A fork of Rural Dictionary
1. Men's close fitting, ribbed, sleeveless white cotton undershirt most commonly used before T-shirts came into vogue as undergarments. It is named wife beater after Marlon Brando's character, Stanley Kowalski, who wore one during much of the movie version of Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire." Stanley proved to be a sloppy, drunken, ill-tempered brute who beat his wife.
2. Slang name in Britain for a Belgian lager, Stella Artois, mostly because of the name, Stella, after Stella Kowalski, the victim of a beating from her husband, Stanley, in the aforementioned Tennessee Williams' play, "A Streetcar Named Desire," but also because of the high alcohol content which could possibly lead one to wife beating were he so pre-disposed.
"That fellow wearing the wife beater has knocked back 3 wife beaters in less than half an hour!"
In the UK, originally the white string-vest, but most vests/tank tops get reffered to as Wife-Beaters.
The oniginal example was so called due to the fact that the main type of person who wears string-vests was usually a fat, wife-beating, alchoholic.
...look at that fat man in that wife-beater...
A man coming home after a long business work day, takes his shirt of and is only dressed with a white singlet on top and his business pants and shoes on the bottom, his day has been long and hard and he takes his frustration out on his wife.
He wears a wife beater to be intimidating
a very tight, white tank top that is ribbed in texture. this style of shirt is usually found on overweight white guys hailing from the trailer courts. unmistakeable markings of bbq sauce or chew spit on the front and smelling of old style beer and excessive perspiration. the wearer can be found at any type of festival which involves his toothless relatives working the carnival rides.
dude, let's go to the state fair and check out all the trash wearing wife beaters.