Such as “money can’t buy happiness” or “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. Generally a false adage or something like that. All I could think of was “fallacious bumper sticker” which just sounds stupid.
‘An old wives tale’
Not all wives tales are false. Most are, but not all.
“Blood is thicker than water.”
Usually said to convince someone that you should be there to help family regardless of what that family did to you. Unfortunately the full saying is “The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb”, meaning the ties you form with friends can be stronger than the family you you born into.
The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb
So, I looked into that because I was wondering where it came from, and I can’t find any references to that ever being used like that. As far as can find in the references on Wikipedia, that saying has meant something like “family is closer than friends” for at least 800 years.
Similarly, “great minds think alike” also got a “but fools seldom differ” addendum very recently that some people like to claim was part of the original saying.
This is probably not true. The concept of this phrase but referring to family is probably a modern confusion. There is no clear evidence it means it was really referencing ties to friends. Although I wish it did. Here’s some further reading from others also looking for a clearer reference.
Most of those old sayings have had the rejoinder omitted, which completely shifted their original meaning, in fact. For example, “Great minds think alike” originally closed with “but rarely do they differ”, etc.
“Fallacy” works. These are also adages, clichés, platitudes and folk wisdom, but neither really means “falsehood” per se. However, many of them just rationalize whatever: the money one is factually incorrect and exemplifies “sour grapes”, silver linings is not a bad idea but also not necessarily true, any number of things will not kill you but make you wish they had, etc.
These fall under the category of “Half-baked Idea”. This includes any idea that obviously hasn’t been thought all the way through. Half-baked ideas can range from the absurd (e.g. “The Earth is flat.”), to the benignly optimistic (e.g. “Everything works out for the best.”)
For example someone says “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” and you might say “that’s a questionable phrase.” or “I doubt the validity of that platitude”. But is there something specific to label it as, i.e. “That’s a [insert word]”
If you’re not trying to be polite, “That’s bullshit” works perfectly.
“Myth” is a word I’d end that sentence with.
Misconception?
Colbert’s “truthiness” comes to mind
“Canard” is the term, as another commented. 🤙🏼
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A proverb.
Because your examples are actual proverbs, that might be considered true or not, depending on who says it when.
I dunno. Something being a proverb doesn’t make it inherently false, which is what we’re trying to define I guess
The examples OP provided are not inherently false because they are proverbs.
A Canard (French for duck) refers to something often believed to be true but isn’t.
The origin of this expression is because the French do not believe that Quebec is real.
Tabernac.
It’s ducks all the way down.
🇲🇶🦆💬"Ouai"
L’honk
Honque*
I like Fallacious Bumper Sticker! I’m absolutely using that going forward. It’s better than Pithy Folk Ignorance that I used to use.
I dunno, I kinda like Pithy Folk Ignorance.
Platitude
ish
“Decimate” =/= “devastate”, but common misuse becomes common use, so here we are. 🤦♂️
Language is fun like that. Kinda like how ‘literally’ can, and often does, mean ‘figuratively’, which has the opposite meaning.
It annoys me that people keep saying “figuratively” is what they mean instead of “literally”. “Figuratively” may be the opposite, and technically correct, but the use of the word “literally” in this way is to strengthen a statement. A more appropriate correction would be “actually” or “seriously”, which holds the intended meaning. “Figuratively” is the last thing it should be replaced with.
The meaning of a word doesn’t change just because you use it incorrectly.
It does if lots of people use it incorrectly
That is literally how language works. Words only mean what we mean when we say them.
Common nonsense
I’ll call it that way.
Bullshitism.
Bollocks.
Baloney
In the actual deep south we say “fruta”, “frula”, “saraza”
Adage
How has nobody said this yet? Some guy actually said idiom.
