The Great Genitalia Debate

A month or two ago, a furor broke out among some friends regarding the usage and definition of the Hokkien terms for male and female genitalia. I suppose I was taken aback because of the vehemence of the protest and the apparent misconception that usage of these terms was sexist.

In defense of this article, let me say that this post has been sitting in a draft state for a very long time. I have waited until now to expand on it because I feel that tempers have died down and we are all ready to look at this from a linguistic viewpoint.

Arguments about my behavior that day will be ignored. This post is purely about the study and usage of the Hokkien swearing vernacular.

The girls' argument was that since there seemed to be more use of cheebye, the term for female genitalia - equivalent to "cunt" in English, I suppose - it was sexist and unfair. "Why don't you use your own genitalia?" They wailed.

Well, I do use it, and rather frequently in fact, but this isn't really the place to discuss such matters.

My argument was that each term has very specific uses, and even the compound terms that they're part of can only be used appropriately under certain circumstances. This in fact applies to their English equivalents as well.

For example, calling someone a cunt is different from calling someone a dick. A dick implies stupidity and a general bad attitude. A cunt carries connotations of viciousness, but not stupidity. Perhaps this has something to do with stereotyping - females are intelligent and vicious, whereas males are stupid and boorish. I'm not saying stereotyping is right, it just is.

In Singlish (or Singaporean English - the local pidgin variety), you can call someone a cock too. This usage implies extreme stupidity, even more so than "dick".

The Hokkien term for the male genitalia is lanjiao, sometimes spelled lan cheow. This term, when not referring to an actual penis, is an interjection akin to "like real", "as if" or "yeah, right" or any other reaction in response to someone stating the blatantly obvious or asking a stupid question.

Example:
Recruit: Sergeant, can I take off to feed my puppy Momo?
Sergeant: Lanjiao, understand! You think it's your father's army ah?

It can also be used as a tag at the end of a phrase, as in the below example:

Little gangster: Kua si mi lanjiao? You want to fight is it?
(Translation: What the fuck are you looking at? You wanna fight?)

Or as an adjective used to describe a person's annoying face, the kind that make you want to go up to them and slap them for no reason at all: lanjiao bin (literally, "dick face"). And believe me, there are a lot of these people around.

Or, more rarely, as an adjective used to describe a shitty or screwed-up situation, as in "lanjiao daiji" (screwed-up business/trouble).

Apart from these, there are not many other situations in which lanjiao can be used correctly, in the non-biological sense.

Cheebye, on the other hand is mostly used as an exclamation. One might express incredulity, shock, annoyance, disgust - almost any variety of extreme emotion - with the term. Hence when people meet with a shocking situation, they might respond with a strong "Cheebye!!" But what they will not respond with is "Lanjiao!" because it is not typically used as an exclamation. I guess one could exclaim anything, when it boils down to it, like "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!" but that's quite a mouthful, and "Cheebye!" kind of rolls off the tongue (no pun intended).

In a related but less vehement usage, it also conveys mild annoyance or even a sense of resignation. For example, you might say "Cheebye lah," in response to news that you had to work overtime that day. This indicates that while you find the task annoying, you're resigned to doing it. But if you were to respond with "Lanjiao lah!", it would mean that there was no way in hell you were going to do it (in line with the first example of the term's usage).

It can also be used, like lanjiao, as an adjective to describe someone's annoying face, but the term cheebye bin is a stronger variation. Here would be possibly someone you would like to maim and have drawn and quartered, as opposed to just slapped. And yes, there are also many of these people around.

Finally, it can also be used as a noun or adjective that indicates a certain type of personality, usually hateful. Calling someone a cheebye, or describing him/her as such, implies that he/she (the term is blind when it comes to gender) is generally evil, vicious, and hateful in all aspects. However, it might also be used as a term of endearment, akin to calling some of your best friends assholes or bastards.

Noun: My boss is a cheebye, I really hate him.
Adjective: My boss is damn cheebye, I really hate her.

After our discussion, I hope everyone has come away a little more aware of the circumstances and variations on the usage of these two terms. As you can see, they are used under completely different circumstances, and in no way are they sexist, when you compare one to the other. Possibly the only sexist thing would be that a cheebye bin is more detestable than a lanjiao bin, but that's only one out of so many variations.

So yeah, relax, yah?

Note: This is the absolute last word I will speak on the subject of debate to the friends in question. All comments will be read, but my responses can all be found within the article above.