If we're being pedantic, there's a second common definition of the word tragedy that does not refer to a drama or literary work, but "an event causing great suffering, destruction, and distress, such as a serious accident, crime, or natural catastrophe."
I think when you take all of the time wasted on useless tests written merely for the sake of having tests, that waste is tragic. You could be doing anything else with that time.
I am curious if there is any good way to measure that amount of waste. I agree that waste from extra and useless tests exists, but I am not convinced that waste is entirely bad.
It seems to me that waste is unavoidable with teams newer to automated testing and may simply be part of the cost of using automated tests. If that is the case then it seems better to compare the cost of bugs with no automated to cost of superfluous tests. In that comparison extra tests definitely seems like the lesser of two evils, even without hard numbers. I would prefer hard numbers because my intuition could be wrong.
I think when you take all of the time wasted on useless tests written merely for the sake of having tests, that waste is tragic. You could be doing anything else with that time.