Misery Loves Company

Not sure of the origin of this phrase.

The phrase seems to indicate that if I am really unhappy and you are really unhappy, then we would love to get together.

This seems highly unlikely.

The phrase is commonly used to refer to situations where people get together and vent.

Are they really enjoying each others company? Probably not.

After venting with you, if they had their preference, they would then be able to immediately find someone else they could vent with about you.

What is probably really going on is that people like to vent, a lot. And, people probably feel more comfortable venting in a collaboration.

Perhaps this is really, PairedVenting?

Cheers, -- JasonNocks

This misunderstands the meaning of the phrase. Actually, it means that when person A is unhappy, they don't get satisfaction from other people being happy and cheerful, in fact that can be annoying. Instead, unhappy person A may take a certain dismal pleasure in someone else experiencing a misfortune, especially a similar one.

It's a form of schadenfreude.

Example: Bob is running a race, and is winning, although Joe is just a step behind him. But Bob falls down and loses the race, and is extremely unhappy - until he notices that Joe fell down, too, and then Bob cheers up, because misery loves company.

It's not that the person enjoys the company of other miserable people, it's that the abstract state of misery enjoys the company of its own kind - more misery.

There's a name for that kind of metaphor but it slips my mind.

''Perhaps this is the inversion of the "HowDoesThatMakeYouFeel" annoyance. People in misery don't want to be told to cheer up. They don't mind being cheered up, but the last thing they want is it "put on a happy face" while denying the source of the original misery"

Another interpretation. If I am miserable, I am more prone to mistakes. And these bring more misery. -- dl

This was actually intended to have a bit of a TongueInCheek? aspect to it. I do think the second definition above is the more correct definition, but I think it's also used (misused) as in the first. It's definitely become a TriteExpression?. Cheers, -- JasonNocks