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many here would be making excuses

Tell me why that isn't just simply insulting. There is no definition of the phrase "making excuses" that paints it as anything but a put-down. Why then is using it anything more that just being openly dismissive of a view you do not hold.

Here. Let me illustrate.

What would be a positive spin on using that term that wouldn't simply be making excuses.

This is honestly not an attack. I am trying to reason with you about something. One fair poster to another.

I won't go into a full response because the thread I did so earlier today was deleted. I don't why but see no good that can come from rehashing a subject that may have already been shut down.

Suffice it to say that I have a completely different assessment of the meaning of the word "excuse."

I don't think it was shut down because of your post.

And, you didn't use the word "excuse." Which in fact has several differ usages, meaning different things. (Meaning comes as much from context as the dictionary...so "may I be excused" is not the same as "that;s a lame excuse." ) Either way you used the phrase "making excuses." That's always a pejorative, and is always an accusation that the other party is whitewashing or rationalizing. Let's put it this way. You are never going to submit a document at work titled "reasons for promoting bill" and then change the title to "making excuses for promoting bill." That's just obvious.


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I disagree that the phrase "making excuses" is always a pejorative. And I disagree that the concept of rationalizing itself is always a negative thing or that saying someone is rationalizing is always insulting. IMO, it is no more insulting to say someone is rationalizing than it is for someone to say or imply that the other party is not seeing something clearly. And that happens all the time.

Suffice it to say that we have completely different opinions on the meanings of those terms.

Not seeing something clearly is lacking information.

Making excuses is a deliberately motivated evasion. It's covering up. Because it involves motives it aims at the person and their integrity.

Try and come up with an example of that phrase where it comes across as neutral or benign.

So for example in this exchange, each is trying to argue the other doesn't see something clearly.

Neither of us is accusing the other of covering something up or dodging the truth. Evading responsibility, or trying to weasel out of something. You would never use it as praise. You would never say, "Gurley was just making excuses for his great 39 catch and run." That wouldn't even make sense. You could say he was making excuses for the fumble---but only in a situation where you felt he wasn't owning up to it, or blaming someone else for his own action. (Which of course isnt' what really happened.)

Which is the meaning of a phrase like "using injuries to make excuses for a loss." It means you should know better and are doing it anyway. It;s a dismissive response to an alternative argument.