Dated colloquial pronoun, often derogatory or dismissive. Used to refer to a group of people the speaker looks down on or feels distant from. Modern equivalents include あいつら or 彼ら.
What do those guys know, anyway?
In old novels, villains are sometimes called 彼奴ら.
Standard kanji spelling for this dated colloquial pronoun.
Variant spelling using 等 for the plural suffix.
Derived from 彼奴 (きゃつ, an old derogatory third-person pronoun) with the plural suffix ら. The exact origin of きゃつ is uncertain, but it may be a contraction of 彼 (か) + 奴 (やつ).