Yonen kamisama, sannen tennō, ninen shimin, ichinen dorei: fourth-year students are gods, third-year students are emperors, second-year students are citizens, and first-year students are slaves. A 1991 paper in a bulletin of Kagoshima University cites the phrase as a way in which the hierarchy of university sports clubs was mocked and criticized.
The sports magazine Number used a short form in a headline that rejects it: Yonen kamisama, ichinen dorei de wa nai. It is not fourth-year gods and first-year slaves.