I've watched nearly every season of The Biggest Loser (from several countries) and I'm pretty sure "It is what it is" has been said at least once in every season. Every time I hear it, I roll my eyes so far that I can see the inside of my head.
A friend of mine has a brother with severe and scary mental illness--the kind with a violent streak. He told me that every psychologist, social worker, etc. says, "It is what it is." It is a useless and grammatically puzzling phrase. "It is what it is" comes awfully close to "Que sera, sera." The movie, The Man Who Knew Too Much, is inadvertently hilarious. "Ambrose Chapel isn't a person; it's a place!" It's worth watching just for the absurd melodrama and holes in the plot. I never quite figured out why Lucy and Edward Drayton were involved in political assassination attempts. I get frustrated by the misuse of "To thine own self be true." Although I like the concept of being authentic and self-actualised, it is a misquote. Polonius is really telling Hamlet to only act in his own best interest, and to ignore the needs of others. Polonius is supposed to be kind of a moron, so it wouldn't be so wise to heed his advise anyway. I really hate, "And this too shall pass." There are so many more eloquent and sensitive ways of saying, "I know that this is a difficult, but it will get easier over time." "By and large" never made any sense to me either. What is that supposed to mean? My mother, an English professor, used to give an entire lecture on "reason being..." I've been more annoyed lately with "organically." As in, "this needs to happen organically." Although it is reasonable, grammatically correct, it just sounds overused. If I feel like it, I'll just launch in to a whole string of catchphrases. "From a 36,000 feet view, I think we're looking a more evergreen solution for our stakeholders."
That's so funny … you gotta love Hitchcock for his cheesy camp film making. A bit like "holistically" … we take a holistic approach to our … "mission statement.." "blue sky scenario.." "the government will not pass that Bill anytime soon" egads.. don't get me started - It is what it is - I think I'm gonna puke… :eek:
I abhor "it is what it is." A very confusing and empty tautology is what *that* is. You're right, Greatwhale, it usually expresses some kind of resignation in the face of something we either can't or are unwilling to change. But ultimately it tells us nothing about the true subject of the matter, only about the attitude of the speaker toward it. "It is what it is." "Well, what *IS* it, then?" is usually my knee jerk response.
television has a tremendous impact on the popular vocabulary, both the shows and the commercials (where's the beef?). I was on a ship in the Persian Gulf for a year that rotated out 1/12th of the crew every month. After about six months, we started noticing that new people were using expressions that we never heard before, and it seemed to be a natural part of their vocabulary. We finally figured out that it was coming from commercials that we had never seen. But it was solidly rooted in their speech. And when you think about advertising, the point is to create some catchy phrase and then keep repeating it in a variety of contexts so that it gets burned into people's brains. Here's a site that gives origins of expressions. the link is specifically for "it is what it is," but has a search box you can use for other phrases. BTW, it says that phrase has been around at least since 1949. Sorry, but it is what it is... Who Coined the Phrase "It Is What It Is"? :icon_bigg