this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2025
711 points (96.6% liked)
Showerthoughts
35877 readers
1297 users here now
A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
Rules
- All posts must be showerthoughts
- The entire showerthought must be in the title
- No politics
- If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
- A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
- Posts must be original/unique
- Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS
If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.
Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
That is my point. Literally can be used correctly in a statement that is not correct, and my reading of the original post is that was OP's intention. They did not misuse the word "literally."
I'm not debating the meaning of the word cancer.
So, billionaires are not "literally" cancer, but "billionaires are literally cancer" is supposedly a correct use of "literally"?
This is generally true, but in this particular sentence, the reason the sentence is false is specifically because of the meaning of "literally".
"The sky is literally purple" is a correct use of "literally" in a false statement. This is what you are trying to argue.
"Billionaires are a cancer" is a correct, figurative statement.
"Billionaires are literally cancer" is false specifically because "literally" does not mean "figuratively".
Sorry for the multiple replies btw. My app is acting weird.
Correct. But that is not what OP said. Read it again and I think you will see that OP is saying that "Billionaires are cancer" is not a figurative statement at all, but a literal one. You can disagree with them (I do, btw), but they have not misused the word "literally."
It is a metaphorical statement rather than a simile, but both metaphors and similes are figurative, not literal.
You are refuting an argument that I did not make.
I enjoy this type of debate, but this one doesn't seem to be getting anywhere. I'm moving on. Thank you, sincerely.
Oh, this one went somewhere, just not anywhere you wanted it to go.
You can say "billionaires harm society, literally". That's a literal statement that is true.
You can say "billionaires benefit society, literally". Thats a literal statement that is untrue.
You can say "billionaires are human, literally", so long as you are talking about individuals, and not corporate entities.
You can say "billionaires are steaming piles of shit, figuratively". They are not literally turds emitting water vapor. That metaphor is quite apt, but not literally true.
Likewise, they are not masses of mutated cells. That metaphor is also apt, bit is not literally true.
You can say "teratomas are cancer, literally". You can't say "this argument is literal cancer". It is figurative cancer, not literal.