Hollowed

I was reading yet another article where the author focused on what they called an "empty promise." The term "empty promise" is a common one, referring not simply to a commitment (real or implied) that someone does not believe will be kept, but one that should, as a matter of morality or ethics, be kept. Of course, there is also a matter of relative importance. Most divorces, after all, render the vows the couple took "empty promises," yet that generally doesn't rise to the level of the common usage of the term.

The definition creates a contrast with a fulfilled promise, and that's the way many people typically understand it. A "promise" becomes "empty" once it becomes clear to someone that the perceived commitment that underlies it will not be kept.

But maybe it's more accurate to see all promises as empty at the start. Fulfilling a commitment is never as simple as making it. After all, talk is cheap, right? Rather than starting from a presumption that every promise made can be carried out, it may be better to evaluate what it would realistically take to do so; and therefore if people are being requested to make commitments that it's unreasonable to believe will be carried out.

A lot of promises remain "empty" simply by virtue of the fact that the party making the promise is not the party responsible, or empowered, to fulfill the promise. And it's easy to sign others up for things that it's unrealistic to ask of them.

Treating all promises as empty at the start, as something to to be filled, may help to drive an understanding of just what it being committed to, and who is being called upon to make that commitment. Which may not result in more promises being honored, but it might result in people counting on fewer of them. Which is useful enough, in its own way.