I was thinking about the phrase ‘The pot calling the kettle black’. It comes from a time where cooking was done over open fires and cookware would become visibly ashy. (Fun fact: It first appears and was perhaps coined by Cervantes in Don Quixote!)
What are some other idioms that have lost their literal connection to time? What would be a good modern replacement?
“One bad apple will spoil the whole barrel” desperately needs to be replaced because nobody has experience with storing apples in barrels so when Michael Jackson subverted it they took it unironically and now many people think it means the opposite.
I’m not techy but something about one line of bad code can jank the whole program?
“A bad link breaks the chain” maybe. Or “one bug causes an infestation” for the idea that you can’t just solve the initial problem once it gets bad, it spreads if not dealth with
Maybe if we just apply “you find one cockroach, there’s a million in the walls” to the same problems like bent police and corrupt politicians…