East Asian Journal

Crime · Chinese-language operations

Butchering the foreign plate


In plain English

Perpetrator jargon for running the relationship-investment fraud against non-Chinese victims, formed by analogy with 杀猪盘. It has since appeared in Chinese court reporting and legal commentary. A homophonic variant, 杀羊盘 or butchering the sheep, is a pun on the same sound.

Register

Subjects' own term. The subjects' own vocabulary. Useful for recognition; not a neutral description.

Literally

Butchering the foreign plate — 洋 meaning foreign or Western.

What English gets wrong

It is routinely rendered in English as butchering foreign pigs. The character 猪 is not in the term. 洋 means foreign; the pig is carried over by analogy from 杀猪盘, not stated. The embellishment is English-side.

What to write instead

the foreign-target variant of the fraud, giving 杀洋盘 and its literal sense.

Related

Sources

  1. Chinese court reporting and legal commentary using the term