笑貧不笑娼 xiào pín bù xiào chāng

despise the poor, not the immoral rich

Word data

HSK Not in HSK
Frequency Unknown

Definitions

  1. 1. the notion in society that it's better to get ahead in the world by abandoning one's scruples than to suffer poverty
  2. 2. lit. despising poverty but not prostitution (idiom)

Characters

Character Meaning
smile; laugh; old variant of xiào
poor; deficient; inadequate
not; no; (negative prefix)
smile; laugh; old variant of xiào
prostitute