Abusing and exploiting the benefits system, frequently while making unflattering (and often racist) remarks about others doing the same thing.
Typically carry around knives, guns, or other weapons as per their countries' weapons control laws (in the sense of how readily available this makes said weapons; don't expect them to obey the law at all).
Female examples are typically The Lad-ette and prone to underage, out-of-wedlock pregnancy, and usually view boyfriends as daddies for their kids and/or lifestyle subsidizers above all else.
Male examples may have kids, but play little to no role in said kids' lives, and often either refuse to work or work cash-in-hand jobs to avoid child support garnishments.
Basing their opinions on things that they have little knowledge of (which, as previously mentioned, is almost everything worth knowing) on stereotypes and anecdotes of questionable relevance, as well as responding to even the most polite challenges of those opinions with disproportionate hostility and aggression.
A distinct lack of hygiene, both personally and in their homes. Suburban and rural examples are particularly bad with the latter, with lawns covered in garbage, scrap wood, junked appliances, the rusting shells of inoperable vehicles, and various perpetually unfinished projects being a very common sight. If they live in an apartment, they'll typically be blights on the entire building, and very well may attract pest and vermin infestations that spread to surrounding units.
Driving around in a modified car (often mostly cosmetic upgrades) with an obnoxiously loud stereo or exhaust system and poor regard for the rules of the road. Rural examples tend to drive horribly dilapidated trucks with offroad modifications that greatly eclipse the car's book value and are frequently illegal.
Wearing (fake) designer clothing (often of a specific brand) with tacky (and fake) jewelry. If they get their hands on legitimate brands, expect them to be flaunted and worn in even more tasteless or otherwise unflattering ways.
Committing domestic violence and frequently being part of a Destructo-Nookierelationship, often with extremely loud screaming matches in public on a regular basis.
Abuse of the legal system. Filing ridiculous lawsuits (usually with the help of a law office whose figurehead advertises on daytime television and promises to "get you the money you deserve!") in the hope of gaining easy money from a settlement is the most obvious example, but abuse of landlord-tenant laws (the "professional tenant") is another very common practice, especially in states with housing laws that heavily favor tenants.note Massachusetts was particularly notorious for the latter for a long time due to an absence of any sort of requirement that tenants place withheld rent money (which is allowed when landlords fail to make necessary repairs or otherwise fail to provide adequate living conditions) into an escrow account. Predictably, this was abused by many a person who wished to live rent-free, as anyone who wished to do so could just stop paying rent, call the housing board when the landlord tried to throw them out and claim that they were withholding rent due to failure to maintain the property to acceptable standards, and then proceed to stonewall them for months (if not years) before finally leaving them with a bunch of attorney's fees, an uncollectible judgment, and utterly ruined property.
A tendency to blow any and all windfall money received on garish, tasteless garbage, as well as having an aggressive "fuck you, got mine, so bootstrap your ass up" attitude towards the less fortunate once they come into said money, regardless of whether they worked for it or not. This also tends to overlap with a conniving nature and exceptional lack of scruples when it comes to acquiring said money, especially when it comes to family matters. When a wealthy relative dies, expect them to come out of the woodwork to contest the will in the hopes of getting a bigger portion, and if they're particularly shameless, there's always funneling the money directly from an elderly relative or fraudulently gaining power of attorney to wrest control of their assets away from them.
Having more children than their income can support. When combined with the aforementioned exploitation of the welfare system, the common stereotype is that they have kids just to get more benefits and tax breaks.
Giving their children Ghetto Names. If they're from a country where English isn't the first language, they may give their children names that sound "American", often borrowed from international celebrities.
Bad parenting, an almost exclusive reliance on Corporal Punishment for discipline, and a tendency to be overzealous with said discipline to the point of abuse. The children are usually foul-mouthed, ill-tempered, violent, and destructive in return.
Embracing violence as the way to handle all challenges and disputes and viewing more diplomatic approaches as being cowardly. The phrase "talk shit, get hit" effectively summarizes this attitude, and it also coincides with a major unwillingness to even attempt to de-escalate potential disputes in favor of adopting an aggressively confrontational, "take no shit" attitude that very frequently turns what may have been a minor dispute into a knock-down drag-out fistfight.
Being perpetually up to their eyebrows in some kind of petty drama... which is usually at least partly (if not entirely) their fault. If someone else did indeed cause the drama, odds are that they did absolutely nothing to keep it from escalating and/or took a needlessly confrontational, "I keeps it real" stance.
Continually going on about how they're going to "get their shit together" with absolutely zero intention of doing so, usually as a ploy for attention or to try and sweet-talk their way back over a burnt bridge because they need something.
Viewing any meaningful attempt by someone close to them in a similar position to better themselves and escape their circumstances as a personal slight or threat, and (at best) will attempt to make them feel guilty for "abandoning" them or "selling out", and at worst will attempt to sabotage them.
Flippant and dismissive attitudes towards their poor reputation and the large amount of people who have serious problems with them ("people just like to talk shit", "don't believe anything that didn't come from me").
Petty vengefulness and vindictiveness, usually when they are in the wrong. Modern examples are particularly prone to attempts at unjustified Internet Counterattacks, usually through bad reviews or callout posts that heavily gloss over their involvement (if not outright fabricating details to make them look better); when the original target calls them out, they will usually either quietly delete everything and pretend nothing happened, or double down in their attempts (often by enlisting the help of their equally trashy friends and family).
A list of groups around the world often considered to be part of this trope
Argentina has "villeros" or "wachiturros" ("villagers" is the closest to an actual translation in English, and it's used as a derogatory term, wachiturro doesn't have a translation), they're all over Buenos Aires, and a couple of provinces. Most listen to Cumbia Villera music glorifying drug abuse and unsafe sex (or complaining that they want work or better job conditions). Their usual clothes consist of sport clothes, and imitations of these. The haircut for men is shaved on the sides and behind, and usually dyed blond on the top. The girls are similar, but they wear it longer. They usually live in either villas (similar to ghettos) and their usual jobs, if they have one, is selling bootleg products from little stands. If they don't, most are delinquents or prostitutes.
Australia and New Zealand have a similar stereotype known as a "bogan", who tend to be more middle class and less inclined towards theft. They are also more likely to self-identify as a bogan. Other regional variants on the term include "chigga" in Tasmania, note named after the suburb of Chigwell, "bevan" in Queensland, "booner" in the Australian Capital Territory, "scozza" or "lexie" in Victoria, and "divo" in New Zealand.
In recent years (largely thanks to the mining boom), the "cashed-up bogan" variant has appeared, combining the stereotypical bogan lifestyle with plenty of money to throw around.
The term 'westie' in Sydney is similar in that it generally means lower class (as the West of Sydney is away from the seaside and isn't as rich as the Eastern suburbs), but a westie will not necessarily follow or refer to the bogan stereotype. This is also found in Melbourne, Brisbane, and Auckland. Inverted with Perth, where it is the east which is more lower class.
France has the "beaufs", who are generally lower to middle-class, have "American" given names (Kévin, Brandon, Jessica, Kilian, Jennifer, Jordan etc), and love cars, sports, crappy pop music, and bad reality shows. There are also the "racailles" or "wesh-wesh", the black and Arab versions of this trope; often delinquents who live in public housing, wear mostly tracksuits and caps, and only listen to rap music.
Germany has (or had) at least two common varieties of this trope:
The country currently has the Asis (from Asoziale = asocial ones). They live in large cities like Berlin or Mannheim, are unemployed, love cellphones, brand-clothes, Fastfood, attack dogs, marihuana, private television, and of course Hip-hop. Their hobbies include shoplifting, graffities, protection rackets, happy slapping, and bullying. They speak heavily mangled German with loads and loads of English words (like "Ey tight, isch geh Aldi, dann Bitches abchecken, du Opfer"). They call everybody "Du" (considered disrespectful when used on strangers or one's elders instead of "Sie") and curse a lot with sexual or homosexual words (whilst the "proper" German only curses "shit" or "god"). They give their children American names like Kevin or Britnay or creative names like Kendra-Tiara-Zoe. The phenomenon of creative names in Asis has even its own name, Kevinismus.
In The '90s, people who drove an Opel Manta were often stereotyped as this, especially in jokes of the time period. They were typically depicted as dimwitted proletarians who wore tracksuit pants, cowboy boots, and mullets, dated Dumb Blonde hairdressers, and drove very aggressively with one elbow out the window. Manta drivers were mostly depicted as being from Bergheim, and their cars were typically heavily modified (generally to make them look like race cars), as well as being decorated with a Kenwood sticker on the rear window and a "fox tail" on the radio antenna. Of course, not all Manta drivers were like this, but there were plenty who fit the stereotype to a T.
In Iran, there is the "javat". A typical javat speaks with a peculiar accent, acts tough, and has a silly haircut and baggy clothes.
Ireland calls them "skangers", but "chav" is becoming more popular.
Similarly to "pikey", "knacker", which was once usually directed at Travellers, is now mainly used to describe any example of this trope.
Israel has arsim (male, sing. arsnote Yes, quite a few Israelis are aware of what that sounds like in English, and often joke about it.) and frekhot (female, sing. frekha). Aside from standard Lower-Class Lout stuff, they are known for being extremely racist towards Arabs, Russians, and Ashkenazis, and non-Jews in general (Arab–Israeli Conflict aside, quite a problem in a country where 1/3 of the domestic population are immigrants of some sort), always trying to rip others off for money, being of Mizrahi Jewish or Arab descent, speaking a low sociolect of Hebrew that’s often peppered with colloquialisms from Arabic and other languages that make it somewhat unintelligible to other parts of society, having a poor command English as a consequence of stupidity or a poor education, and listening to a genre of music called muzika mizrakhit (lit. ‘Eastern music’), influenced by Mediterranean, Arabic, Caucasian, and pop music, creating music that resembles the kind their Balkan counterparts listen to. Some of these features are seen as quintessentially Israeli to some extent, causing some Cultural Cringe for those who wish to disassociate from it.
Japan has two flavors of this
Yankees/Yankiis. The pop culture portrayal being "violent low-class delinquents given to speaking roughly, wearing tacky fake "brand-name" clothes and jewelry, and driving heavily modified (and also tacky) motorbikes/scooters". See Japanese Delinquents. Bōsōzoku is a related subculture more focused around motorcycles than the other stuff. Gyaru Girl (and the male counterpart gyaru-oh) also overlap sometimes, though they aren't stereotyped as violent.
Osakans are frequent targets of this stereotype, with several of the more unflattering stereotypes of rednecks (excessive alcohol consumption, using violence to solve disputes, lack of mannerisms and intelligence) and Chavs (tacky clothing, speaking with a dialect deemed a low sociolect) showing up, along with gluttonous eating habits, excessive materialism and greed. This isn't helped by the fact that the word Yankii originated from an area in Osaka's Namba neighborhood known as Amerikamura (literally "American Village"), where they wore American-style fashion such as hawaiian shirts and baggy cargo pants. See The Idiot from Osaka.
Mexico has two main flavours of this:
The Naconote "Naca" would be the term for a female one, is loud, uneducated, unrefined in fashion senses, speaks using only Double Entendre, Unusual Euphemism and weird puns, watch only soccer matches (or telenovelas if female), and they might or might not be a delinquent, work in the informal economy, or just poor and pretending that they have money. More often than not they have either Americanized names or names based on soccer players (such as Brayan, Kevin, Brandon, Ikernote due to Iker Casillas on boys and Kimberly, Britney and Tiffany on girls). Their preferred music genre are Cumbias, Tropical and Banda music. They are usually stereotyped as having a very marked Chilango note from Mexico City and its surrounding areas accent. Another stereotype that they have is that they are students at CONALEP, a system of free public schools in Mexiconote The stereotype of students of the CONALEP system are all thughs, delinquents and junkies, where Teenage Pregnancy, underage alcoholism and drug use are rampant; the truth is way off from the mark (but the students often bring them up for laughs), with these schools providing journeyman certifications for programming and other trades. that caters mostly to working class students.
The Buchónnote "Buchona" if female (also called Agropecuariosnote "Agropecuarians" due to their rural roots or usually stereotyped as students of agricultural sciences in Nuevo León and Tamaulipas, and Manguerasnote "Hoses" in Baja California) are smug, cocky, wear tackier clothing and jewelry than the first ones, listens to Narcocorridos, Banda Sinaloense or Norteño music, are extremely aggresive and confrontational, and acts like a hammy drug trafficker. The female version also wears tacky clothes and jewelry, listens to narcororridos, has exaggerated breasts, small waists and large butt sizes and sometimes exaggerated facial features due to excessive plastic surgery done on themselves. Most of the time, they come from the state of Sinaloa or can trace their family origins to that place. If they are "religious", they end up showing off icons of Jesús Malverde or Santa Muerte. The Buchón is more likely to get himself killed (or get the crap beaten out of him in the best case scenario) for pissing off the real narcs, who do not like their show-off attitude and their antics.
The Philippines has the Jejemon, the latter originally arising in the early 2010s to mock poor grammar and overuse of Leet Lingo in text messages from analog-era cellphones. As more sophisticated smartphones emerged, the term Jejemon was later used against usually lower-class youths wearing hip-hop or later K-pop inspired clothing, play basketball, invading shopping malls to sing loud rap songs to the annoyance of shoppers. Street fights between rival groups are very common.
Russia has its equivalent in "gopnik"note a term originating from "gop-stop", slang for street mugging. Etymologic principle is the same as for beatniks. Gopniks wear Abibas, Nyke, and Puwa, drink cheap beer, eat sunflower seeds, are obsessed with mobile phones (more often than not acquired by mugging), and are laughably stupid and violent. Some occasionally become full-fledged bros, most of them either grow up or piss off the wrong people and wind up in a gutter somewhere. Particularly stupid ones frequently try to pretend that they are either actual bros or have big-time connections, and they're usually the ones who wind up dead when they run afoul of the real deal.
Scotland has "Neds" (which are similar to chavs, although some argue distinct).
Singapore and Malaysia have counterparts: the "Ah Beng", "Ah Lian", and "Mat Rempit".
In South Africa, "zef" culture is generally maligned in much the same way England looks down on "chavs" and Australia is disdainful of "bogans". Die Antwoord grew out of zef culture and could be described as South African punk rock. "Baby's On Fire" is a good taster of zef culture.
Spain has one variant or two.
The main one is the "cani".note The female form would be "choni", also called "jessi" or "jenni" The canis usually sport mohawk-esque haircuts when male and tacky buns when female, and in any case wear big amounts of golden jewelry complete with gaudy-colored tracksuits and caps. They listen to reggaeton and underground flamenco, and love especially soccer, motorcycling, and ocasionally bodybuilding. On the streets, their trademarks are their distintively loud language, heavy drinking, uncultivated mentality and penchant for troublemaking, although they don't have an actual love for fighting and typically back away from brawls if they are not in a overt numerical advantage. The word "cani" apears to come from "canijo", a Spanish word for "skinny" which was formerly used a friendly insult among them.
There is also a branch called "bakala", which focuses on car tuning and electronic music, specially mákina and bakalao, which is the reason behind her name. They tend to be more peaceful and articulated, if similarly despise mental complexity, and prefer partying nonstop than anything else. They are more prone to mix alcohol with other drugs, and thoroughly love adrenaline. While the cani type is roughly scattered across the entire Spain, the bakala is more concentrated on the northern lands, and it's increasingly rare to find them in other areas. Interestingly, the pure bakala are mostly male, while the female members are often mixed with their cani homologues.
The UK has had a number of such stereotypes over the years.
First, there were the "Teddy boys", or Teds, of The '50s. They wore dressed in a manner inspired in equal parts by Edwardian fashion and zoot suits, and listened to American Rock & Roll and, before that, jazz and skiffle music. Female examples were known as Teddy girls and Judies. They're often cited as Britain's first youth subculture, and they were met with media hysteria like any other; in particular, they were associated with race riots against West Indian communities, and the film Blackboard Jungle was also known for sparking riots by Teddy boys wherever it was screened.
After that, there were the mods and rockers of The '60s. Mods were defined by an obsession with stylish clothes (tailored suits for the guys, miniskirts and androgynous clothes for the girls), their music of choice was modern jazz, R&B, and soul, their drug of choice was amphetamines, and their vehicles of choice were Vespa and Lambretta motor scooters. Rockers, meanwhile, had many similarities to American greaser culture (see below), replacing the hot rods with motorcycles but otherwise maintaining the choice of fashion and music, to the point where the terms "greaser" and "rocker" are seen as interchangeable in Britain. The rivalry between mods and rockers was heavily hyped by the media at the time, to the point where it was the origin of the term "moral panic", with the media jumping onto fights between the two groups to claim that there was a war going on between them. While both groups had working-class roots, there was also a Slobs Versus Snobs element to their rivalry — rockers saw mods as effeminate and trying to imitate the middle class, while mods saw rockers as crude thugs. (Incidentally, the skinheads, of all people, have their roots in the '60s mod scene.)
Football Hooligans can be found in many countries, but in '80s Britain hooliganism reached moral panic levels and took a heavy toll on the game itself. The name says it all — the defining characteristic of many hooligans was identification with one's favorite football team to the point of tribalism and violence against fans of other teams, with many forming supporters' clubs that were often closer to gangs in their structure and behavior. Hooliganism died down from its '80s peak with the reforms to English football in The '90s and government crackdowns on the "English disease", though it does still rear its head on occasion.
Finally, we come to the chavs, the modern Lower-Class Lout du jour. Their preferred fake brand is Burberry, and their slang includes such words as "innit"note "...is it not?", "Safe!"note "Wonderful!", "Sorted!"note "Done!" or "Ah, we no longer need to concern ourselves with this matter.", "mint"note "awesome", "battyman/battybwoy"note Jamaican slang for a gay man, used exclusively in a derogatory context, and "Brap! Brap!"note An onomatopaia for the noise made by a TEC-9, typically combined with a pair of Finger Guns being fired into the air Gangsta Style. They also may emulate British Caribbean accents and diction when speaking, but this is not a guarantee. Other names (that might be used depending where you are in the UK and may have slightly different criteria) include charva and scally. "Pikey" might also be used to describe them, but it was originally a slur directed at Travellers (and may be recognised as such).
The United States has several types, although they tend to be regionally based. The exact slang used is different, the exact labels might be different, but there's generally a lot of overlap.
The "guido" stereotype (or "guidette" for the girls) in the mid-Atlantic states, which combines most of the above with Italian-American culture and extreme ethnic pride. Music of choice is electronic dance-pop, and the vehicles are likely to be '80s American sports cars (the Camaro IROC is the stereotypical "guido-mobile") or German sport sedans. Personal appearance is a high priority for both the men and the women; the guys are frequently working out, slicking their hair back, and wearing muscle shirts to show off their "guns", the girls dress in club wear, hoop earrings, and high heels and wear massive amounts of makeup, and both sexes are regular customers at tanning salons. One particularly famous guido coined the phrase "gym, tan, laundry" (or simply GTL) to describe this lifestyle. Steroid usage, misogyny, violent homophobia, excessive alcohol consumption and usage of club drugs, and an overwhelming fondness for starting fights are also common behavioral stereotypes, but they aren't quite as thoroughly ingrained in the cultural consciousness.
The less-flattering stereotypes one finds in Boston about Southies can run into this. Like the guido, this stereotype is also ethnically rooted, in this case with Irish-American culture; sympathy for the IRA is the most stereotypical (and infamous) source of Patriotic Fervor.note This was a particularly big problem during The Troubles, as it wasn't uncommon for fundraiser events in particularly Irish parts of Greater Boston to actually be funding terrorism, supplying the Provos with arms and money.
The term "townie" is occasionally used as a more general epithet in New England. While it's technically used to refer to lifelong residents of a particular town or city, it's frequently used as a derogatory epithet to refer to crude, vulgar, loutish, and generally trashy individuals from working-class backgrounds. There's also some overlap with rednecks, but townies are generally distinct enough to be treated as a separate entity. Speaking of...
Rednecks. Let's not forget the rednecks, the other modern Lower-Class Lout du jour. This stereotype tends to focus more on racism, excessive drinking and drug usage (particularly methamphetamine and, more recently, prescription painkillers), filthy and unkempt appearances and property, and poor taste in women, and less on the tacky clothing (unfashionable, yes, but not tacky). There are other traits that overlap with the "gangsta" stereotype, namely a penchant for violence, open anti-intellectualism that is viewed with pride, lots of illegitimate children, a tendency to milk the welfare system as much as they can, and disproportionate pride in meager accomplishments that are usually just things that they should be doing in the first place.
The (usually) black urban equivalent is the gangsta. (That's the polite version; another common term is one that we can't say on this site.) Chris Rock did a famous sketch about this, which remains one of the canonical descriptions of the stereotype — violent, proudly ignorant, prone to crime and having kids out of wedlock, abusing the welfare system, and overly proud of what few accomplishments they have. The embracing of "sovereign citizen" beliefs and tactics has also become increasingly common among them in the past ten or so years.note Amusingly enough, the Posse Comitatus (the original movement that gave rise to the concept of the sovereign citizen) was rooted in white supremacist ideology, believing either that the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution (which granted full citizenship to freed slaves) was never properly ratified, or that a loophole in the phrasing of the amendment (namely, differences in capitalization that come down more to what was considered proper grammar in 1789 vs. 1866) created two different classes of citizenship, and that only white people could claim the first one, which conferred special rights. Later on, black supremacists turned this around to claim that, if they technically couldn't claim full citizenship, then that made them a separate nation outside the jurisdiction of the US government. The irony of this has not been lost on many of the prosecutors and judges who have had to deal with African-American sovereign citizens.
Juggalos are frequent targets of this stereotype, with most of the more unflattering stereotypes of rednecks (excessive alcohol consumption and drug usage, Destructo-Nookie relationships, using violence to solve disputes, poor parenting, and frequent milking of the benefit system) and chavs (widespread Pretty Fly for a White Guy tendencies (as the fanbase is mostly white), tacky clothing (band shirts and hoodies for Psychopathic Records artists and their associates, plus Hatchetman pendants), and tacky music (again, largely Psychopathic Records artists along with acts commonly associated with the label, particularly Tech N9ne, Kottonmouth Kings, Potluck, and Hed PE)) showing up. Faygo, a Detroit-area soft drink, is also common among them, with bottles of it frequently within reach.
There are also "refs", who are generally specific to South Florida, though any area with a heavy Cuban diaspora will do. They are stereotyped as being vapid, overly materialistic, extremely vain, and singlemindedly obsessed with partying and the club life, with tacky attire (lots of tracksuits, wifebeaters, and gold chains) and music (almost always exclusively a mix of Latin pop, reggaeton, and pop-rap) both showing up.
Finally, there are the "bros". While this term is also used to refer to spoiled East Coast frat boys and other college-age upper-middle-class males, the lower-class example takes the form of redneck-ish douchebags from rural and suburban areas who obsess over pickup trucks and SUVs with myriad modifications that are ostensibly for offroad purposes, but seldom actually see any offroad use. Their preferred music is a mixture of pop-country (or "bro country"), aggressive hard rock (usually Nu Metal or Post-Grunge), pop-oriented hip-hop, and in some areas (particularly central California) deathcore, while their choice of TV viewing is largely dominated by UFC, football, and all things "extreme". Tacky clothing tends to focus on either MMA or extreme sports-themed brands like Tapout, Affliction, Fox Racing, and Monster Energy, or military-inspired clothing brands like Grunt Style (whether or not they actually served, they want people to think they did), while "tribal" tattoos are also common. Additionally, they tend to be particularly fond of "war arcade" first-person shooters, particularly the Call of Duty series. Their dialect is frequently an indecipherably-slurred mix of "urban" affectation, profanity, and homophobic slurs.
Greaser Delinquents are an older version of this trope most associated with The '50s. They tended to be Italian, Irish, or Latino and heavily involved in car culture; a Corvette, a Thunderbird, or an old '30s coupe tuned into a "hot rod" was what many greasers aspired to own. Leather jackets, slicked-up pompadours, and blue jeans or black khaki trousers were the defining look, and the music was Rock & Roll or rockabilly. While they've been looked upon with misty-eyed nostalgia for quite some time now, back then they were considered as loutish as any of the other groups on this list, and were the go-to "bad boys" for media of the era. Straight examples mostly died out by the end of The '60s, when they were largely replaced by outlaw bikers and gangbangers, and these days it's largely a retro aesthetic.
The military has the "dependapotamus" as an Always Female version of this trope. Typically the stay-at-home housewife of a soldier (though she may supplement the income with a low-skill service job or a multi-level marketing scheme), she married him for his money and military benefits and proceeds to exploit them to the fullest, spending most of her time vegging out on the couch watching tabloid talk shows and pulling the patriotism card whenever she gets into an argument, vicariously using her husband's military service to puff up her own ego. She may have been attractive (if trashy) before she got married, but afterwards, she let herself go with her lazy lifestyle and unhealthy diet.
Venezuela round all the lout under the umbrella terms of "marginal" (a semi-insulting term derived of the euphemism of "zona marginal" to refer to the barrios/shanty towns) and "Malandro" ("thug" is the closest translation) for the more criminally inclined. Generally stereotyped as living insanely cramped, fond of beer and cheap alcohol, listening to whoever is the lowest denominator of music at the time (currently vallenato, reggaeton, and bachata) at a deafening volume, either a devout of Santeria or an "evangélico" (think "Reborn Christian") from some charismatic-cult church, and if they are not thugs or jobless they are buhoneros (street sellers, often of the bed-sheet-on-the-floor variety) or mototaxists. The women wear too tight clothes, have a disturbing trend of getting pregnant at very young ages in the belief that The Baby Trap is a workable strategy (despite themselves and their mothers being proof that it does not work that way) and ending having many kids by several (absent) fathers, being proud of having criminal boyfriends as long as they give them money, and somehow manage to get their hair dyed (or at least bleached) and their nails done. The subcultures associated have changed: in the nineties, the to-go stereotype was a "joldan" who wore basketball attire, had their head shaved or with very short haircuts, owned (or aspired to) a pair of Air Jordan shoes, and spent their free time in their local basketball court and listening underground rap and technomerengue. In the noughties and new tens, the stereotype is the "tuki", whose distinctive appearance and jargon has been imortalized by a meme, listen to reggaeton and an Electronic Music derivative nicknamed "changa tuki", and all are bikers who drive like lunatics even by Venezuelan standards. The stereotype is summarily described by the phrase "tener el rancho en la cabeza" (having the shack inside the head), meaning that even when/if they get out of their marginal environment, their bad habits remain with them.
were often stereotyped as this, especially in jokes of the time period. They were typically depicted as dimwitted proletarians who wore tracksuit pants, cowboy boots, and mullets, dated Dumb Blonde hairdressers, and drove very aggressively with one elbow out the window. Manta drivers were mostly depicted as being from Bergheim