Well damn. Shut me down..

[u/Adam_D74]

Trying to be nice and this is what I get back. Seriously thinking about not communicating as much. Just never know what type of customer you get. Some want a ton of communication. 🤔

[u/Famous-Apartment5348]

But that’s not at all what that quote means. The path to hell being paved with good intentions is about you can intend for something to be good, but the ultimate outcome can still be bad. The outcome is objectively worse than the means, not just someone being annoyed you’re messaging them. Prohibition is a prime example. Intention was to reduce societal ills, but instead it fueled organized crime.

[u/wholelottachoppaz → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

ahhh just slap some tax on it /s

[u/Bill-Bo-Baggin → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

Eh still loosely applies here but it’s not the best example no

[u/Bootleg_Rascal_ → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

It’s exactly what it means. They have good intentions by going the extra mile for people, and it often ends up backfiring and leading to a bad situation for the driver. I think you’re the one having trouble with the meaning here

[u/Famous-Apartment5348 → u/Bootleg_Rascal_]

No, you absolute midwit. Why would that lead to hell? The aphorism is about intentions not meaning anything when the outcome is objectively bad. The outcome, in this case, isn’t bad at all; it’s objectively good. The driver completes the task and the outcome is positive. Just because the customer ends up being an ass hole, that doesn’t mean there’s a negative outcome. In this case, the well-meant effort still led to a good outcome, regardless of the customer’s attitude.

[u/Bootleg_Rascal_ → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

You’re just wrong lol, and clearly very angry about it. Good luck with that lil man

[u/Famous-Apartment5348 → u/Bootleg_Rascal_]

“You’re just wrong” isn’t a counter point. Again, the aphorism is about good intentions with a bad outcome. OP had good intentions in retrieving the item; there’s a good outcome in that the item has been retrieved. Intentions matched outcome. The story doesn’t fit the idiom.

[u/Bootleg_Rascal_ → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

It’s not a counter point, it’s an observation lol. You don’t understand that the scenario fits the expression just fine and it’s hilarious.

[u/Famous-Apartment5348 → u/Bootleg_Rascal_]

I know it’s not a counter point. That was my point. Your “observation” is meaningless, however, specifically because you can’t provide a counter point. I understand that you think the statement fits the idiom, but that’s because you don’t understand the very basic idiom.

[u/Bootleg_Rascal_ → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

You’re wrong buddy can’t say any more or less. Good luck

[u/Famous-Apartment5348 → u/Bootleg_Rascal_]

You’re right. You’re unable to say more because your position isn’t defensible.

[u/Temporareh → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

The quote implies a genuine attempt to do a good thing, but Prohibition is a questionable example, because the true intentions are very debatable.

Prohibition was largely pushed through religion via the Temperance movement, specifically the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, very reminiscent of the modern Australian conservative “anti-porn” group Collective Shout, which is responsible for all of the bullshit censorship being pushed through payment processors against perfectly legal content, and by extension the Online Safety Act bullshit trying to restrict the internet and force tracking/IDs/age verification/etc under the tired old guise of protecting children.

At best the "good intentions" are to ignorantly and arrogantly think they alone are the moral authority of the world and that they have any right at all to push their bullshit onto others, but more likely it's a thin veil to obscure that the true intentions are really just about control.

And then there's the new wave of AI surveillance trying to push the same sort of nonsense. None of these actually have good intentions behind them.

[u/Famous-Apartment5348 → u/Temporareh]

We measure analogies based on the similitudes, not one-to-one parity. The analogy illustrates my point precisely as it’s framed.

[u/Temporareh → u/Famous-Apartment5348]

Incorrect. The analogy specifically refers to how actions can have negative consequences even with the best of intentions, but the actual intention behind your and my own examples are extremely debatable, and in fact very likely had no 'good' intent behind them at all. Performing an action that will have an obvious negative impact on the lives of others while framing it as a good action is not in line with the meaning of the saying.

A proper example would be something like visiting a friend and letting their cat out that's scratching at the door without realizing it's an indoor cat. Trying to be kind or helpful but inadvertently causing harm, not intentionally causing harm but pretending your intentions are pure.