'Losers' can flatter themselves in any culture

Third, diaosi often long after an idyllic soul mate. The problem is that the person they want to hook up with would be anything but attracted to them, leading to sexual frustration, loneliness and depression.

Fourth, diaosi always toil away in hard, exhausting and gloomy jobs. But they are usually at the middle of the social stratum and never the lowest. Their pay is not as meager as they claim, and in fact roughly equates with their abilities and talents. It's just that they feel they deserve a better job and are undervalued at work.

Many young people attach the word to themselves even though they are not nearly as hard up as the original diaosi. In that sense, diaosi are much like Ah Q, a character created by Lu Xun (a celebrated Chinese writer) in a novel.

Ah Q is a rural peasant with little education and no fixed job and famous for "spiritual victories", Lu Xun's euphemism for self-deception even when faced with extreme defeat or humiliation.

Juan Ripolles' artworks displayed in Nanjing

Ah Q is a bully to the less fortunate but fearful of those who are above him in rank, strength or power. He convinces himself that he is spiritually superior to his oppressors even as he succumbs to their tyranny and suppression.

Lu Xun exposes Ah Q's extreme faults as symptomatic of the Chinese national character of his time, the 1920s. The ending of the story - when Ah Q is carted off to be executed for a minor crime - is equally poignant and satirical.

The domain of the diaosi has never been a purely Chinese one. Japan has its otaku boys, Internet addicts who stay at home playing computer games, and "inertia girls", who lack the energy or motivation to face life. In American culture, "loser" is a serious word that refers to those who lack work and life skills.

And just as the word diaosi has become popular in China, there are youths in the US for whom being called a loser has lost its sting. In one song, Beck, a rock star representing the consumer generation, says, "I'm a loser, baby, so why don't you kill me?"

The writer teaches Chinese at Peking University.

Contact him at weibaoliang@pku.edu.cn.