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In a shop I have found a T-shirt with the sentence: "Brake the rules" (not "Break the rules"). Is it correct?

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    Considering that the media on which it is written is often used to portray some short one-liner joke, I feel safe in assuming that it is meant to be a phonemic idiom of sorts. By chance, did the T-shirt have a picture of a car or automobile on it? "Brake" would refer both to break/sever (the correct word) and also the brakes/stopping mechanisms of an automobile.
    – Goodies
    Dec 15, 2014 at 8:12
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    It is probably a pun!
    – user66974
    Dec 15, 2014 at 8:13
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    Don't buy this shirt because most of the people will not understand it. And you will look like a...
    – ewooycom
    Dec 15, 2014 at 12:06
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    actually, since the T-shirt is sold in Italy, I am tempted to believe in a mistake.
    – wiso
    Dec 15, 2014 at 22:49

1 Answer 1

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It's a pun on break.

The slogan exhorts the reader to "Break the rules," and to make the point it does just that itself, by breaking the rule about how to spell break.

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