Tao Te Ching: The "Ancient Child" Fallacy [Lao Tzu = 'bully...picking a fight']

Taoism.net ^ | Derek Lin

[Colofornian]

In certain circles, it is popular to talk about the name Lao Tzu (or Laozi) having the dual meaning of "Old Master" and "Ancient Child."

...Another Meaning

In spoken Chinese, the two characters lao tzu can have another meaning when used in another context, but it's like absolutely nothing imagined by Western academics.

In this other context, the tzu character looks the same but is pronounced in a different pitch. An English speaker probably won't be able to tell the difference. When pronounced this way, the meaning is 1) father and 2) a rude and crude way to refer to oneself.

For instance, when a bully wants to pick a fight, he may say: "lao zi zo ni!" This can be translated as "I'll beat you up!" And if we break it down linguistically, we'll see that what it says has the compressed meaning of: "I, your old dad, will beat you up!"

The rude and crude part of it is the assertion of oneself over another, similar to the American expression, "who's your daddy?" Only someone who has no class would be so insulting to someone else. Therefore, the phrase can only be suitable for people at the lowest level of Chinese society - illiterate and ignorant criminals, gangsters, thugs, and so on...

[Colofornian]

From the article:

In spoken Chinese, the two characters lao tzu can have another meaning when used in another context, but it's like absolutely nothing imagined by Western academics. In this other context, the tzu character looks the same but is pronounced in a different pitch. An English speaker probably won't be able to tell the difference. When pronounced this way, the meaning is 1) father and 2) a rude and crude way to refer to oneself. For instance, when a bully wants to pick a fight, he may say: "lao zi zo ni!" This can be translated as "I'll beat you up!" And if we break it down linguistically, we'll see that what it says has the compressed meaning of: "I, your old dad, will beat you up!" The rude and crude part of it is the assertion of oneself over another, similar to the American expression, "who's your daddy?" Only someone who has no class would be so insulting to someone else. Therefore, the phrase can only be suitable for people at the lowest level of Chinese society - illiterate and ignorant criminals, gangsters, thugs, and so on...

Hmmm...

Interesting.

[laotzu]

I like pickled okra.