Tall poppy syndrome

Tall Poppy Syndrome (TPS) is an Australian (particularly) description of a levelling social attitude, pushed to the point of bad behavior. Someone has TPS, when he is shows himself envious of someone who is placed in a higher social, political etc. position than himself. TPS can also make the envious person slanderous about the better-positioned person. This originates from the Roman tyrant, Tarquinis Superbus, who when he learnt that his son Sextus was coming to slay him , went into his garden, took a stick, and symbolicly swept it across his garden, thus cutting off the heads of the tallest poppies that were growing there.