Dumbass Sayings: “I Wouldn’t Be Caught Dead Wearing That”

Sometimes a person will come up to you when you’re wearing your Dale Earnhardt Jr. NASCAR replica jumpsuit and say “Yuck, I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing that!” What does this even mean? This is a very puzzling sentence. You wouldn’t be caught dead wearing that? Well first off, who is ever caught dead? Caught dead doing what? If you’re dead then that means you stopped whatever you were doing. Caught is an action word. You can’t catch a corpse unless it’s falling out of a window. I will assume being “caught dead” means being “seen dead.” Does it mean the clothing looks so bad you wouldn’t want people to see you wearing it even if you were dead and you could no longer experience shame? So basically you’re saying “I wouldn’t want to wear that on my death bed.” How is that even an insult? Wear whatever you want on your deathbed. Though to be honest I don’t think fashion is a top concern at that point. See, I could be caught dead in anything and I wouldn’t care. I could be wearing a pink thong and leg warmers, I’m dead. It doesn’t matter. This saying should be “If I wore that I would die of shame.” That makes a little more sense, it’s still stupid, but at least it’s not as convoluted a saying.

Bulletproof vests are the clothing item people are least likely to get caught dead in.