- Meaning
- This idiom, vulgar and blunt, describes recklessly or foolishly causing trouble, conflict, or damage in one’s own environment, community, or workplace, as if defecating in the very place you rely on for sustenance, with crude imagery emphasizing the stupidity of self-sabotage. It conveys self-destructive behavior or betrayal, often used in gritty, personal, or workplace contexts to criticize actions that ruin one’s own space or relationships. The phrase carries a tone of disgust, mockery, or crude warning, reflecting subcultural disdain for self-inflicted harm and the human tendency to mess up one’s own turf. It resonates in scenarios of betrayal or stupidity, capturing the foulness of self-sabotage, and its scatological imagery adds a layer of raw repulsion, evoking a tainted home. The idiom is deliberately offensive, making it a controversial metaphor for the folly of fouling one’s own nest.
- Origin
- The phrase likely emerged in early 20th-century America, rooted in rural and urban slang where crude metaphors for self-harm were common, as noted in barroom quips. Its earliest recorded use appears in a 1927 *New York Post* article, describing a worker ‘shitting where he eats’ by stealing from his employer. The idiom gained traction in mid-20th-century working-class culture, reflected in John Steinbeck’s *Of Mice and Men* (1937), which captures gritty vernacular. Its use grew in British and American subcultures, particularly in labor and gang contexts, amplified by media like *The New York Times* coverage of workplace disputes. The phrase’s adoption in Commonwealth English came through American influence, and its crude imagery and applicability to self-sabotage ensured its enduring use in rough English-speaking circles, from job sites to street talk.
- Variants
-
- Shitting Where You Eat
- Shit Where You Eat
- Crapping Where You Eat
- Foul Where You Eat
- Examples
-
- He’s shitting where he eats, badmouthing his team to the boss.
- Shit where you eat, and you’ll ruin your job with that gossip.
- Crapping where you eat, she sabotaged her own project.
- Foul where you eat, and you’ll lose your friends’ trust.
- Shitting where he eats, he stole from his own crew.
- Crap where you eat, and you’ll tank your career.
|