Nobody is perfect
I'm really tired of this phrase, and it is completely useless and irrelevant to any discussion. It should be never be a response to someone looking for validation, especially.
Does anyone think this phrase is useful and/or helpful to a discussion? For example. If I tell you how my family member verbally abused me, does a response of "Well, nobody is perfect.", help at all? IMO, people need to stop saying these types of phrases. 'Nobody's perfect' - 'We all make mistakes'
Does anyone think this phrase is useful and/or helpful to a discussion? For example. If I tell you how my family member verbally abused me, does a response of "Well, nobody is perfect.", help at all? IMO, people need to stop saying these types of phrases. 'Nobody's perfect' - 'We all make mistakes'
Comments (46)
It is what it is.
lol... I hate that one too. ffs -.-
If everyone else is dutifully offering the ‘validation’ so eagerly sought, then sometimes a little perspective may be called for. The question is why it upsets us so much to hear this consideration of the offender as a human being, as deserving of compassion as we are.
Would it make you feel better if the response was to denigrate this family member, label them as ‘evil’ and resolve hatred towards them?
When you express an interpersonal interaction, you cannot always expect people to immediately relate to your position. In this case, they may relate initially to the family member instead, and may be responding defensively to your pain and anger for their own reasons that have nothing to do with you. Your taking offence at a lack of validation is based on an assumption that yours is the only position in the encounter worth consideration: either in the situation of abuse or in the telling of it to others. Sorry to burst your bubble.
If I respond instead by telling you how my family member physically abused me, is it because I’m expressing compassion for your situation, or because I want to position myself as more deserving of validation than you are? Being conscious of our limited perspective can be a lesson in humility.
(Trite sound bites in response to genuine pleas for compassion or understanding are bad, m'kay, but also automatic villainizing of people is worse, so it's true that nobody's perfect and people deserve understanding for their faults and wrongdoing, but those who've been wronged deserve understanding for their pain even more, and dismissing them with a trite sound bad is the wrong way to balance those conflicting claims to humanity).
I don't deny that the offender is a human being, but that's irrelevant when offering someone validation and/or compassion. If my daughter is raped, I am not going to tell her, "Have some consideration for your rapist. He is a human being as well." - Not only is it absurd, but it is completely dismissive of what my daughter is going through.
Quoting Possibility
Absolutely not. Validation isn't necessarily about agreeing with the person on their view, or affirming their view is accurate. It is about allowing someone to feel and express their emotions and thoughts. Once the person has become more logical and out of emotion, then you can discuss the validity of their thoughts. If my wife comes to me and tell me her mother upset her, I am going to validate her emotional expression. And sympathize with her, until we reach a point we can actually talk about what happened in an objective sense. It doesn't matter how accurate her initial story is of her mother.
Quoting Possibility
Validation is irrelevant to relating. It's quite the opposite actually. If someone tells me a story about something they went through, I don't need to relate it to myself or anyone else. All I need to do is understand that they went through something, and I will initially validate their experience in what they went through.
Quoting Possibility
You sound like you don't understand what validation means, or how to execute it. If you're girlfriend/boyfriend comes home from work, and tells you they had a hard day because of something their co-worker did to them. Are you going to respond to them initially by telling them, "Well, your co-worker deserves some consideration here. You don't have the only position worth considering, sorry to burst your bubble here." - You would be an awful support partner if you said that.
Quoting Possibility
If you responded with that initially, without validating my story/feelings first, I would say that is completely selfish and lacking empathy and/or compassion. Someone is telling you a story to vent and/or reach out for some support, not to hear about your story as an initial response. If I tell you a story, one sign that you would be interested is for you to ask questions about what happened, why it happened, what could prevent it in the future, how to resolve it, etc... But on the contrary, if you don't say anything other than relating it to yourself, well then it's obvious how interested you were in my current frustration. This is not to say that one could never talk about themselves in response to someone's hardship, but it should never be the initial response.
Scenario A:
"I realize that this is my 19th offense your honor, but what can I say? Nobody's perfect..."
Scenario B:
"It's true Obama failed to revolutionize American health care, but does this mean his presidency was a failure? Nobody's perfect."
Scenario C:
[i]"Bobby Fischer was a shit chess player because he lost some games"...
"Nobody's perfect"[/i].
Did you just want validation here, or a philosophical discussion? It wasn’t clear, sorry. This is a philosophical forum.
I agree with you that it’s inappropriate and insensitive to dismiss someone’s expression of negative experiences with phrases such as ‘nobody’s perfect’. I agree with you that when someone is clearly looking for validation, then the appropriate response would be to give it as required. I would have thought that was obvious, and doesn’t require discussion. I doubt you’ll have any argument on these points.
But your claim was also that the phrase was “useless and irrelevant to ANY discussion” - I disagree with this. There are situations where it could be useful, and where it might also be a response (albeit insensitive) by someone with no direct malice towards you, and no intention to dismiss your feelings. Sometimes their insensitivity with a phrase such as ‘nobody’s perfect’ is a clear warning that they have their own shit going on, and just as you would want them to be sensitive to your shit, you can also be sensitive to theirs, and their emotional capacity to deal with your shit at the time - which has priority only for you.
My intention was not to offend you further, but to contribute to a discussion.
Nothing is raw, as nothing happened to me. But I see many responses in forums, or parents of my friends talking to them in a similar way.
Quoting Possibility
I don't need validation, as I came here for discussion. Why would you think otherwise? It's strange for you to assume I am the one who has been wronged, when I have been explaining things thoroughly.
Quoting Possibility
If it was obvious, people would stop doing it. But they don't. I see it happen every week almost.
Quoting Possibility
Could you give me an example of a discussion that would benefit from someone saying, "Nobody's perfect?"
This is a bit strange. Why would God be perfect if it existed?
I doubt the judge would think that phrase has some validity to it.
Conclusion: The phrase was useless to say.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
The first part of the scenario's statement is a good starting point and good question, but the end is unnecessary.
Conclusion: The phrase was useless to say.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
The person saying Bobby was a shit chess player was demonstrably wrong. And you can prove that by showing the games he won. Saying 'Nobody's perfect' after the rebuttal, is completely useless and adds nothing to the point.
Conclusion: The phrase was useless to say.
Suppose Mary is yelling at Harry for having made some mistake, and Harry responds, "everybody makes mistakes" or "nobody's perfect". Which one is being more unreasonable? It depends on the circumstances.
Right. This was the example of when it doesn't work as a defense.
Quoting chatterbears
What do you mean "unnecessary"? As long as "nobody's perfect" adds something to the statement, then it serves a purpose, and in this scenario it's a functional or rhetorical answer to the question it posed.
Quoting chatterbears
It points out that failing to achieve absolute perfection is not the same as achieving overall failure.
Jesus intervenes with a crowd about to stone a woman found to have committed adultery. He looks around and says, "Let he among you who is without sin cast the first stone."
All was quiet for a moment...then suddenly a rock flies through the air and hits the woman smack on her head.
Jesus frowns and admonishes, "Mother!!!"
So, yes, it can be use to diminish in an unjust way acts and patterns of behavior in a silly and damaging way.
But it depends on the context.
Sometimes judgmental people expect something rather close to perfection, and using that phrase and staring at that person with one raised eyebrow - as in, you shoplifted when you were a teenager, so don't make it sound like my son should be put down because he did similar stuff.
Of course Mary could be yelling in an unreasonable fashion, but a response from Harry such as "nobody is perfect", literally adds nothing to the situation. Something actually productive to the situation could be a statement like, "Mary, why are you getting so upset over this specific issue? Is something else bothering you?"
I'm unclear as to what purpose it serves? I guess the main concern here is, this is assuming that the person on the opposing end of that statement, doesn't apparently know that perfect people don't exist. Do you think anybody on this planet believes that a perfect person exists?
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Absolute perfection is impossible. So pointing it out which be a red herring. Unless you're referring to 'never losing a match' as absolute perfection? In chess, I would label 'absolute perfection' as never making the wrong move within the chess board. It's like saying, an NBA achieved absolute perfection by never losing a game during the regular season. But I wouldn't call it perfection, unless they didn't miss a single shot, didn't allow the opponent make a single point, etc...
So, you're perfect. :up:
Quoting chatterbears
[quote=Matthew 5:48]You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.[/quote]
The phrase serves to concisely express a widely known and understood truth in order to save time and relate to the audience, not to make excuses for those who do evil.
It may, sometimes, be used in this way, but I hear it used in contexts that do not fit this criticism. I see it used in reaction to petty judgment that has nothing to do with mediocrity. Further The most amazing people make mistakes. In fact many of them make more mistakes than other people. To find new things: inventions, innovations, works of art - you have to make mistakes. If you do not make mistakes you are not taking risks and this will lead to mediocrity.
On the basis of no one being perfect. Whether we should forgive others or advise them to forgive themselves is difficult to decide simply because of the various different situations there are and each case being unique.
I think the usage in an artistic/academic sense is easier to decide on. We should strive for perfection and never tell ourselves or others that no one is perfect. It would be even better if we incorporate it into our moral fabrics but it would be too burdensome for mortals like us. I haven't seen people being disappointed in themselves for moral reasons. The sense of being guilty for all the good deeds that we didn't carry out is lost. As for great artists making a lot of mistakes, great artists and great intellectuals do not benefit from the standards we impose on ourselves. There is a saying that artists never finish their work, only abandon it. Once an artist accepts his work as being good enough, he fails to improve it.There is always room for improvement. We will benefit more by striving for perfection.
You really gave stupid examples, intent matters and context matters. You can't make a phrase sound bad by giving ludicrous examples of people using it to say absurd things like "forgive your rapist nobody is perfect" and whatnot lmao.
Yes, it can be used as an excuse for mediocrity, but recognising that nobody IS perfect can also be helpful as we aim for the possibility of perfection. The ultimate value of an effort is not always known at the outset, and sometimes a reminder that even those who are light years ahead of us are not perfect either is enough incentive to keep striving, and neither settle for mediocrity nor give up, nor for that matter, expect to achieve perfection alone. Each of us is imperfect in our own way - in my view it’s our collaboration that approaches perfection, not our individual efforts.
...but the one that really drives me nuts is, "Everybody is a sinner!"
You can make mistakes AND acknowledge that, without assuming you could have been perfect AND not accept it as it is. If you expect perfection now, in this moment, you won't allow yourself to take risks. Taking risks entails knowing that there will be failures. That doesn't mean you accept that you cannot make something incredible, it means you accept the fact that along the way you have to make mistakes. And inventors and scientists and artists have in many instances said that you have to make mistakes and not making them is a problem. This in no way stops one from striving for perfection. These are two separate things.
There is no context where "nobody's perfect" is useful or helpful. Unless you're talking to 5-year olds, who think that some people may indeed be perfect (such as their parents), grown people do not believe anybody is perfect. Therefore, staying that 'nobody's perfect' is a red herring. Things that are useful can be consistently used throughout any example, similar to a moral principle.
In this case, you're recognizing that it was an accident. "Nobody's perfect" in your example is similar to saying "Don't worry about it." - I think the saying is still a bit silly. Because it is almost implying that I claimed I am perfect, and you're somehow enlightening me by letting me know I am not, and neither is anyone else. I also don't like the indirectness of the saying itself. Rather than saying, "Nobody's perfect", why not say what you actually mean? In your example, you could just tell me, "It's ok, I value you more than my mug" - In other examples, for the most common use, people say "Nobody's perfect" when they defend a wrongdoer. In essence, what they are saying is, "It's ok that they did something wrong, because we all do wrong things. Therefore, he doesn't need to take responsibility for what he has done."
That actually might be a cultural thing. Where I'm from (the Netherlands) we use it mostly when someone is being too hard on themselves. So here it's most often used to say "stop complaining and cheer up". Or even more common is when the person complaining recognises it in themselves and tells themselves "nobody's perfect" to accept failure and move on.
Quoting chatterbears
That's absurd, you have quite a way of thinking about things. "Nobody's perfect" can mean different things based on the context, it absolutely never means "I'm disputing your position that you're perfect" except when perfection was actually claimed but I am genuinely amazed that you've taken it that way.
I do enjoy how you've tried to misrepresent the phrase as being a way of apologising for rapists and feeling as if since you did that there's no possible utility to the phrase anymore.
It's shorthand for "don't worry about it" pretty much, just a different way of saying something which is unambiguously fine to say. You probably know that but I won't try to speculate how this could be a problem for you, I don't want to.
Ofcourse you can acknowledge your mistakes while accepting the fact that no one is perfect but the motivation to improve it comes from the desire to be perfect. Unless an artist is considering sucide or contemplating destroying his art work, we shouldn't tell him that no one is perfect. I was told this only once in my life when l was complaining about being slow and stupid but l didn't even need it then. I believe that perfection is possible, especially in mathematics and science.
I believe perfection is attainable and there is nothing wrong with striving for it. This discussion shouldn't be really important cause we should not rely on other people's feedback and neither should they rely on ours. We know ourselves quite well. If someone wants to get the noble prize in physics then he better be at the top of his game, otherwise it would be a ridiculous goal. Perfection is actually quite visible in our world, the bridge that won't fall and the building which stands despite the earthquake are perfectly made. Moral perfection on the other hand is a different story...
Always
Going to be able
To
Be
Used
Wrong.
But if we start throwing away all phrases that can be used wrong
We are going to be walking around with a weird internal Big Brother
It would be ridiculous to ban the usage of the phrase or throw them in the memory holes. On a side note, we need to bring back Orwellian terms in politics now more than ever. Julian Assange is an another victim of the Big Brother . So F*** censorship.
I certainly agree that there is nothing wrong with striving for perfection, and that ‘perfectly achieved’ goals and aims are attainable, when considered within their limited context. A bridge that won’t fall or a building that succeeds in withstanding an earthquake can be considered ‘perfectly made’ for that limited purpose - but any claim that one has made a ‘perfect bridge’ or a ‘perfect building’ is false hubris, generally speaking. Being ‘at the top of one’s game’ sufficient for a Nobel prize in physics can be considered a ‘perfectly achieved’ goal within the context of current contenders, but it isn’t perfection, by any stretch.
I guess what I’m saying is that the concept of ‘perfection’ as you describe it is relative, not absolute. Which is fine - so long as you’re aware of the shortfall.
The phrase carries a lot of baggage. Similar to the definition of God. Nobody would ever say, "When I say I believe in God, I am referring to this coffee cup." - If they were to say that, they can. But they are grossly ignoring the how the word 'God' is actually defined and/or used. You can claim that when people say "Nobody's perfect", it has a plethora of meanings to it, but you're ignoring the most common use of the term and appealing to the rare situation. I've been alive for quite a while, and have known people from 20+ different countries, watched countless movies and shows, and I have never once heard someone use "Nobody's perfect" in a way you are talking about. They have only ever used it as a way to defend a person who is being criticized.
It's obvious that things can have different meanings, based on the context. But just as with the God example, sometimes it is a bit absurd to ignore how something or some phrase is used by almost everyone on the planet.
Quoting Judaka
I've actually talked to Christians and other people who have said this very thing for murders and rapists. That nobody's perfect, and we shouldn't judge them, etc... The phrase doesn't have utility in the way you want it to. Just like the term 'God' doesn't have utility when I define 'God' as my coffee cup. I could use it that way if I want to, but it doesn't make much sense does it.
Where are you from? I talk to friends on a regular basis from all over the world. Netherlands, Norway, UK, Argentina, Denmark, Sweden, Canada, etc.... I've never heard anyone use the term this way. And as I said in a previous comment, I've watch plenty of movies/shows, and not even in the fictional character world, have I heard an actor/actress use the term 'Nobody's perfect', in any other way than defending someone.
Here's the Merriam Webster's example sentence: Yes, you made a mistake, but it's okay; nobody's perfect.
That's how I hear it often. The shift to monologue might be peculair with my surroundings, I don't know. Or me projecting this on others. Don't know. In any case, the first version definitely seems to be in use also in the English speaking world.
Oxford: Well I'm sorry—but nobody's perfect (= used when someone has criticized you).
This is much closer to how you seem to hear it regularly. I suspect we'd sooner tell someone to fuck off in the Netherlands than say we're sorry, which might be why this doesn't strike me as common usage.