I am watching a video of a person releasing a mouse from a plastic trap into the "wild," but it was actually released in an open field. The freed mouse gets across the field and then a large bird happens upon it. Is there a word that describes "Hell is paved with good intentions?" Kind of ironic, but saying more than it merely backfired.
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1Is it the law of unintended consequences?– Yosef BaskinNov 8, 2020 at 22:28
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2Does this answer your question? Expression for "intend to help but instead making things worse"– livresqueNov 8, 2020 at 22:46
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See also: Is there an English word or phrase that means “intending to help and hurting instead?”– livresqueNov 8, 2020 at 22:48
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1Collateral damage?– StephenSNov 9, 2020 at 6:12
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1"Hell is paved with good intentions?" This is wrong. The saying is "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions" (The general belief is that Hell itself is not paved as it is a lake of molten brimstone.)– GreybeardDec 9, 2020 at 11:10
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3 Answers
Situations as the one you are describing are generally referred to as:
out of the frying pan into the fire (saying)
when you move from a bad or difficult situation to one that is worse
(Cambridge Dictionary)
answered Nov 8, 2020 at 22:31
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1When having lunch at the monastery it's "Out of the frying pan, into the friar." Nov 9, 2020 at 0:08
To throw the baby out with the bathwater. LINK
To discard something valuable or important while disposing of something considered worthless, especially an outdated idea or form of behavior.
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I really don’t see how that applies to feeling good about freeing a mouse into the wild only to see it all go terribly wrong as a hawk snatches it up.– JimNov 10, 2020 at 15:30
Another phrase:
https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/going+from+bad+to+worse
Going from bad to worse.
