It is what it is.

Shaun here.  So I’m driving home from work today at the coal mine, listening to sports talk on the radio (no, I couldn’t be studlier).  Then I hear it.  I get a cold chill like you get when someone scrapes a fork between their teeth.  I let it go.  Then it comes again, and again.  Now I can’t stop hearing it, and it’s driving me effing crazy.

“It is what it is.”

This statement had to have started from a coach or an athlete.  No one else would lack the ability to elaborate or expand on a topic. It’s saying something but meaning nothing. USA Today called this saying the best new cliche of 2004.  Seriously, USA Today actually monitors this stuff, which is scary in itself.  Now, this damn thing is everywhere. Yes, I heard it on….dear God….CNN.  Unbeleivable.  Now the idiot pandemic is here.  We all need shots ASAP.

“Coach, how do you explain the three game losing streak after starting the season so well?”

“It is what it is”

What is it?  And what does that mean?  Can we really be so stupid and lazy that this is acceptable?  There is no question to which this answer works, yet it can answer almost anything badly.  If anyone asks you anything in any way difficult, it’s there for you like a fast-food vocabulary.

“You, in the back row.  How does this economic theory relate to post-Cold War Russia?” 

“Well, professor…….it is what it is.”

This thing must be stopped before it invariably spreads and expands to other conversation-fillers.  I don’t know what the answer is, but it ain’t ‘it is what it is’.  If you use it, stop.  If you don’t, I guarantee you hear it soon.  Then you’ll shiver too.