The idiom “don’t yell fire in a crowded theory” only applies when there is no fire.
It’s usually brought up in free speech arguments, and the question is if triggering a panic which could kill people by causing them to be trampled underfoot (from back in the day when people actually responded appropriately to the risk of fire which we have since lost in the days of fire codes and controls) in the absence of an actual fire is a free speech right.
Traditionally yes. It has taken on new meaning over time. I’ve had many conversations with all sorts of people high and low where the double-entendre is clear if not explicit.
Edit: I should add that its within the context of corporate, civil and military disaster management planning. The public remains largely unaware, ignorant while many insiders throughout various institutions know how bad and how quickly things can get. Those who know often want to make their moves, before the public catches on, therefore like to muddy the message.
Classic example are investors talking their book. By the time you read about an opportunity in the G&M, FT etc, the insiders have already made the trades and the public is now their exit strategy.
In the UK, in the context of climate change, look up LifeBoat Ethics. You’ll see where this new usage of an old idiom is going.
That, too, but I was thinking of a story about a country where people live a thousand years and nobody can understand the seniors because their language is aniquated and they can’t understand younger generations.
He doesn’t want to yell “Fire!” in a crowded theatre.
He’s not. He’s the one locking the doors when there actually is a fire.
Sorry. There are two possible meanings for the idiom “don’t yell fire in a crowded theatre”:
The benevolent is to avoid a crowd’s panic. The selfish is to make your exit first, before the crowd’s panic.
I’m not close enough to British politics to say one way or another. But the idiom fits either way.
Incidentally the trope of people panicking and causing more mayhem is false.
The idiom “don’t yell fire in a crowded theory” only applies when there is no fire.
It’s usually brought up in free speech arguments, and the question is if triggering a panic which could kill people by causing them to be trampled underfoot (from back in the day when people actually responded appropriately to the risk of fire which we have since lost in the days of fire codes and controls) in the absence of an actual fire is a free speech right.
Traditionally yes. It has taken on new meaning over time. I’ve had many conversations with all sorts of people high and low where the double-entendre is clear if not explicit.
Edit: I should add that its within the context of corporate, civil and military disaster management planning. The public remains largely unaware, ignorant while many insiders throughout various institutions know how bad and how quickly things can get. Those who know often want to make their moves, before the public catches on, therefore like to muddy the message.
Classic example are investors talking their book. By the time you read about an opportunity in the G&M, FT etc, the insiders have already made the trades and the public is now their exit strategy.
In the UK, in the context of climate change, look up LifeBoat Ethics. You’ll see where this new usage of an old idiom is going.
I’m still absorbing literally to mean figuratively and continue to use adverbial forms. Jonathan Swift wrote a story about me.
Did he want rich people to eat you?
That, too, but I was thinking of a story about a country where people live a thousand years and nobody can understand the seniors because their language is aniquated and they can’t understand younger generations.
More like he doesn’t want to vindicate the people who’ve been screaming their lungs out for the last decades, while being victimized and brutalized.