black gangster

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English

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Chinese 黑幫黑帮 (hēibāng, gangsters, gang). The first character, , translates as "black" on its own.

Noun

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black gangster (plural black gangsters)

  1. (politics, historical, derogatory) propaganda term used by Mao Zedong against opponents
    • 1968, Survey of China Mainland Press: Supplement, page 14:
      [] and branded more than one-third of the people in the Agriculture Ministry as "rightists" or "black gangsters."
    • 1970, Jan S. Prybyla, The Political Economy of Communist China, page 539:
      It was not always clear who was a counterrevolutionary or a black gangster for that matter. Former landlords, capitalists, and rich peasants were more readily spotted, but even here there was some difficulty []
    • 2016, Philip Short, Mao: The Man Who Made China, page 534:
      The radicals held that Liu's men were 'black gangsters' in league with the ousted Party committees.
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see black,‎ gangster. (i.e. one with black skin)

See also

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Further reading

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