How to Read “If you glare at your parents, you’ll become a flounder”
Oya wo niramu to hirame ni naru
Meaning of “If you glare at your parents, you’ll become a flounder”
This proverb warns that if you act rebellious toward your parents or show disrespectful behavior like glaring at them, you will surely face consequences.
The word “glare” here doesn’t just mean having an angry look. It refers to any attitude that lacks respect for your parents.
People mainly used this proverb when children showed rebellious attitudes toward their parents. Parents and other adults would use this expression to correct a child’s arrogant behavior.
By showing the specific image of a flounder, the warning becomes more powerful than just saying “you’ll be punished.”
In modern times, parent-child relationships emphasize equality more than before. However, this proverb still teaches the universal lesson that we shouldn’t forget basic respect and gratitude toward our parents.
If rebellion and rudeness become habits, you lose trust in all your relationships. Ultimately, you’re the one who suffers the most.
Origin and Etymology
The exact first written appearance of this proverb is hard to identify. However, the structure of the phrase reveals an interesting background.
A flounder is a fish that lives flat against the ocean floor. Both eyes sit on one side of its body, and its body is completely flat, as if it were crushed.
This distinctive appearance forms the core of this proverb. Why does glaring at your parents result in becoming a flounder?
The flat shape of the flounder was seen as a symbol of punishment, like being “crushed” or “trampled.” In traditional Japanese values, filial piety was one of the most important virtues.
Influenced by Confucian thought, disobeying your parents was considered equal to defying heaven itself.
In folk beliefs, people believed that immoral actions brought concrete punishments. Just like the stories that liars would have their tongues pulled out by the King of Hell, or thieves would have their hands rot, the sin of glaring at your parents would result in being transformed into a flounder.
Among sea creatures, the flounder with its especially flat and strange appearance was the perfect example to visually convey such a warning.
Interesting Facts
When flounders are born, they have symmetrical bodies just like ordinary fish. But as they grow, one eye migrates to the opposite side, and their body becomes flat.
This dramatic transformation might have looked like the fish had been changed by some kind of punishment. People in the Edo period likely overlaid moral lessons onto this mysterious fish’s appearance.
Flounders and halibut have similar shapes, but you can tell them apart by eye position. There’s a saying: “left flounder, right halibut.”
The reason the proverb uses flounder specifically isn’t certain. However, flounder is known as a more expensive fish, so it may have been chosen as a more impressive example.
Usage Examples
- I still remember my grandmother scolding me, saying “If you glare at your parents, you’ll become a flounder”
- When I told my rebellious teenage son “If you glare at your parents, you’ll become a flounder,” he gave me a puzzled look
Universal Wisdom
Behind this proverb’s long history lies a deep insight into fundamental human relationships. The parent-child relationship is the first hierarchical relationship people experience.
It’s also where we learn how to deal with authority. Children naturally develop rebellious feelings as they grow, but how they express those emotions shapes the foundation for all future relationships.
What’s interesting is that this proverb doesn’t simply command “don’t disobey your parents.” Instead, it focuses on the specific attitude of “glaring.”
Glaring is an expression of unspoken hostility or contempt. This proverb points to an issue of inner attitude rather than surface-level obedience.
Humans are emotional beings, so sometimes we feel dissatisfaction or anger toward our parents. However, throwing those emotions at someone as hostility is completely different from communicating them appropriately.
This proverb teaches the importance of maintaining respect within relationships.
The specific punishment of “becoming a flounder” represents the idea of cause and effect. Our ancestors tried to convey a universal truth through the image of a fish.
Rudeness toward others ultimately distorts your own character and damages your position in society.
When AI Hears This
A flounder’s eyeballs are positioned symmetrically like ordinary fish right after hatching. But during growth, one eye migrates across the head to the opposite side.
This dramatic change is genetically programmed as an adaptation to life on the ocean floor. Interestingly, research shows that the timing and completeness of this migration varies with environmental stress.
When stress factors like water temperature or nutrition are strong, more individuals show abnormal eye migration or incomplete asymmetry.
This phenomenon is called “phenotypic plasticity.” It shows biological flexibility where organisms with the same genes develop different forms depending on environment.
In mammals too, when the mother experiences strong stress, it affects fetal development. For example, chronic stress during pregnancy changes the child’s brain structure and behavior patterns.
Stress hormones pass through the placenta and regulate the fetus’s gene expression.
This proverb expresses the intuition that psychological stress from hostility toward parents affects a child’s physical formation. Scientifically, we can understand this as tension between parent and child raising the mother’s stress level, which then influences the developing child.
Through the concrete example of flounder, ancient people may have experientially grasped the biological truth that invisible psychological states cause visible physical changes.
Lessons for Today
This proverb teaches us about the importance of how we express emotions. Not just in parent-child relationships, but in all human relationships, feeling dissatisfaction or anger is natural.
However, how you express those emotions determines the quality of the relationship.
Glaring, a non-verbal expression of hostility, closes off communication and only hurts the other person. It doesn’t lead to solving problems.
Modern society requires the ability to verbalize emotions appropriately and communicate them constructively. Saying “your action hurt me” produces completely different results from silently glaring.
In family relationships especially, having a long-term perspective is important. Attitudes driven by temporary emotions can create regrets you can’t undo later.
Not forgetting gratitude toward your parents and treating them with respect even when you disagree enriches your own humanity.
This teaching also offers insights for people in the parent role. When children become rebellious, it may be because they don’t know appropriate ways to express themselves.
Keeping the door to dialogue open is the key to building healthy relationships.
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