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Futility
(See also EXTRANEOUSNESS.)
bark at the moon To labor or protest in vain; to choose an ineffectual means to achieve a desired end, or to attempt the impossible, thereby making any effort futile by definition; also often bay at the moon. The phrase refers to the common practice of dogs to bay at the moon, as if to frighten or provoke it. Connotations of the foolishness of barking at the moon, based on the disparity between the earthly dog and the mystical moon, are carried over into the figurative usage, as if to imply that barking at the moon is like banging one’s head against the wall.
beat one’s head against the wall To attempt an impossible task to one’s own detriment; to vainly oppose an unyielding force; also to hit, knock, or bang one’s head against the wall, often a stone wall. The allusion is to the futility and frustration, not to mention injury, caused by such an action.
beat the air To strike out at nothing, to labor or talk idly or to no purpose; to shadowbox. The phrase may well derive directly from the last definition, as suggested by its use in the King James Version of the New Testament:
I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air. (I Corinthians 9:26)
the blind leading the blind Ignorance on the part of both leaders and followers; lack of guidance and direction resulting in certain failure; futility. The phrase is of Biblical origin. Speaking of the Pharisees, Jesus says:
They be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch. (Matthew 15:14)
The expression is also the title of a famous painting by Pieter Breughel the Elder (156
.
cast stones against the wind To labor in vain; to work without accomplishing anything.
I see I swim against the stream, I kick against a goad, I cast a stone against the wind. (Grange, Golden Aphrodite, 1577)
cry for the moon To desire the unattainable or the impossible, to want what is wholly beyond one’s reach; also to ask or wish for the moon. Although some sources conjecture that this expression comes from children crying for the moon to play with, that theory seems a bit forced. The moon has long typified a place impossible to reach or object impossible to obtain, and was so used by Shakespeare in Henry VI, Part II (1593):
And dogged York, that reaches at the moon,
Whose overweening arm I have plucked back. (III, i)
A similar French expression is vouloir prendre la lune avec les dents ‘to want to take the moon between one’s teeth.’