Get your allegory straight Bubb

So I had opportunity last week for some ‘career building’ type exercises and the esteemed expert in the field on this occasion unfortunately mangled more than a few good old fashioned allegories.

There they were – right in front of my eyes – bleeding like stuck pigs in the noon day sun !

I could pass on this perhaps except that the guy delivering these gems was purportedly a wise and reputable enough chap and so it kind of tainted everything he said thereafter. It doesn’t help that I’m beginning to feel like I hear way too many allegories and analogies in every day conversation these days. We have somewhere about  1/4 million words in the english language - do we really have to keep resorting to ripe old (and very often overly simplistic) sayings that MAYBE fit the situation at hand??? It’s like a shortcut to actual thinking …

(reference)

I’m also of a mind that in our ever increasing world of cultural and politically diversity we are cutting out large parts of the audience by relying upon this notion of universally shared context that clearly not EVERYONE is going to have.

But I digress … back to the horror …

We’re on the topic of organizational change and he is looking for another way to express the notion that often times things depend a great deal upon your perspective .. and he decides to use the ‘ a camel can travel through the eye of needle easier than a rich man can enter the gates of heaven’  one and proceeds to talk about how if that camel is close to the observer there is no way he can fit through that needle (also using the apparently misplaced notion of the needle in this allegory being a gate in ancient times) but if you move that camel far enough away from the observer then sure  you can get him through that needle’s eye ??!!!

Seriously???

I’m not a Christian but I do know that the real story behind that particular gem is all about shedding wealth, helping the poor, assuming some humilty and THEN maybe a rich man can be granted access to eternal life in heaven. (reference)

WTH?

First of all this particular allegory is totally not applicable to the point he is trying to make, and secondly I’m sure that more than a few people who heard that reference did not have the proper context to put it in.

I’m starting to think that the use of allegory and analogy are so poorly executed these days that the more one uses them the dumber one sounds….

Remember that great Star Trek TNG episode where Picard is beamed down to a planet to fight off a mythical beast with another alien as his partner but alas this particular lifeform speaks ONLY in allegorical terms and without the context Picard is totally lost ???!!!

 

Oh wait …..  damn

 

P.s. thankfully when writing on the internet one can site their references

(Star Trek The Next Generation – Episode Darmok)

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