Bless His Heart...

Do you know something that I've noticed that has really been getting on my nerves lately?

It's people using the phrase above; "bless his heart?"

I've been talking to chaps lately and they've chucked the BHH thing into the conversation. At first thought it's as innocuous as one can imagine, a little inoffensive, probably even nice and complimentary, three words.

But something about the use of it, on all these recent occasions, nagged deeply inside me. So much so that I devoted some thinking time to it to try to figure out why.

I realised why this has come about. This little trio of words is a farce, a trojan horse of a phrase, a cunning way of disguising an insult as a compliment.

Why am I saying all of this?

Well it's used when people want to assert their superiority and patronise someone else. They use it as if they're talking about a dog or a small child, wrapped in a bundle of smelling like a compliment.

One person was telling me about a driver recently, of how helpful he had been and how good he was. All very nice I hear you think. But then the person came to narrate details of a specific incident and said:

"And L, bless his heart, was very protective"

The implication, in a very indirect way, was that L knew no better, that he was like a faithful dog following his master off the edge of a cliff.

Another friend was talking about his child and used BHH in that context. And that's when people use it; when they want to portray the person as childish or pet like.

That's why it's my current bone of contention.

Just saying like.

Bless my heart.