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Anonymous Posted 12 years ago
Grammar

Pay disrespect?

Hi

What does "pay disrepect" mean? Is it an idiom or something like that? 

Samurai in feudal Japan were allowed to execute civilians who paid them disrespect!

Thanks
  

Top answer

It's not a natural English expression. " "Show disrespect" is fine, but "pay disrespect" is not.

  • It's not a natural English expression.
  • " "Show disrespect" is fine, but "pay disrespect" is not.
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3 Answers
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It's not a natural English expression.

The writer has confused the expressions "pay respects" and "show respect" and then tried to apply it to the opposite, "disrespect."

"Show disrespect" is fine, but "pay disrespect" is not.
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Interesting! "pay disrespect" is meant to be the opposite of "pay respects" , which is a fairly common phrase. I personally would use "showed them disrespect" there.
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It didn't sound natural to me as well. Thanks for the answers.

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