Joy of Spanish
Nobody’s fool
In an e-mail from Oaxaca, I am asked if there is a Spanish equivalent of “beggars can’t be choosers.” Yes there is: limosnero con garrote (beggar with a billy club). “Beggars can’t be choosers” is an admonition. Let’s say I would like Alberto to lend me one of his two cars. (He has already told me I could borrow one if I really needed it.) So I mention to my friend Juan that I hope he lends me the Mercedes-Benz and not the VW Beetle. “Beggars can’t be choosers!”, I am promptly admonished by Juan. “Be happy with what you get.”
The phrase is usually employed in this sense by a third party not directly involved, although it can be used directly to admonish an over-eagar “beggar.” The same is true in Spanish. Either I can be chided for asking too much from someone willing to do me a favor (“no seas limosnero con garrote”), or I can be rebuked directly by this person: ¡Limosnero con garrote! But one should be aware that this is tantamount to saying “Back off, you peasant!”
Calling someone who is not present a limosnero con garrote is common enough, but saying it to his face is something else entirely. In order to do that, the limosnero should either be a very good friend of ours, in which case he won’t take offense (hopefully), or he belongs to what people used to call “an inferior social class,” in which case the admonisher doesn’t care one way or the other if the admonished is offended. A teacher, for example, can admonish a student in this way because, as far as many teachers are concerned, students belong to “an inferior social class.” This, of course, is a question of power, and that is how most insults work. One can insult a friend (we usually consider friends as “equals”) and get away with it, knowing they can — and will — insult as back. This is no skin off anybody’s nose, and it’s not really an insult but a game.
When the playing field is uneven, however, or if we aren’t on familiar terms with the person whom we are insulting or who is insulting us, the situation changes dramatically: it becomes a power play. Either it’s a put-down directed to someone generally considered inferior, like a menial laboror, for example (this is particularly tasteless and boorish), or it’s intended for someone conceived as a competitor.
In Mexico people do not take kindly to insults from peers who are not on familiar terms with them. This occurs frequently among politicians, writers, painters, literary critics, professional athletes, etc. That’s why it’s much more dangerous to do so than to insult a bricklayer (albañil), unless the bricklayer happens to have a brick in his hand. So what happens is that the insults become very polite, or disguised; they can even be thinly veiled by sarcasm meant to be understood only by the person insulted. That way, if the person alluded to is offended, the offender can defend himself by coming out with “What did I say?” This obliges the offended to either back down or disparage himself by spelling out what he perceived to be, and probably was, an insult.
It’s hard to say what the greatest insult is in Mexico. I’m not talking about four-letter words, which can be offensive although not necessarily insulting, but true insults: epithets used to belittle someone, cut him up into little pieces, and then step on them.
One of the biggest insults is to call someone a fool, a tonto, or some other more offensive equivalent, like the “p” word we saw last week. As a matter of fact, there is an entire catalogue of tontos. Here is a sampling:
The optimistic fool thinks he’s not a fool: El tonto optimista cree que no es tonto. The pessimistic fool thinks that only he’s a fool: el tonto pesimista cree que sólo él es tonto. A telescopic fool can be seen as a fool from afar: El tonto telescópico, desde lejos se le nota lo tonto. A studious fool is obsessed with learning foolish things: El tonto aplicado se preocupa por aprender tonterías. A petulant fool is proud of his foolishness: El tonto petulante se enorgullece de sus tonterías. A friendly fool only has foolish friends: El tonto amigable tiene puros amigos tontos. A knowing fool knows he’s foolish: El tonto consciente sabe que es tonto. The philosopher fool asks why he is foolish: El tonto filósofo se pregunta el porqué de sus tonterías. A xerox fool copies other people’s foolishness: El tonto xerox se copia las tonterías de los demás. A hopeful fool believes he will someday cease being one: El tonto esperanzado cree que lo tonto se le va a quitar. The ignorant fool is known to be foolish by everyone except him: El tonto ignorante, todos saben que es tonto menos él. An ecological fool is a fool by nature: El tonto ecológico es tonto por naturaleza. A cautious fool is a fool just in case: El tonto precavido es tonto por si se ofrece. The paranoid fool thinks that everyone knows he’s a fool: El tonto paranoico cree que todos saben que es tonto. A political fool is a fool, but according to him, the situation can be remedied. El tonto político es tonto, pero según él tiene solución. A thrifty fool saves his foolishness for when it will really be necessary: El tonto ahorrativo se guarda sus tonterías para cuando las necesite.
That’s probably enough foolishness for one column. I thank Dr. Samuel Schmidt for e-mailing me his extensive list of foolery all the way from El Paso, Texas. But only a fool would say he is responsible for them appearing here today. I’ll claim that for myself.
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