How To Be Clear Without Being Cringey

Or What I Learned from Every 90s Christian Movie

When I was a kid growing up in a well-meaning evangelical household during the 90s, my entertainment diet consisted mainly of Ninja Turtles, Full House, and a lot of Christian films…like A LOT, a lot. If you’ve never seen one, imagine a regular movie, but right before anything interesting happens, a guy in a denim vest puts a hand on someone’s shoulder and gives a heartfelt altar call.

These films weren’t bad because they lacked a clear message. They were bad because they couldn’t resist telling you exactly what they wanted you to believe, think, feel, and buy into. Every metaphor was spelled out. Every moral was highlighted and underlined. Every character who strayed was either converted, punished, or magically went to heaven somehow managing to leave their clothes behind, causing me to wonder just how many naked people were up there.

To be fair, Christian films have gotten better over the years…but they used to be pretty cringey. And Cringe is the direct result of whenever there’s an excess of Clarity.

This might sound like an odd criticism. I get it. We’re told all the time that Clarity is the holy grail of communication. And often, for good reason. But “Clarity at all costs” can be just as ineffective as confusion, especially when it strips a message of tension, texture, and truth.

Often, what makes a story memorable isn’t the painfully clear parts, but the parts that gave us something to think about, chew on, wonder, and wrestle over.

What I’m talking about is Nuance.

We’re going to cover how to know when to solve for Clarity vs. Nuance a bit later, but first, let me be clear about Clarity...

Clarity is a tool, not a virtue.

Clarity is not the enemy. In fact, in many contexts, Clarity is the hero of the story.

If your landing page confuses people about what your product does, they’ll bounce. If your call-to-action requires interpretive dance to understand, no one’s clicking. If your teenager doesn’t know to text you if she’s going to be out past 10, get ready for a sleepless night.

There are moments when direct, simple, unmistakable language is exactly what’s needed:

• A product’s core purpose (e.g., “This is a password manager”)

• Clear value propositions (“Save time. Save money. Get your life back.”)

• Calls to action (“Buy now,” “Try it free,” “Brush your teeth.”)

Clarity is essential when the stakes are high, when time is limited, or when your audience is new to your world. But Clarity is a tool, not a virtue. We can use it well, without using it religiously. It turns out the latter has some unintended consequences...

“Clarity at All Costs” Can Be Quite Costly.

The trouble starts when we begin mistaking simplicity for truth. When we start lopping off Nuance just to make the message cleaner, faster, and easier to digest. When we believe our audience won’t question, “because I said so."

Last year, for example, a University of Oregon study decided to investigate the notion that “Clarity is king” when it comes to brand messaging. The team conducted seven studies, including real-world data from nearly 150,000 Consumer Reports surveys, and found something interesting:

When consumers mentally construct brands, they give them varying degrees of “dimensionality.”

The brands with the lowest dimensionality-rates? Their messages veered overly-simplistic, minimal, myopic. To consumers, those things actually signaled a lack of substance, limited capability, or hidden risk. What was meant to evoke ease and trustworthiness sometimes backfired, coming off as shallow or evasive instead.

You Can’t Cringe While You’re Chewing.

Well, maybe you can, but I don’t really want to test that theory.

Some of the greatest messages don't tell us what to think. They give us something to chew on. Consider:

• Hemingway’s famous six-word story: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” It’s clear. But not obvious. It evokes emotion by what it doesn’t say.

• Billy Joel and Randy Newman’s piano style: Both employ the use of
  suspended, dissonant, or unresolved chords on songs, designed to pull at our heartstrings.

• Liquid Death’s branding: Is it a water brand? A metal band? A lifestyle cult? Yes. No. Kind of. By refusing to spell everything out, Liquid Death made space for its audience to lean in, laugh, and self-identify. The brand used edgy, satirical packaging and irreverent tone not to obscure its purpose, but to elevate it. It stood out in a sea of wellness-speak and virtue signaling by being bold, weird, and deeply self-aware. And it worked: the brand grew from a niche curiosity to a $700 million valuation, fueled largely by fans who felt part of an inside joke. The Nuance wasn't a distraction, it was the magnet.

Nuance is for those moments when we’re already clear on what our choices are…we just need to feel their gravity.

Where Clarity is about reducing ambiguity to aid understanding, Nuance is about honoring complexity without creating chaos. Clarity reveals function. Nuance reveals feeling, belief, and identity, those deeper layers of how people see themselves, what they value, and who they want to be. Both are essential, but they serve different purposes.

The purpose of Nuance is to invite your audience to ask more questions, to go a bit deeper than they’re comfortable with, to wrestle with their preconceived notions, and to ultimately shift their behavior. But if you try to rush this process, if you go full-on Denim Vest Pastor and reveal the “lesson” too soon, it backfires. I’ve found this Clarity-Nuance dance to be true whether I’m working with a brand on their message or trying to explain to my 12-year-old why she’s not allowed to have social media.

Dance Instructions for When to Be Clear vs. Nuanced

So how do you know when to be clear and when to be nuanced? The question matters whether your leading a brand, handling a leadership crisis, teaching a class, or parenting a child. Here’s a handy field guide:

1. Start by Defining Your Message’s Purpose: Are you trying to change minds, change behavior, or simply explain something? If it’s about getting someone from point A to point B, Clarity is your GPS. But if you're inviting someone to explore, reflect, or evolve, it might be better to give them a compass.

2. Next, Know What Kind of Problem You're Solving: If it’s an urgent challenge people are facing but you’re in a crowded marketplace of competitors, Nuance is your best friend. On the other hand, if you're addressing a problem people have already accepted and learned to deal with, your job is to convince them that better is possible. And the best way to do that is through Clarity.

3. Tune into the Emotional Frequency: Are you addressing a matter of logistics or a matter of the heart? Emotionally charged topics like injustice, identity, or grief are rarely served well by oversimplification. Use Nuance as a signal of respect and emotional intelligence.

4. Gauge the Risk of Misreading: Could misinterpretation cause harm, especially at scale? If yes, lead with Clarity. But if Nuance can provoke the kind of deeper thought that leads to deeper buy-in, trust your audience to do some lifting.

5. Map the Cultural Context: In some cultural seasons or demographics, Nuance may feel evasive. In others, bluntness may feel tone-deaf. Context is everything.

6. Finally, Ask What’s Gained (or Lost) in Translation: Does distilling the message make it more powerful—or does it strip away what made it meaningful in the first place? Revisit your message until you’ve struck a balance that honors both intention and intrigue.

The Light and the Shadow

The best stories aren’t spoon-fed to us. They stir our curiosity. They give us something to wrestle with, something to carry, something that lingers in the back of our mind for days, weeks, maybe even years.

Clarity is not inherently good or bad, but simply useful. Like a spotlight, it helps focus on what matters when the moment calls for direction, instruction, or urgency. But left on too long or too bright, it can blind people to everything else happening in the room. Nuance, by contrast, is like adjusting the lighting—creating atmosphere, suggesting dimension, revealing the shapes in the shadows. Neither tool is superior. The real craft is knowing when to flip the switch.

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CJ Casciotta

Writer, Director, Dad
Founder, Reculture: a message design & media production company.

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