: reductio ad aburdum.
Take a cliché to its logical conclusion and see if it holds up. The essence of a cliché is that it never will, which is what distinguishes it from, say, a proverb or an aphorism or a maxim.
If a business associate says, “We have to spend money to make money”? Ask if the business should spend all its money, thus leaving nothing for contingencies and year-end bonuses. That, after all, would be logical, if the act of spending money always yielded greater sums.
Does someone really believe that an apple a day keeps the doctor away? Tell them to try it after losing a battle with a chainsaw. Does someone really believe that everything he needs to know he learned in kindergarten? Tell him he shouldn't be doing anything to make a living besides operating a lemonade stand (with his parents' financing). Does a person believe we can't legislate morality? Ask him about murder or statutory rape.
Of course, reductio ad absurdum isn't the only way to dismantle a cliché. There's also the simple means of finding examples that debunk it. Does Lance Armstrong think an apple a day is sufficient to keep the doctor away?
I've written so far about attacking clichés. The obvious corollary is that we should avoid using clichés. Or rather, struggle hard to use them sparingly and use them only properly. It's hard to do: cliches are easy and we don't always recognize them. I wouldn't be shocked (surprised maybe, but not shocked) if someone cogently alleges that I've used a cliché or two in this piece.
In order to recognize a cliché, every canned saying ought to be suspect. Many canned sayings are not cliches. Famous lines from Shakespeare and Casablanca, for instance. But if it's a canned saying used to convince someone of something, then our cliché antennae should stretch high, but even then, a cliché may not be present. Quotes from the Bible, for instance, are often canned and used to convince, but they aren't clichés.
You can always be sure that a cliché has sneaked into the conversation or onto the page when it's (i) canned, (ii) used to convince, and (iii) can't withstand reductio ad aburdum or any other logical rigor. It's a simple enough test, though much easier to employ while writing (when you have time to think) than in conversation.
Notwithstanding my condemnation of cliches, we can properly use them occasionally, as long as the clichés are used honestly and rigorously.
Make sure they never substitute for thought and that you're not using them conclusively. (As a related matter, you might use them for humor. “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” is pretty funny when you're counseling a man who just lost his arm in a traffic accident.)
Never use them when the subject matter is serious or disputed, unless the cliché is wholly appropriate to the situation and the other side would concur that the cliché adds cogency to your argument. That, of course, greatly limit's the use of cliches in debate, but that's a good thing.
