đạn ăn lên tên ăn xuống

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Meaning · English

When one person rises, another falls

Literally: bullets go up, names go down

Examples

Khi ông A được thăng chức thì ông B bị giáng cấp, đạn ăn lên tên ăn xuốngWhen Mr. A was promoted, Mr. B was demoted, bullets go up, names go down

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Discovered via Tục ngữ, cổ ngữ, gia ngôn (Huỳnh Tịnh Của, 1897; public domain, via vi.wikisource); retrieved 2026-08-01. Source: source ↗ Attested in Tục ngữ, cổ ngữ, gia ngôn (Huỳnh Tịnh Của, 1897). Source gloss (Vietnamese): “Ay là lời chuẩn đích trong sự bắn súng, bắn ná.” Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-08-01; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “đạn ăn lên tên ăn xuống” mean?

When one person rises, another falls Literally: bullets go up, names go down

Is “đạn ăn lên tên ăn xuống” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.