Dictionary

screen door on a submarine en · NOUN

Etymology

A screen door on a submarine would be absurd as it would allow the vessel to fill with water.

Meanings

1. (idiomatic) Something that is useless or absurd.
   • But realists put the final number of jobs saved through privatisation at no more than 800. "It's about as useful to us as a screen door on a submarine," says an angry mayor's office in Sacramento . 1995, The Economist, volume 336, numbers 7921-7925, Economist Newspaper Limited:
   • I doubt anybody would give you static about unloaded and stored long guns anywhere in U.S. waters, and few places would about handguns (although unloaded guns are as useful as a screen door on a submarine).” 2005 July, Rich Beattie, “Trigger Happy”, in Boating, volume 78, number 7, →ISSN, page 123:
   • If you don't know what security vulnerabilities look like at the code level, then having the source code is just as useful as a screen door on a submarine from a security perspective. 2016, Rocky Heckman, Designing Platform Independent Mobile Apps and Services, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN:

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