Ill start:
“Me cago en tus muertos” - ill shit all over your dead relatives. Spanish.
“Spargeltarzan”, which is German for “asparagus Tarzan”. Basically someone who is physically weak, but tall and lanky.
I also like “Lauch”, which just translates to “leek”, the veggie. Oh, and “Bohnenstange”, which means bean stalk. We do seem to have quite a few vegetable-related insults in German, now that I think of it…
When a man balds at a young age, we say ‘they were still shaving his mom when he was born’
Pretty brutal, eh ?
I dont get it.
They shaved the private parts of women before giving birth back then. (Maybe it’s still a thing somewhere today, I don’t know.)
Heard one: Your mother has a penis and your father is jealous of it.
German: “Du Lappen”
Translates to “You rag”, pretty much calling someone a loser or idiot.
Portuguese is full of these, but how about vai pra casa do caralho.
Which roughly translates to “go to the dick’s home”, basically another way of saying “go fuck yourself”, but even more vulgar somehow.
I’ve heard ‘caralho’ used to be the name for the lookout on top of a ship’s mast (later turned into yet another word for dick) and sailors were sent to duty on the caralho as punishment?
I’m not Portuguese though, so if any native could confirm …
Portuguese here. “Diz que vais cagar e baza”, which translates to “Say you go shit and get outa here”, when someone is not welcome.
Oh, another one: “deves comer gelados com a testa”, which translates to “you must eat icecream with your forehead”, a not so soft way to call someone stoopid
Brazil “eu caguei e andei” (I shat and walked). Functionally equivalent to “I don’t give a shit” but in Portuguese one actually shits but doesn’t care to wipe and walks away or walks at the same as is shitting.
In Quebec French, people sometimes say of someone who’s not particularly bright:
“His mom rocked him/her too close to the wall.”
It’s just so… vivid and random.
Oh cool, we have a very similar one in German: “His/her swing stood too close to the wall.”
A strong insult in french would be to tell that someone has been “fini à la pisse”.
I don’t know how to translate that but it would means that their dad did not have enough sperm so he used urine to conceive them.
Triangeljosti.
The Jostiband is a Dutch orchestra for people with a developmental disability, mainly people with down syndrome.
A [triangle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_(musical_instrument\)) , or triangel in Dutch, is possibly the simplest instrument you can think of.
So calling someone a ‘triangeljosti’ is basically comparing them to someone who plays the simplest possible instrument in a band for developmentally disabled people.
This reminds me of the not-very-edifying-at-all moment when “joey” became a universal term of abuse in UK playgrounds.
I’m wheezing. Never heard it before but the image is livid in my head.
That’s so specific. lmao
That just sounds like ableism
Well, yeah, it’s an insult so it’s not exactly meant to be flattering for either the insulted party or the person they are being compared to.
I mean, OP asked for insults. You should be prepared to see some you don’t like (which is the point of an insult after all).
Never heard that one being used, though.
It’s not super common but I do hear it on occasion.
كول هوا
“Kawl hawa”
Literally “eat air” in Arabic
Means shut up
That’s hilarious
Oh that is fantastic. I need to use that one.
German: “Dich soll der Blitz beim Scheißen treffen” - Lightning shall strike you while you’re taking a shit
Best insult ever, imo.
Yiddish is not my native language but I think this one is so good it absolutely deserves a mention:
All of your teeth shall fall out except one that gives you a massive toothache.
In polish, calling people with the neutral gender. It’s a grave insult which implies lack of agency and dehumanisation, and thank to some rightwinger assholes in parliament is also a specific transphobic insult now.
While in english it’s completely normal thing to say if you’re not sure of a person’s gender.
So definitely not my “favourite”, i would never said this to anyone in polish and i occasionally get a hiccup of misgendering someone in english because of that, but interesting from language point of view.
In polish, calling people with the neutral gender…While in english it’s completely normal thing to say if you’re not sure of a person’s gender.
Maybe I misunderstand, but you should never call someone “it” in English, except for animals and babies. Calling someone “it” is considered dehumanizing in English.
Yes, what i meant that in english you call people in 3rd person “them”, “they” regardless of their gender, but in polish neutral gender would always be “it”. That’s why it’s so insulting to use it despite it is gramatically existing. Polish had pronouns literally build in every noun, verb and adjective.
This seems like a thing in Slavic languages in general. In Russian the equivalent is “одушевленные и неодушевленные существительные” - animate, and inanimate objects, so I guess they add one extra pronoun to the usual three, which is just for objects. I think some genderqueer people prefer using the plural pronoun in that case (“они” instead of “оно”). Is that possible in Polish?
The neutral gender is perfectly grammatical in polish, just it was never used for people other than small babies, i seen some effort to use it in literature for gender fluid or genderless people but it’s rare and don’t get positive reviews. It might catch some day though, i don’t know.
Is it kind of like calling someone “it” as an insult in English?
Pretty much yes, the closest thing that would be.
I’d say so, and I’ve seen it used in the same transphobic contexts.
My personal favourites from Finnish.
“Ei ole kaikki muumit Muumilaaksossa” “Not having all the Moomins in Moomin Valley” Used for people who are either stupid or lack sanity. There are other variants of this and Moomin one is not older than a couple of decades.
I find our version of Grammar Nazi pretty great. We call them comma fuckers.
“Ei voi kauhalla ottaa jos on lusikalla annettu” “You can’t take with a ladle if it was given with a spoon”. This refers also to a lack of something, usually a lack of intelligence or sense.
“Not having all the Moomins in Moomin Valley”
That’s totally something we’ll use. Thanks :D Also I’m stealing that. I’m stealing that insult and Americanizing it and you can’t stop me
Just be warned Moomins are a gateway to communism (Weird internet theory). Or at least to more Moomins. We literally have Moomin everything here.
In Denmark you have:
- Paragraph Knight - someone who cares too much about rules and regulations.
- Fly Fucker - someone who cares too much about something deeply insignificant.
In German there is “Paragraphenreiter” - Paragraph rider.
- Γαμώ το σπίτι σου (literally: fuck your house) I guess this basically means to fuck your whole family
- Γαμώ τη Παναγία σου (literally: fuck your Saint Mary)
- Γαμώ το Χριστό σου (literally: fuck your Jesus)
- Να μου κλάσεις τον πούτσο (literally: fart my dick) I guess this means “I’ll fuck you from behind”
- Πάρ’τα 3 μου (literally: take my 3) The 3 is implied for balls, and they’re 3 instead of 2 because it’s more manly I guess lmao
- Κλάσε μου τα 3 (literally: fart my 3) A combination of the previous two
- Αρχίδι (literally: testicle) You can actually call someone a testicle in Greek
If you rotate a 3 clockwise it becomes a pair of balls
We have something similar to “fuck your house”. “Fuck your couch” is a popular insult in American English thanks to Rick James and The Chappele Show. Still, “fuck your house” is more extreme because I guess it includes the couch, too.
Those are all amazing insults that you listed, btw.
Here are a few Austrian ones:
“Häferl” (Cup): someone with anger management issues
“Du rüttelst am Watschenbaum” (You are shaking the slap tree): I’m close to deliver the fruit of said tree to you.
“Ohrwaschlkaktus” (Ear cactus): Someone with large, protruding ears
“Saubauch” (Hog belly): A way of telling someone that they are fat and dumb at the same time. But in a nice way.
In Tamil: சோத்துல உப்பு போட்டு தான தின்ற?
Translation: Don’t you add salt to your food?
Context: This is when somebody doesn’t react/listen/change no matter how much they are insulted. The other party asks if they add salt to their food, or if they only eat bland food, and thus have lost all emotions and have become as bland as their food.
It’s a bit difficult to explain, but the general belief is that food reflects your emotions and reactance and moods. Bland food - emotionless, spicy food - easy to anger, etc.
