What's the difference between cruel and grim?

Cruel


Definition:

  • (n.) See Crewel.
  • (a.) Disposed to give pain to others; willing or pleased to hurt, torment, or afflict; destitute of sympathetic kindness and pity; savage; inhuman; hard-hearted; merciless.
  • (a.) Causing, or fitted to cause, pain, grief, or misery.
  • (a.) Attended with cruetly; painful; harsh.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) China’s new law also restricts the right of media to report on details of terror attacks, including a provision that media and social media cannot report on details of terror activities that might lead to imitation, nor show scenes that are “cruel and inhuman”.
  • (2) Through small and large acts of deprivation and destruction we follow the process: the removal of hope, of dignity, of luxury, of necessity, of self; the reduction of a man to a hoarder of grey slabs of bread and the scrapings of a soup bowl (wonderfully told all this, with a novelist's gift for detail and sometimes very nearly comic surprise), to the confinement of a narrow bed – in which there is "not even any room to be afraid" – with a stranger who doesn't speak your language, to the cruel illogicality of hating a fellow victim of oppression more than you hate the oppressor himself – one torment following another, and even the bleak comfort of thinking you might have touched rock bottom denied you as, when the most immediate cause of a particular stress comes to an end, "you are grievously amazed to see that another one lies behind; and in reality a whole series of others".
  • (3) It goes on: "In a reality of ongoing occupation, of solid cynicism and meanness, each and every one of us bears the moral obligation to try to relieve the suffering, do something to bend back the occupation's giant, cruel hand."
  • (4) At one point, Walters speculates that “she looks the same weight as the Duchess – about 8st”; later, he disingenuously asks her to discuss “the cruel comments about being a ‘childless spinster’”, neither telling readers who made those “cruel comments” in the first place, or where.
  • (5) More here: UK regulator urges banks to speed up swaps mis-selling compensation 8.40am GMT More reaction to the decision to send riot police to evict people from the offices of Greece's former state broadcaster this morning , starting with journalist Nick Malkoutzis: Nick Malkoutzis (@NickMalkoutzis) 5 mths after flicking switch on public broadcaster ERT, gov't tries to settle issue by sending riot police to remove remaining staff #Greece November 7, 2013 Nick Malkoutzis (@NickMalkoutzis) While #ERT will be off air for good after police intervention, the stain of how its closure has been handled won't wash away easily #Greece November 7, 2013 Lady Mondegreen (@amaenad) Like a mean stupid dog appeasing a cruel master, the Greek government wants to lay ERT's limp body at the troika's feet.
  • (6) The government confirmed on Tuesday that the second year of the cull had begun, sparking outrage from animal rights activists, campaigners and opposition politicians who claim it is cruel and ineffective.
  • (7) Her friends have been arrested and subjected to what they describe as cruel and inhumane treatment .
  • (8) The jury decided unanimously Thursday that the Colorado attack was cruel enough to justify the death penalty .
  • (9) One of its board members is retired Major General Andrew James “Jim” Molan, co-architect of Tony Abbott’s “Operation Sovereign Borders,” the draconian program relying on the remote island detention centres condemned as cruel and inhumane by multiple respected human rights organisations.
  • (10) MOAB map “Isis were so cruel to us,” said Ahmad.
  • (11) Philip French championed Boyle's career from the outset, describing his debut feature film, Shallow Grave , as "a good piece of storytelling... Hitchcock would have admired its ruthlessness and cruel humour."
  • (12) S an Francisco is now a cruel place and a divided one.
  • (13) In a rather florid letter with classical, literary and historical references, he told her: "You, I already know from happy experience, will not be cruel to my tender flame … As I think of you I shall learn to love you more.
  • (14) Of course the timing was cruel, aimed at throwing the prime minister off balance just before what turned out to be a fairly successful Commons question time.
  • (15) He could be very charming, he could be very cruel, but he mattered and he put something together that was extraordinary."
  • (16) One of the first demands is that the bombardments by the regime and its [Russian] backers must end.” Merkel condemned the air raids on Syria’s second city as “inhumane and cruel”.
  • (17) While Liverpool seemed stretched by cruel successive away fixtures, Chelsea arguably mustered some of their finest attacking football of the campaign through that ferocious opening period.
  • (18) If you follow Twitter regularly, it's easy to believe that many of our fellow citizens are cruel, mean, misogynist and foul-mouthed.
  • (19) We perceive the circumstances of our youth as normal and unexceptional, however sparse or cruel they may be.
  • (20) "It's outrageous and cruel that people are taken off to detention and the families hear nothing until the body shows up with signs of abuse," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.

Grim


Definition:

  • (Compar.) Of forbidding or fear-inspiring aspect; fierce; stern; surly; cruel; frightful; horrible.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) This is the grim Fury on a rainy winter morning in Cannes.
  • (2) The level of prescribing of opioid painkillers – Percocet in Geni’s case – has soared, and with it the incidence of addiction, and addiction’s grim best friend: fatal overdoses.
  • (3) Patients with anti-NC1 antibodies were characterised by linear immune deposits along the glomerular basement membrane and the clinical outcome was invariably grim.
  • (4) The Mail branded the deal "a grim day for all who value freedom" and, like the Times, accused David Cameron of crossing the Rubicon and threatening press freedom for the first time since newspapers were licensed in the 17th century.
  • (5) ARD TV showing grim-faced FDP cadres: could this be the first time they fall out of national parliament in 60 years?
  • (6) It has said a better productivity performance and rising North Sea oil revenues will make the budgetary position less grim.
  • (7) Shields accepted that the Irish appeared more inclined to send up their grim fiscal situation than go out and riot.
  • (8) Inside the Islamic State ‘capital’: no end in sight to its grim rule Read more The Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) militia and an alliance of rebels known as the “Euphrates Volcano” – backed US-led coalition air strikes – have seized swaths of territory from Isis, including the strategic border town of Tal Abyad .
  • (9) Yet, if that flurry of form pepped optimism, the injuries and displays in recent friendlies have provided a grim reality check.
  • (10) The dark, luxury air in the silent bedrooms of empty riverside apartments, their identical curving blocks clustered in threes and fours, grim and silent as gill slits, will be theirs.
  • (11) Chinese media and bloggers published images of three young children in blue school uniforms lying dead on the pavement – a grim echo of the high casualty rate at poorly constructed schools in Sichuan in 2008, when a bigger quake killed 87,000 people.
  • (12) The BCC survey represents a turnround from the end of last year, when it was predicting stagflation – a grim combination of zero growth and inflation.
  • (13) The human rights organisation, which has produced a series of in-depth reports detailing the grim working conditions of many of the 1.5 million migrant labourers engaged in a huge construction boom, said “little has changed in law, policy and practice” since the government promised limited reforms 12 months ago.
  • (14) Carcinoma of unknown histogenesis or primary site is an increasingly recognized syndrome regarded by most physicians as having a grim prognosis.
  • (15) "There are times when a swingeing sentence can act as a deterrent", as the judge at the trial was grimly to pronounce.
  • (16) The footage beamed back from the liberated districts of Ramadi is grim: a ghost town littered with debris and smashed concrete, destroyed storefronts, plumes of smoke, the sound of gunfire piercing the air as Iraqi soldiers speak on camera.
  • (17) It was my shortcomings as coach that caused this result,” said a grim-faced South Korea manager, Hong Myung-bo, who spent most of the post-match press-conference scratching his nose in apparent distress and deflecting comments about whether he would stay on as manager until next year’s Asian Cup.
  • (18) After grim news on the recession, at least one thing should become clearer: going back to where we were is no longer an option.
  • (19) While deplorable and to a degree self-defeating, this insouciant defiance also makes a grim kind of sense, both historically and reinforced by recent events.
  • (20) The entity carries a grim visual prognosis, as all ten eyes initially had no perception of light; improvement to light perception occurred in one instance.