one man's meat is another man's poison
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Also seen as: one man's fish is another man's poison · one man's fish is another man's poisson
What is beneficial to one person can be harmful to another
Điều có lợi cho người này có thể có hại cho người khác
Machine-translated — suggest a fix
Examples
Tatoeba sentence #67212 (CC BY 2.0 FR, tatoeba.org, retrieved 2026-07-31)
Sources & notes
Listed on Wikipedia “List of proverbial phrases” (CC BY-SA 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “one man's meat is another man's poison” mean?
What is beneficial to one person can be harmful to another Literally: food that is nourishing to one person is toxic to another
Is “one man's meat is another man's poison” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.