(v. t.) To put to a wrong use; to misapply; to misuse; to put to a bad use; to use for a wrong purpose or end; to pervert; as, to abuse inherited gold; to make an excessive use of; as, to abuse one's authority.
(v. t.) To use ill; to maltreat; to act injuriously to; to punish or to tax excessively; to hurt; as, to abuse prisoners, to abuse one's powers, one's patience.
(v. t.) To revile; to reproach coarsely; to disparage.
(v. t.) To dishonor.
(v. t.) To violate; to ravish.
(v. t.) To deceive; to impose on.
(v. t.) Improper treatment or use; application to a wrong or bad purpose; misuse; as, an abuse of our natural powers; an abuse of civil rights, or of privileges or advantages; an abuse of language.
(v. t.) Physical ill treatment; injury.
(v. t.) A corrupt practice or custom; offense; crime; fault; as, the abuses in the civil service.
(v. t.) Violation; rape; as, abuse of a female child.
Example Sentences:
(1) Unfortunately, due to confidentiality clauses that have been imposed on us by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection, we are unable to provide our full names and … titles … However, we believe the evidence that will be submitted will validate the statements that we are making in this submission.” The submission detailed specific allegations – including names and dates – of sexual abuse of child detainees, violence and bullying of children, suicide attempts by children and medical neglect.
(2) The authors empirically studied the self-medication hypothesis of drug abuse by examining drug effects and motivation for drug use in 494 hospitalized drug abusers.
(3) Alcohol abuse remains the predominant cause of chronic liver disease in the Western world.
(4) With respect to family environment, a history of sexual abuse was associated with perceptions that families of origin had less cohesion, more conflict, less emphasis on moral-religious matters, less emphasis on achievement, and less of an orientation towards intellectual, cultural, and recreational pursuits.
(5) An official inquiry into the Rotherham abuse scandal blamed failings by Rotherham council and South Yorkshire police.
(6) Former detectives had dug out damning evidence of abuse, as well as testimony from officers recommending prosecution, sources said.
(7) After these two experimental years, a governmental institute for prevention of child abuse and neglect was organized.
(8) Stringer, a Vietnam war veteran who was knighted in 1999, is already inside the corporation, if only for a few months, after he was appointed as one of its non-executive directors to toughen up the BBC's governance following a string of scandals, from the Jimmy Savile abuse to multimillion-pound executive payoffs.
(9) History contains numerous examples of government secrecy breeding abuse.
(10) This preliminary study compared the level of ego development, as measured by Loevinger's Washington University Sentence Completion Test (SCT), of 30 women with histories of childhood sexual victimization, and 30 women with no history of abuse.
(11) The District became a byword for crime and drug abuse, while its “mayor for life” lived high on the hog and lurched cheerfully from one scandal to the next.
(12) An official from Cafcass, the children and family court advisory service, tried to persuade the child in several interviews, but eventually the official told the court that further persuasion was inappropriate and essentially abusive.
(13) A series of hierarchical multiple regressions revealed the effects of Surgency, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and Intellect on evoking upset in spouses through condescension (e.g., treating spouse as stupid or inferior), possessiveness (demanding too much time and attention), abuse (slapping spouse), unfaithfulness (having sex with others), inconsiderateness (leaving toilet seat up), moodiness (crying a lot), alcohol abuse (drinking too much alcohol), emotional constriction (hiding emotions to act tough), and self-centeredness (acting selfishly).
(14) Its abuse has become concentrated among post-high school age, black males in a limited number of cities, especially Washington, DC.
(15) From a clinical standpoint, it is clear that psychiatrists caring for anxious patients must be aware of the possibility of secondary alcohol abuse.
(16) A thorough nursing assessment is essential to detect and correct drug misuse and to diagnose drug abuse.
(17) Substantial percentages of both physicians and medical students reported access to drugs, family histories of substance abuse, stress at work and home, emotional problems, and sensation seeking.
(18) Subjects with past history of chronic substance abuse, neurologic disease, or focal findings on MRI or CT were excluded.
(19) And any Labour commitment on spending is fatally undermined by their deficit amnesia.” Davey widened the attack on the Tories, following a public row this week between Clegg and Theresa May over the “snooper’s charter”, by accusing his cabinet colleague Eric Pickles of coming close to abusing his powers by blocking new onshore developments against the wishes of some local councils.
(20) Again, the boys in care that he abused now speak to us as broken adults.
Vituperative
Definition:
(a.) Uttering or writing censure; containing, or characterized by, abuse; scolding; abusive.
Example Sentences:
(1) This school of thought has had a massive surge in disciples of late, as the dust settles in the aftermath of the credit crisis; now that the second wave of the credit crunch appears to be upon us, the baying for blood has become even louder and more vituperative.
(2) But most critics, it seemed, were damning and vituperative.
(3) People are afraid because they understand that gay propaganda is banned, and even mentioning LGBT relations is essentially forbidden.” Klimova herself has been the subject of vituperative online commentary after creating Deti-404 in spring 2013.
(4) Gradually, he came to write fewer vituperative articles and more ruminative ones on music (especially Wagner), literature and the arts, though never forsaking his pet hates - lawyers, especially judges, and home secretaries, nor his second love after music - food.
(5) The conspiracy theorists who have taken over Poland Read more With a penchant for conspiracy and a vituperative speaking style, Jarosław Kaczyński routinely brands his opponents “gangsters”, “cronies”, and “reds”.
(6) At a time when much smaller ideological differences are regularly the occasion for vituperative ad hominem attacks, Hobsbawm should serve as an example of how civilised people can differ about big questions while agreeing about much else.
(7) His victory came after one of the most bitter and vituperative run-ups to the prize in living memory - not among the shortlisted writers, but from dismayed and bemused commentators who accused judges of putting populism above genuine quality .
(8) In an extraordinary interview, sometimes humorous and sometimes vituperative, West returned again and again to those who would thwart his desires to expand way beyond music, and to pointing out that black people are routinely denied the opportunities granted to white people.
(9) Defence expenditure has been a longstanding irritant in the North Atlantic alliance, but it was the vituperative nature of Trump’s delivery, combined with his petulant body language, that convinced the allies they had better look to each other if they wanted a sense of direction.
(10) Well, yes, that is the law of our country, not however a nicety often afforded to the victims of his titles, and here I refer not only to hacking but the vituperative portrayal of weak and vulnerable members of our society, relentlessly attacked by Murdoch's ink jackals.
(11) Complaints from early guests, traced by an archaeologist, Gary Marshall, were vituperative.
(12) Earlier this month Murdoch was vituperative about how search engines have aggregated news .
(13) He was the subject of films, cartoons and at least one rock song, by Scritti Politi; he generated both adulatory and vituperative journalism; and he wrote some of the most formidably difficult philosophical works of his time.
(14) The librarians know it's a racket, but they feel powerless to act because if they refused to pay the monopoly rents then their academics – who, after all, are under the cosh of publish-or-perish mandates – would react furiously (and vituperatively).
(15) Fry took aim at the "stinking, sliding, scuttling, weird, entomological creatures" who leave abusive comments on blogs, whose "resentment, their desire to be heard at the most vituperative level, at the most unpleasant and malevolent, genuinely ill-willed malevolent, level is terrifying".
(16) On a less elevated note, all three painters were also the victims of vituperative reviews and critical miscomprehension during their careers.
(17) The Tory MEP Daniel Hannan's vituperative assault on Brown in the European parliament, which became a global internet hit, was named speech of the year, while James Purnell's dramatic call as he quit the cabinet for the PM to "stand aside" secured him resignation of the year from among a larger than -usual field of candidates.
(18) Alain Badiou , venerable Maoist, 75-year-old soixante-huitard, vituperative excoriator of Sarkozy and Hollande and such a controversial figure in France that when he was profiled in Marianne magazine they used the headline "Badiou: is the star of philosophy a bastard?
(19) Next year brings the referendum, and with it a vituperative Tory schism.
(20) During the early phase of this parliament, when the Labour party was often more vituperative about the Lib Dems than it was about the Tories, Ed Miliband used to say that he could "never" imagine himself being in coalition with Nick Clegg .