Very much so. The fascination to me with metaphor is that it's
analogy but more: it can take something out of one set and apply
it to another set that's really not related at all, just by
*similarity* - and it can be the most tenuous similarity... and
the metaphor is *so convincing*, even when the relationship is
atrocious when brought beyond a basic similarity. My favorite
(least) example is that of comparing groups of people to
infections in the body. What things have been justified by that
metaphorical comparison! Such atrocities against humanity
because people were metaphorically compared to cancers and
infections that needed to be cleansed, surgically removed,
irradiated, ... [insert medical procedures used to combat such
things... which become bombs, guns, propaganda campaigns... and
all sorts of human nastiness... metaphors themselves justified
by only metaphor....] We're so accustomed to hearing it, we
hardly even hear it. But once you 'hear it'... you can't unhear
it.
