Confession. I don't understand a very common phrase even after googling...

[OverthinkingOlive]

Oxymoron. I don't get it? Please can somebody explain? I'm in a professional role and I own a house but for fuck sake I just don't get it.

A nice nightmare? Is that the kind of thing it means?

It’s down to the actual language used being contradictory to the meaning of the statement. Oxymorons juxtapose opposing words next to one another, but retain the ability to make sense. For example, sweet sorrow, awfully good, deafening silence. The literal meaning of oxymoron is ‘sharp and dull’.

Most people are giving you the wrong information
oxymoron: two words that are directly opposite- pretty ugly for example

juxtaposition: two contrasting words or ideas- love and death for example.

That's a paradox, not an oxymoron.

Why would you think that?

Apparently, it is a comical oxymoron.

Colossal finesse

Silence can actually be deafening as in when a comedian cracks a joke and no one laughs. So I'd argue that's not the best oxymoron!

Never thought like that about jumbo shrimp before 😂

I'm having flashbacks of 'happy funerals' which I think is Phillip Larkin.

Silence does not cause deafness.

I really don't see that; because it is perfectly possible not to like yourself. It might be a weak paradox, but not an oxymoron.

Think he also gave us 'come friendly bombs and drop on Slough' but that was before the Mars Bar was invented.

I think it makes it an even better oxymoron because the opposite of what is happening appears to be happening. Silence being so unbearable in that context.

Pure evil
small crowd

I don't think anyone was making a dig (which funnily enough, my phone just autocorrected to dog 😂). I think they were trying to make a joke about it being impossible not to like dogs. It wasn't an oxymoron though.

Old news
Living Dead
Silent scream
Britain’s Got Talent 😁 (Paul Merton old joke, still makes me smile)

Fun run.

In school the examples I remember most were little giant and kind monster if that helps?

I’d assume the oxymoron in relation to the dog is saying people can’t not like dogs as opposed to anything mean!!!!

English is so hard! I am amazed at how people can learn it as adults. Blows my mind really.

It’s only after having dc that I appreciated the above. Trying to explain to them why some words are spelt the same but pronounced differently or why a word sounds the same but is spelt differently is hard work as I can’t answer their questions of “why?” 😆😆

Neither does sound, most of the time.

Genetic illnesses, infections, burst eardrums may do.

I don’t think pretty ugly counts though. In this context pretty is meaning ‘rather’ or ‘quite’ instead of ‘beautiful’.

Terribly happy

Posted too soon! I remember being taught 'terribly happy' as an oxymoron at school.

Terrible = bad
Happy = good

So it's a contradictory phrase, also known as an oxymoron.

Fun run

as obviously it can't be 'fun' if someone is making you 'run'

I think it still counts as an oxymoron though the same as the above example, terribly happy. As a phrase it works but the words mean the opposite of each other.