# to be plastic



## épuisette

hello!

if someone says "I'm not going to be plastic", does it mean that this person does not want to be fake?

that's the way I understand it, but I'm not sure I'm right.

any idea?


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## carolineR

I 'd say so 
plastic evokes plastic surgery or plastic money => phony things


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## épuisette

thanks, Caroline 

I'm glad I got it right


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## mally pense

Once again no context. For those of us who may be wondering in spite of your satisfaction with the reply, is there any chance you could post the context in this and any future posts?


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## carolineR

agreed !
even though I answered the question, how can we be sure it's the right answer ?


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## épuisette

Context is: 
a girl is about to meet a young man and explains her friend that she's not going to be plastic.

Sorry I didn't mentionned it before


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## mally pense

It's still unclear. Sorry, but it seems an unlikely thing to say in isolation. Maybe the preceding dialogue and the actual words used would be useful, but perhaps just take this as a note for future postings. It is easy to give too little context, it is almost impossible to give too much. It is as much in your own interest as anyone else's to take the trouble to explain because otherwise you cannot be sure that the advice you get is the best or even correct.


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## tandelol

I think it's pretty clear what the meaning is. "Plastic" means "phony" or "fake". Like a plastic doll. There's a Frank Zappa song called "Plastic People" that uses this meaning. People who are pretending to live an ideal life, but really it's all fake. As a result, they are shallow, they have no depth to their personality, nothing on the inside. If she says "I'm not going to be plastic", it means she's going to be herself and not try to be exactly what he wants. This is a very common adjective, at least here in the US. Does that help?


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## mally pense

It certainly does. I don't think the use of the word plastic as an adjective completely on its own is all that common in the UK, at least not in my experience.


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## tandelol

Interesting. Maybe it comes from California, which really does seem fitting. For all I know it was Zappa's song that got that phrase started here (he lived in Cali his whole life). Anyway, one of the great things about this site is new the stuff I learn about English.


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## david314

Et en français, s'il vous plaît?


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## Trisia

I wish we had a bit *more *context... I've heard the expression to mean that she's not going to give all the details (such as exactly what they did on that date).
Or, maybe it's just my twisted mind.


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## tandelol

Moi aussi, j'amerais savoir comment exprimer ce sentiment.


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## tandelol

Trisia, I've never never heard it in that context. It's very common in the US to say someone is plastic, meaning "fake", "shallow", like a mannequin in a store window, you know?


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## carolineR

david314 said:


> Et en français, s'il vous plaît?


difficile... je ne vois pas d'équivalent exact. Pas d'image en français comme le "plastic" anglais...
elle est complètement superficielle ? c'est bien plat


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## tandelol

Pas complètement superficielle. C'est quand quelqu'un a une espèce de personnalité faux ou stéréotypique, mais toujours conservateur...comme un politicien hypocrite ou comme une femme (ou homme) qui veux donner l'impression d'être movie star ou Barbie Doll. Si une fille dit:

"I won't be plastic with him." Elle veux dire "I will be a real person, I will be myself, I will not put on airs."


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## quoi29

N.B.  "Plastic" peut vouloir dire "souple" ou "flexible" aussi.

Ex: "The brain of a young child is very plastic."


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## tandelol

Interesting quoi29, I have to disagree with that context, and if someone said that I wouldn't be sure of what it means. I could maybe see saying "The brain of a young child is like clay." Plastic isn't really flexible. Also, there's no doubt that the common usage of "plastic" as an adjective to describe people is "fake". As an experiment I asked some people I know, what does "he/she's very plastic" mean, and they all said "fake".


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## pieanne

Une marionnette? (dans certains contextes)


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## quoi29

tandelol said:


> I have to disagree with that context...plastic isn't really flexible.



Well, it may be true that in informal speech "plastic" is sometimes used to describe a fake personality.  I was simply offering another usage (which happens to be the original sense of the word). In fact, you'll find that the FIRST definition of plastic is "malleable."


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## pieanne

Une poupée de son?


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## david314

carolineR said:


> difficile... je ne vois pas d'équivalent exact. Pas d'image en français comme le "plastic" anglais...
> elle est *(complètement) superficielle* ? c'est bien plat


 (It's) Close enough for me!


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## tandelol

Yes, but the first definition of the word plastic is not necessarily applicable to people. #5 comes close, but it doesn't give the full scope of usage and what the connotation is to the average speaker. This forum is about popular usage, and this thread is about usage in the sentence "she said she's not going to plastic with him on a date." You think she meant "I'm not going to be flexible?". Definitely not. Anyway, as we all know, dictionaries (including at answers.com) don't always give the full scope of popular usage of a word. 

Having said that, my American Heritage dictionary has almost the exact same definition (with the same examples) as what's at answers.com, but there's one more definition: "Marked by artificiality, pretension, or lack of originality." This is the definition that is most common when used as an adjective to refer to people.

However, if you say to someone "plastic". The first thing they thing of is the material used to make things (definition #6 at answers.com). If you say "Are you paying with plastic", it means "Are you paying with a credit card." This is extremely common (definition #10).

I'd be willing to bet any amount of money that the vast vast majority of Americans at this forum would agree that "She is really plastic" means "she's really fake", NOT "she's really flexible".


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## quoi29

tandelol said:


> Yes, but the first definition of the word plastic is not necessarily applicable to people.



Ok, fine. That definition isn't _necessarily _applicable to people.

I didn't include my post to contradict anyone, I just wanted to let people know that there are other meanings.  And when you say "plastic isn't really flexible" you're doing a disservice to people here who are trying to learn vocabulary.


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## tandelol

Peut-être: superficielle, et avec l'air (hypocrite) d'être gentille


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## Aoyama

I'm not going to be plastic", could be understood as "not going to be easily moulded or changed" , going with what quoi29 said 





> malleable


, refering to "plasticity", like plasticine (terre à modeler).
But that figure of speech is strange, or at least unusual, to me .


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## tandelol

French people know what plastic material is! That's not the question. It's not as common for lay people to refer to the plasticity of the brain as it is to use the word plastic in reference to a person as a rough synonym for the word "fake". Also, "plastic brain" is used in medical writings, but it is not used to refer to people's bodies and personality. It would be wrong to tell French people that they can use "plastic" exactly as they would use "flexible". I don't know if they say "the brain is plastic" in French, but this is not slang, and it should be pointed out that it refers SPECIFICALLY to the brain in this particular context. For example (thanks to google): 

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_wtd004291.html


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## tandelol

Here are the lyrics to an American song by Frank Zappa, trust me, in the USA saying a person is "plastic" is very very normal, common and understandable:

But you're Plastic people
Oh, Baby, now
You're such a drag

[...]


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## Aoyama

> Et en français, s'il vous plaît?


"Ne t'imagine pas que tu vas pouvoir me modeler comme tu veux" is one way (not too good but ...) to render that.


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## tandelol

Sorry, Aoyama, but that's not the context being expressed here. Trust me, as I've said 100 times, this is a very common saying in the US. I hear it a lot. Note that quoi29 is not disagreeing with my explanation of this context, (s)he is simply pointing out that there are other meanings.


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## Aoyama

> Here are the lyrics to an American song by Frank Zappa, trust me, in the USA saying a person is "plastic" is very very normal, common and understandable


That would mean, in simple terms, that "to be plastic" would/might have two meanings :
1- to be phony, a fake
2- to be malleable, easy to influence /to fashion
here, in that context, I would vote for the second alternative, even though I understand perfectly well what tandelol is saying. Frank Zappa and his song, from the mid seventies, may not be fitting our context here (but I may be wrong ...).


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## tandelol

Also, when someone in the US says "I'm flexible", it can mean two things, depending on the situation:

1. "I'm able to bend my body in extreme ways."

2. "I'm easy to deal with and to get along with" for example: "Do you want to eat Chinese food or Indian food?" Answer: "I'm flexible. I can go either way."

"Plastic" would never be used to represent these things. No one would say "I'm plastic, I can go either way."


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## Randisi.

I agree with Tandelol.

The usage of "plastic' in the sense of being a phoney person very common in the US. She doesn't want to be phoney with him.

(By the way, the Zappa song is played and sung to the tune of "Louie, Louie.")


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## tandelol

Aoyama, I've lived in the US for the last 34 years, born and raised. Trust me, it is EXTREMELY common for someone to say that people are "plastic" in the first context. Note that earlier in this thread a British person said they had not heard it in this context. Zappa's song is 100% relevant today. It is very very very common! I heard someone say it last week at work. They were referring to the residents in a Chicago neighborhood called Wicker Park. They said "Wicker Park used to be full of artists and great, cheap bars. Now that all the plastic yuppies have moved in it's just so fake. I friggin hate it." Or something like that. I must hear someone refer to a yuppy as plastic once a week in Chicago, because Chicago has a lot of neighborhoods that are getting overrun by condominiums, which attract yuppies. These are the kind of people we call "plastic". I use it all the time. This isn't a specialized term. It's very very common. It's not always a fair thing to say about someone you don't know, and true, poor people and artists can be phoney just as easily (and often are), but this is how it's used. Think of a really annoying, fake-smiling politician as well. I think I've said enough about it now...


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## Cosmic_lightning

mispost.  sorry


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## tandelol

Thanks Randisi. and Cosmic Lightening...I'm not even sure why the meaning here is being questioned. It's very simple.


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## Cosmic_lightning

I agree... must be just a North America thing. I use plastic all the time... as in "she's so plastic"... especially to mean "like a barbie-doll"... perfect and pretty and rich and exactly like every one of her friends. 

(I'm not sure if you were responding to my now-erased post or not... oh well)


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## tandelol

Yeah, Cosmic lightning, I was, but this post is great as well. Just so long as people understand what this word means in this context.


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## david314

carolineR said:


> difficile... je ne vois pas d'équivalent exact. Pas d'image en français comme le "plastic" anglais...
> elle est (*complètement*) *superficielle* ? c'est bien plat


  That's close enough for me.


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## pieanne

Now I understand "Plastic Bertrand"...


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## mally pense

> Note that earlier in this thread a British person said they had not heard it in this context.


 
To be accurate, I said I hadn't heard it "used as an adjective completely on its own", i.e. as a single-word description. I've absolutely no doubt that fake/phony is the intended meaning, and I'm equally sure that if I'd seen more of the dialogue this would have been clear to me at the start. To clarify, I _didn't_ say I hadn't heard it in this context (if it was me who was being referred to).

Notwithstanding the above, I've a nagging doubt that possibly it _is_ used as a single-word description in the UK, and have been half-expecting someone to come along and say so, but in the absence of such input, I'll assume for now that my assumption was correct. Although I can't think of any specific examples (or indeed find any), I think the word plastic would be used with this meaning in the UK, but only as part of a slightly longer descriptive phrase.


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## mally pense

> Now I understand "Plastic Bertrand"...


 
Interesting that it's "Plastic" rather than "Plastique" but I'm not sure it tells us too much, but it would be interesting to know if the "Plastic" in his assumed name has any of the connotations discussed here.


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## pieanne

mally pense said:


> Interesting that it's "Plastic" rather than "Plastique" but I'm not sure it tells us too much, but it would be interesting to know if the "Plastic" in his assumed name has any of the connotations discussed here.


It was meant to be in English I'm sure.
And yes, it wouldn't surprise me!


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## tandelol

I don't know about Plastic Bertrand, but there is a comic book character in the US called Plastic Man. I'm kind of contradicting myself here, but his ability is to be able to stretch: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_Man

This is not the same meaning as current slang, however. In the US, if you say "David is plastic", it means fake, and as I say, it's super common. It's a bad thing to be, and usually you would say something more like "David is too plastic, it's annoying." or "those people are so plastic". I don't know why someone would want to call themselves Plastic Bertrand in that context, because it is negative.


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## calembourde

Interesting... the first meaning I thought of when I saw the thread title was 'flexible'... i.e. I'm not going to let people bend me to their will. Maybe it's a regional difference. But if plastic is commonly used to mean fake in the US then that's most likely the meaning here. Even though my first interpretation was 'flexible', I wouldn't say that it's common in NZ English to say plastic for flexible in that context.

In fact if I hear 'he/she's so plastic' I am likely to think it means fake, but for 'I'm *not* going to be plastic', that meaning doesn't come through as immediately, so I went with 'flexible'.


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## Gil

My try:
Je ne serai pas artificielle.


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## tandelol

I've personally never heard anyone in the US use "plastic" to mean "flexible". The superhero is an exception, possibly because that was more the context when he was invented back in 1941.

I think "artificielle" works, but I don't believe there's a single word in French that describes the concept. You can say "she's artificial" in English as well, but that can apply to many kinds of people. As I and others have pointed out, it refers to certain kinds of people in society (like a preppy blonde cheerleader might be called plastic by a kid who's into heavy metal). So when someone says "I am not going to be plastic on my date with him" it means "I'm not going to try to be something I'm not in order to make him like me".


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