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In a particular story, one character is getting tortured, and his friend, who was betrayed by him, says this:

普通敵にしたりされるようなことを友達にされるってのはどんな気分だ?

I can infer that the speaker is saying something along the lines:

How does it feel, having done it by a friend what you normally do to your enemies?

How does 敵にしたりされる work here? Does it really mean "What you do to your enemies (and such)" or "What you are done by your enemies (and such)" ?

jarmanso7
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Bluegate
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  • I don't feel confident enough on this one to elaborate an answer, but I think 普通敵にしたりされるようなこと means "things you would normally be done by your enemies" and not "things you would normally do to your enemies". This is my conclusion after removing たり and reevaluating the sentence: 普通敵にされるようなことを友達にされるってのはどんな気分だ? so probably たり here acts just like や or なんて: 普通敵 なんて にされるようなこと. But I'm just guessing. – jarmanso7 Nov 24 '23 at 22:58
  • ^ 普通敵 なんて にされるようなこと <-- 「敵なんかに～」ならいいですが「敵なんてに～」はダメです。「Nなんかが」「Nなんかを」とかはいいけど「Nなんてが」「Nなんてを」は言わないでしょう – chocolate Nov 25 '23 at 00:50
  • @chocolate コメントする前に、「なんてに」も「なんかに」もどちらも言えるかな、と思っていたが…やっぱり「なんてに」ダメなんですね。ありがとうございます、勉強になりました！ – jarmanso7 Nov 25 '23 at 08:27
  • I would have never guessed the speaker meant 敵にしたりされたりする... – aguijonazo Nov 26 '23 at 04:54

2 Answers2

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I think your understanding is correct. 普通敵にしたりされるようなこと is the same as 普通敵にしたりされたりするようなこと. The second たり is omitted, which is common in recent informal speech.

普通敵にしたりされるようなこと
= 普通敵にしたりされたりするようなこと

things that [you] normally do to or are done by an enemy

This is a shorter way of saying two things:

普段敵にするようなことや、普段敵にされるようなこと

things you normally do to an enemy and things you are normally done by an enemy

From an English perspective, に may seem to have the function of "to" and "by" at the same time, but it's the same に in Japanese.

So a literal translation of the entire sentence would be:

[普通敵にしたりされるようなことを友達にされる]ってのはどんな気分だ?

How does it feel like when [things that you normally do to or are done by an enemy are done by your friend]?
→ How does it feel like when a friend does something to you that you'd usually expect from an enemy?

naruto
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Keep in mind how ~たりする typically works in modern Japanese,.... to do things like.

敵にしたりされる

parses as

They have things done by their enemies

adding ようなこと nominalizes this into

those things that they would have done by their enemies

Overall, I would translate this sentence as

How does it feel? To have done [those things] by a friend that you would normally have done by your enemies.

A.Ellett
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    What about 敵にされたりする ? – jarmanso7 Nov 24 '23 at 23:22
  • @jarmanso7 I'm not sure that's how the grammar of ~たりする works. The verb filling in for ~ seems to always be the root verb and never an inflected form of the root verb. It always seems that the する part is the part that gets further inflected. – A.Ellett Nov 24 '23 at 23:25
  • I understand, and yet something is puzzling in that に is used to mark the agent with the passive form of a verb, but in this case, it seems like に is "separated" from される by したり. That is to say, I have trouble accepting that we can split 敵にされる while keeping this agent marker use of に at the same time. I don't know if I'm making sense... – jarmanso7 Nov 24 '23 at 23:31
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    @jarmanso7 - 敵にされたりする is fine. I even prefer it to 敵にしたりされる. – aguijonazo Nov 24 '23 at 23:56
  • @aguijonazo I think you should post an answer. As a nonnative speaker, I clearly don't understand the permissible variations these forms can take on. – A.Ellett Nov 25 '23 at 00:11