Led by the nose? 被牵着鼻子走

Reader question:

Please explain “led by the nose” in this quote: “I’m new to this game and need to be led by the nose.”

My comments:

This is just the speaker admitting to the fact that he or she isn’t familiar with this game (a computer game?) and need to be told exactly what to do.

The speaker is being honest, I think. They don’t mean for you or anyone else to really lead them by the nose, as if they were an ass or a cow.

An ass or donkey may be too dumb or stubborn not to be led by the nose; the cow may be too docile or too lazy for its owner not to do so – lead them around by the nose. But a human won’t want to be led by the nose.

Not for too long at any rate.

Initially the speaker may want to be told exactly what to do, step by step, but over the long haul, I mean later on after they’re familiar with all the moves, they’ll prefer to do everything by themselves. Sooner or later, they’ll quit wanting to hear orders or directions.

Sooner rather than later.

That’s because, you see, being led by the nose is not something anyone would like if they have a choice. Being led by the nose, you see, originally alludes to an animal, an ass or a cow, being led by a string passed through its nostrils.

Ouch!

Exactly. I feel your pain, too.

Well, leading animals by the nose has its advantages, obviously. It prevents them from going astray, so to speak, and makes them concentrate on the task at hand, so on and so forth.

But, metaphorically, if a human is led by the nose, it has a few unwelcome or unpleasant or at any rate negative connotations. If you allow yourself to be led by the nose, for example, then you probably are greatly lacking in initiative. Or perhaps you’ve been forced into this position – a position where you’re compelled to do as told and you’re powerless to fight back.

In our example, happily, the speaker just wants to be told of the moves in a step by step fashion and asks for patience as they pick things up carefully and slowly.

Anyways, here are a few examples of leading or being led by the nose in the media:

1. Polish President Andrzej Duda said after meeting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Tuesday (17 October) that he backed Turkey’s aspirations for joining the European Union.

Erdoğan, who was on a visit to Warsaw, called on Brussels to make clear declarations whether or not the EU wants Turkey to join the community.

Poland is the first EU member state to host the Turkish leader after the unsuccessful coup attempt in Turkey last July.

Duda expressed hopes that the paths of Turkey and the EU “will continue to strive in the same direction”, which in the end will lead to “a full membership in the EU”. “Poland has continued to support Turkey’s efforts to join the European Union, as Turkey has had these aspirations for many years now,” he said.

As the president said, Poland backs Turkey’s European aspirations because the country “has been running for this membership for a long time” [the first official request was issued in 1963] and it is “a crucial partner of the European Union when it comes to European security”.

“I don’t think it needs to be explained to anyone what important role Turkey plays today when it comes to its geopolitical location or its potential – both economically and militarily,” Duda told reporters.

Both presidents agreed that Ukraine has to restore its territorial integrity and Russian aggression on Ukraine must come to an end. Duda added that he also counts on Turkey when it comes to strengthening the Eastern flank of NATO.

The Turkish president complained that Turkey’s accession process “has been pending since 1963”.

“I would honestly like to hear a clear declaration: let us not delude each other, stop leading us by the nose,” he appealed. “If you want to take Turkey into the European Union, just tell us, do it. When you do not want it, tell us,” he added.

- Erdogan in Warsaw tells EU: Stop leading us by the nose, Euractiv.com, October 19, 2017.

2. It’s not exactly a news flash at this point that Donald Trump isn’t very fluent on questions of public policy, but his interview over the weekend with Fox Business Channel’s Maria Bartiromo is really a sobering reminder of the levels of ignorance and dishonesty that the country is dealing with.

Bartiromo is an extraordinarily soft interviewer who doesn’t ask Trump any difficult questions or press him on any subject. That makes the extent to which he manages to flub the interview all the more striking. He’s simply incapable of discussing any topic at any length in anything remotely resembling an informed or coherent way. He says the Federal Reserve is “important psychotically” and it’s part of one of his better answers, since one can at least tell that he meant to say “psychologically.”

By contrast, it’s often hard to make any sense at all of Trump’s words. Asked whether he plans to tie an infrastructure plan to his tax plan, Trump says, “I was thinking about tying it, but there’s too many honestly.” Too many what? He then continues: “You lose a few votes, you gain a few votes. I don’t want to take any chances ’cause I feel we have the votes right now the way it is.” There is, of course, no tax bill at the moment, so there’s no way Trump has the votes for it.

It’s a funny interview in many ways. Along with being comically ignorant, Trump for some reason keeps referring to Chief of Staff John Kelly as “elegant.” But the prospect of a president of the United States who’s incapable of talking about any of the many issues he oversees in a reasonable way is also pretty scary.

...

Another signature quality of the interview is that since Trump is actually totally incapable of answering softball questions, Bartiromo has to try to lead him by the nose to delivering on-message propaganda. Trump, however, is not that cooperative with this agenda.

Cutting taxes on the rich, for example, is unpopular. So the White House’s plan to get tax cuts on the rich passed is to lie about it and pretend they’re actually proposing a big middle-class tax cut. Bartiromo tries to get Trump to say that, but he keeps getting distracted by his desire to tell a name-dropping story about the owner of the New England Patriots:

BARTIROMO: If the top earners pay 80 percent of the taxes, why are you so afraid to cut taxes on the top earners?

TRUMP: I think this, look, you know, I am very happy with the way I’ve done part of this in my civilian life, all right.

BARTIROMO: Of course. This is not about —

TRUMP: Other people — well, it’s about me representing rich people.

BARTIROMO: Okay.

TRUMP: Representing — being representative of rich people. Very interesting to me Bob Kraft was down. He was very nice. He owns the Patriots. He gave me a Super Bowl ring a month ago. And he —

BARTIROMO: Well, Putin took his —

TRUMP: Which was very nice. That’s right. But he left this beautiful ring, and I immediately give it to the White House and they put it some place, and that’s the way it is.

BARTIROMO: That’s great.

TRUMP: He said to me — he’s a good man. He said to me you have to do us all a favor, give the tax decrease to the middle class, we don’t need it. We don’t need it. We don’t want it. Give it to the middle class. And, I’ve had many people, very wealthy people, tell me the very same thing. I’ve had very few say I want more, I want more.
Then Trump meanders off message and admits that what he’s really backing is a huge tax cut for rich business owners:

TRUMP: So that’s a big factor, but we have so many things that are going to be so great; bringing the corporate tax down maybe is the most important. And we have a lot of most important, but bringing it down from 35 down to 20 percent, that’s a massive — that’s the biggest that we’ve ever done.

BARTIROMO: It’s a big deal in the corporate rate for sure.

TRUMP: That’s a big deal for companies; that’s a big deal for investment. I think one of the other ones is expensing, you know when you write something off in one year as opposed to, you know, over many years, I think that’s going to be tremendous.

- Trump’s latest big interview is both funny and terrifying, Vox.com, October 23, 2017.

3. A HEARTBROKEN Theresa May today dramatically announced her plans to step down as prime minister.

Fighting back tears, she said that it had been ‘the honour of my life’ to hold the office and that she had ‘done my best’ when it came to Brexit in an address in Downing Street.

Mrs May will stay on as prime minister for now, but step down as Conservative leader on 7 June with a party leadership contest due to begin the following week. A new prime minister could be in place by the end of July.

In Guernsey, business and political leaders expressed hope that a new prime minister might be able to break the Brexit deadlock that has paralysed the UK parliament and government.

Deputy Chris Green said: ‘I do have some sympathy for Theresa May. She inherited a poison chalice. Rather like the previous three Conservative prime ministers - Thatcher, Major and Cameron - her administration has been destroyed by the issue of Europe, which is such a toxic brew for the Conservatives.

‘I believe that Guernsey's best interests require a proper deal to be struck between the UK and the EU, but unfortunately the prospects of that might seem bleak unless the next PM is prepared to compromise with opponents in the UK parliament, and not just be led by the nose by the extreme right of their own party.’

He added: ‘I can't see that a No Deal Brexit would be good for Guernsey, particularly in the short to medium term.’

Paul Smith, chair of the Guernsey branch of ICSA: The Governance Institute, said: ‘I think she got herself stuck and couldn’t get a way out and nobody would actually accept what she was saying anymore.

‘So it needed a clean break. So I would view it positively as moving Brexit forward. This is probably the least worst option to get Brexit sorted and obviously getting Brexit sorted will be good for Guernsey.’

- Theresa May resignation: Guernsey reaction, GuernseyPress.com, May 24, 2019.

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About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

（作者：张欣 编辑：丹妮）