Thanks, but no thanks?

Reader question:

Please explain “thanks, but no thanks” in this headline (Greenlanders say no to Trump, Politico.eu, March 12, 2025): Greenland had a message for Donald Trump as islanders went to the polls this week: thanks, but no thanks.

My comments:

Donald Trump, President of the United States, wants to annex Greenland, assuming Greenlanders would welcome the opportunity to become American citizens.

To that offer, Greenlanders reply in unison: Get the hell out of here.

That’s what “thanks, but no thanks” means here, pardon me for the hell-ish language.

They could have said simply: Thanks, but we’re fine as Greenlanders and being with Denmark.

That would’ve been a normal reply to a normal offer. That is, a normal, kind, generous offer.

Or, they could have just said, “no, thanks”.

That’d also be a normal and understandable reply. No, but thank you for the gesture.

But, instead, they said: Thanks, but no thanks.

And that really is an emphatic “No.”

What it means is, really: No thanks at all.

“Thanks, but no thanks” shows that Greenlanders are perceptive enough to see the sinister intentions behind Trump’s offer.

It’s up to you, of course, to decipher what Trump’s sinister intentions exactly are. Here, I’m just concerned with “thanks, but no thanks” as an expression.

As a reply, “thanks, but no thanks” is different from the normal, “thank you, but we can’t accept this offer” only in that the receiver thinks the offer is undesirable.

Like, very undesirable.

And by “thanks, but no thanks”, the receiver really means to say: No, and no thanks, either.

In other words, no thanks at all.

As a reply, “thanks, but no thanks” can be used sarcastically, too. So, it really depends on context as to whether the receiver of an offer is really upset or not.

All right, here are a few media examples of situations where “thanks, but no thanks” seems to be an apt reply:

1. Many Norwegians rejected on Friday a suggestion by U.S. President Donald Trump that they would be more welcome to move to the United States than immigrants from “shithole countries” such as Haiti or African nations.

The Nordic country, one of the richest in the world by GDP per capita, was last year named the happiest nation on the planet and is known for a cradle-to-grave welfare state funded in part by large reserves of oil and natural gas.

Trump mentioned Norway in derogatory comments about other countries of migration as U.S. senators briefed him on Thursday on a newly drafted bipartisan immigration bill, according to two sources who asked not to be identified.

One of the sources who was briefed on the conversation quoted him as saying: “Why do we want all these people from Africa here? They’re shithole countries ... We should have more people from Norway.”

In one of several Twitter posts on Friday, Trump defended his stance on a bipartisan Senate immigration deal, but denied using the vulgar language ascribed to him.

“The language used by me at the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) meeting was tough, but this was not the language used,” he said. He also later denied using derogatory language about Haitians.

“On behalf of Norway: Thanks, but no thanks,” tweeted Torbjoern Saetre, a politician representing Norway's Conservative Party in a municipality near Oslo.

Others condemned the U.S. president’s comments as inappropriate or racist.

“We are not coming. Cheers from Norway,” one woman wrote.

While hundreds of thousands of Norwegians emigrated to the U.S. in the 19th century, just 502 out of a population of 5.3 million people moved there in 2016, down 59 from the previous year, according to Statistics Norway.

- ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ – Norwegians reject Trump’s immigration offer, Reuters.com, January 13, 2018.

2. There was once a time when Aussie workers would be expected to “put in the hard yards” to get promoted and slowly climb their way up the corporate ladder, often through middle management positions. Gen Z workers are rejecting this traditional approach, in a growing trend dubbed “conscious unbossing”.

More than half of Gen Z workers (52 per cent) have said they don’t want to take on middle management roles, research from recruitment company Robert Walters found, with 16 per cent outright refusing to ever do the job. When asked why, 69 per cent said they thought the roles were “too high stress, low reward”.

Milly Bannister, a Gen Z boss and founder of youth mental health charity ALLKND, told Yahoo Finance she was a “living example” of someone who had side-stepped the traditional linear career and hustle culture.

“The ‘conscious unbossing’ trend is basically Gen Z, including me, saying, ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ to the old-school climb-the-ladder hustle,” Bannister said.

“Instead of chasing titles and bigger paychecks, we place more importance on - and are more interested in – wellbeing, autonomy, and finding purpose at work.”

Bannister said older Gen X and Baby Boomer workers often had a more traditional view of work ethic with “ingrained beliefs about duty and productivity”, which didn’t fit with younger workers’ values.

HR and workplace expert Jonathon Woolfrey told Yahoo Finance he was seeing the “conscious unbossing” trend play out in Aussie workplaces across the country, with virtually all industries impacted including the likes of healthcare, teaching and law.

“There’s more pressure, more stress and it doesn’t always come with significant positives such as a significant amount of increased pay or increased remuneration,” Woolfrey explained.

“[It doesn’t justify] Gen Z trading off the flexibility and the lifestyle that they can have when they don’t take on that extra responsibility.”

- Gen Z reject pay rises in new workplace trend: ‘Thanks but no thanks’, Au.finance.yahoo.com, October 16, 2024.

3. Shortly after President Donald Trump resettled into the Oval Office last year, Derek Wright took over as the chief of police in the poultry-processing boomtown of Springdale, Arkansas. He had joined the force 19 years before, and as he rose through the ranks, the area increasingly became a magnet for immigrants seeking good jobs.

Springdale is in the red northwest corner of the state where Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Trump’s former spokeswoman, is governor. Local Republican leaders remain close to Trump. This month, the president commuted the federal prison sentence of the son of the congressman for the area, who had been convicted of distributing methamphetamines

Still, not everyone’s at ease in Trump country.

Immediately after becoming chief, Wright heard complaints about federal immigration agents operating in Springdale, emboldened by mandates to arrest and detain undocumented immigrants. They were not identifying themselves to people, nor letting them know why they were being stopped, residents told Wright. He said he felt he had to intervene and started requesting to talk with an Immigration and Customs Enforcement supervisor. In an October meeting, finally face-to-face, Wright said he refused to enter a formal agreement to work with ICE and asked that immigration agents show respect and professionalism in the streets of Springdale.

“After the meeting, I’ve gotten substantially fewer complaints, and I know for a fact that they are still operating,” said Wright, 47.

…

Sanders also mandated that the state police participate in a program “to expedite deportations and enhance cooperation” with ICE.

“Thanks, but no thanks,” Wright said of the invitation he received to participate in a similar agreement.

- A Diverse Boomtown in Trump Country Says ‘Thanks, But No Thanks’ to ICE, TheMarshallProject.org, January 28, 2026.

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About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

（作者：张欣）