kick butt

Quote

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Definition

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to do well at something, to beat someone up

2. Use - Learn how the slang is used.

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When something kicks butt, it does a really good job. This can either work for you or against you.

If you kick butt at a game, that’s a good thing. You win! But if a game kicks your butt, it means the game was smarter, stronger, faster, or otherwise better than you. That’s not a good thing. You lost.

The phrase kick butt comes from fighting. If you lose a fight, you could say you got your butt kicked. If you win, you could say, “I kicked his butt!”

You see, when you get into a physical fight with someone, there’s a chance you’ll actually kick their butt. Like, between punches you might use your foot to kick them, and it might land on their butt. That would hurt.

Thus, this metaphor of fighting has been applied to almost everything else in life. If a car is a really good car, and it’s faster and cooler than the most other cars, you could say it kicks butt. If you really enjoy a particular class at school, you could say the teacher kicks butt. But you probably wouldn’t want to say that to the teacher directly. Kick butt is very informal slang.

Examples

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“This new workout plan I’m on is kicking my butt. I am really sore.”

“No one thought the Trailblazers would win, but they kicked butt and won by 40 points!”

“The kid tried to steal something and got his butt kicked by the security.”