Fair enough; I guess I had some threads were collapsed when I ^F'd.
> I don't see how any of that is relevant here. Many countries have committed crimes and injustices, and in some cases continue to commit crimes and injustices. That doesn't say anything meaningful about China and Taiwan.
It's not a "fun fact", my point was that it's just a generic insult in multiple languages and that going on about literal definitions of cancer is a bit silly.
I don’t know anybody that regularly used “It’s a cancer” in english other than to express a severe dislike/disapproval/alarm about a thing.
Can you give an english example that you’ve personally heard where “cancer” just meant “a thing that mildly bothers me”? Like do your friends call when their shoestrings tied too tight “a cancer on society”?
Or in some other way give a personal example where you would use “cancer on society”, “cancer on the firm” etc. that is both personal to you and in english? You’re kind of defending a hypothetical and heavily referencing languages not at play here. If you feel strongly about it being a passe phrase, you must have an analogy in this language that makes sense to you personally?
Edit: For example, a pig can ejaculate for over 31 minutes. This is as relevant to this conversation as your references to China and Taiwan. Fun facts!
> I don’t know anybody that regularly used “It’s a cancer” in english other than to express a severe dislike/disapproval/alarm about a thing.
That seems about right; people are expressing a severe dislike about this.
I'm not entirely sure if I follow where we still disagree then? You asked for "empirical study that says Diversity programs are literally the same thing as glioblastoma" in your earlier comment, but clearly it's understood that "cancer" is this context does not refer to a disease, but is used more metaphorically.
Whether people should be using such language is a different matter altogether.
Can you give an english example that you’ve personally heard where “cancer” just meant “a thing that mildly bothers me”? Like do your friends call when their shoestrings tied too tight “a cancer on society”?
Which was two yes or no questions. Based on your response it’s a no to both.
Thanks for the response! Gotta love theoretical arguments about people that may not exist and didn’t post in this thread. What a good use of our time!
edit:
To make myself clear
> I'm not entirely sure if I follow where we still disagree then?
I disagree fundamentally that this is a fun moment to discuss linguistics. I was trying to figure out how exactly you felt you were contributing, especially now that you’ve walked back the importance of your fun facts about Dutch and the culture in Taiwan.
Is it always, by definition, a sort of funsy analogy when people say “a cancer on society”? People always both clearly feel strongly, but also clearly NEVER mean to point out what they feel is an existential threat?
I started out by pointing out that in English that cancer tends to mean something clearly bad with a special meaning. You invited yourself in to discuss otherwise. I guess replying to you meant inviting more of your posting, my bad.
Edit: also lol not a single example of anything I’ve asked for. Thank you for the unprompted trivia bit!
edit 2: Not all swiss cheese is the same! In fact there are many alpine and subalpine varieties made there in various forms! There are exactly zero casual examples of “cancer on society” from posters that have been asked about it though. Welcome to QI!
> I don't see how any of that is relevant here. Many countries have committed crimes and injustices, and in some cases continue to commit crimes and injustices. That doesn't say anything meaningful about China and Taiwan.
It's not a "fun fact", my point was that it's just a generic insult in multiple languages and that going on about literal definitions of cancer is a bit silly.