Can someone explain what どうせだったら means?

8 comments

1. どうせ is like an “anyway” or “after all” type of expression.

   https://eow.alc.co.jp/search?q=どうせ

2. どうせ・だったら

   If it was どうせ

   This seems to me to be the kind of thing where translation is context sensitive, but it kind of has the feeling of “if X was going to happen either way, then [the rest of the lyric].

3. song?

4. Take my answer with a grain of salt: non-native speaker, and this isn’t a construction I’m familiar with on a deeper/ more intuitive level.

   In general, どうせ means something along the lines of “at any rate, anyhow”. I might translate どうせだったら as “whatever else may have been the case…”

   どうせ would indicate that, despite some premise, a certain proposition is sure to be (or felt to be) true.

   “If I’d known” is probably a more creative reinterpretation of the song lyrics. It might fit the vibe of the song, and the general emotional context of this line, even if it’s not an accurate one-to-one translation.

   Some links:

   * https://hinative.com/questions/25072469
   * https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/5899/how-to-decide-to-use-%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%9B-or-%E3%81%97%E3%82%87%E3%81%9B%E3%82%93

   EDIT: I read どうせだったら as being a more emphatic form of どうせ, with どうせ complementing the second part of the sentence. If どうせ pairs semantically more with だったら, it might mean “if [that] was [the case] after all”. If a native speaker sees this, I’d be curious to know what their intuition is.

5. Popping in to give a shout out to [youglish.com](http://youglish.com) if you haven’t used it before (not affiliated, just think it’s cool 🙂

   You can blast through a bunch of real-world vide examples of a particular word of phrase being used to help get a feel for it: [https://youglish.com/pronounce/%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%9B%E3%81%A0%E3%81%A3%E3%81%9F%E3%82%89/japanese](https://youglish.com/pronounce/%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%9B%E3%81%A0%E3%81%A3%E3%81%9F%E3%82%89/japanese)

6. “どうせ X だったら” is a colloquial form of “どうせ X ならば,” where X is often omitted when it is clear from the context. どうせ here roughly means something similar to

   “anyway” as in “Well, it doesn’t matter anyway”

   “regardless” as in “He’s not gonna change regardless”

   or something along those lines. It is a somewhat dismissive sense of “same difference,” “doesn’t make a difference,” “in the end, it’s the same” etc. Here are some examples:

   どうせずっと日本語話せたらなって思ってたんだし，今日から勉強始めるのも悪くないよな，(Since I always wanted to speak Japanese, I might as well start learning it today.) [Here, the connotation carried by どうせ is that, if you don’t start your learning Japanese today, it doesn’t change the fact that you’ll still be wanting to speak the language and will end up learning it anyway.]

   どうせここまで日本語勉強したんだし，文句言わずに勉強続けろよ．(Why don’t you stop whining and just do it when you are already this deep into Japanese learning?) [The connotation carried by どうせ is that whining doesn’t do anything and surely it doesn’t change the fact that you’ve spent lots of time.]

   Here is an example similar to the first one above but with “どうせだったら” form:

   どうせだったらさっさと日本語勉強始めてたらよかったな．(I wish I had started learning Japanese early.)

   Here, the implied sense is that while the speaker didn’t start learning earlier when they could, they ended up start learning Japanese “anyway.” どうせだったら like this is particularly useful when you want to express your regret.

   So, どうせ in the lyrics in question adds the sense that the speaker could have done something differently (i.e., 男らしく余裕を見せる), but didn’t. So, it’s like, “in the end, I still like him/her as before, and I wish I did it/behaved differently.”

7. i love this song sm haha

8. [どうせ](https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%9B) in a hypothetical or conditional situation suggests that if you have to do something or deal with something anyway, it’s better to take the initiative and do something positive or proactive rather than just passively accepting it.

   どうせだったら implies a situation where something is already in progress or has been decided. It suggests that since you’re already in the process of doing something, you might as well consider getting something nicer or better.

   The similar phrase どうせなら, on the other hand, is more about suggesting a better alternative or option before something starts or is fully decided, encouraging you to choose the better option from the start.

   Since it’s lyrics, the situation is a bit ambiguous. If I interpret it as どうせ（君といるん）だったらもうちょっと, the literal translation would be something like: ‘If I was going to be with you anyway, I should’ve shown a bit more confidence and acted more manly.

   Examples:

   * どうせなら、これも一緒にやろう: If we’re going to do it anyway, let’s take care of this too.
   * どうせだったら、これも一緒にやろう: Since we’re already at it, let’s take care of this too.
   * どうせなら、もう少しいいのを買おう: If we’re going to buy it anyway, let’s get a nicer one.
   * どうせだったら、もう少しいいのを買おう: Since we’re already buying it, let’s get a nicer one.