Totalled SuperChargeA4

i have a mid size shelf system that i am trying to hook up to a semi home system

it has only 2 rca out for surround speakers and 1 rca out for subwoofer

so i went out and bought 2 small speakers for the surround (rear) however, those speakers only has clip style speaker wires connections

the sub i have has 2 rca low level in and 4 clip style high level in.

questions is, can i use speakers wire and connect them as rca? i tried that with the surround speakers but there's a grounding problem and it keeps shorting out the system, i used a Y split for the sub and there's no signal at all

so what did i do wrong? i figure i can just get a pair of rca wire and the sub should be fine, however, what about the surround speakers?

thanks

Clout

not only because this is totally off-topic here, but also because there are a lot of audiophiles over there.

ex-quattro PETE

Another words, this is just providing line-level signal which needs to be amplified first before going to speakers.

It also applies to the subwoofer, but since most subwoofers have a built-in amplifier (self-powered sub), then that should work just fine.