What's the difference between dross and scum?

Dross


Definition:

  • (n.) The scum or refuse matter which is thrown off, or falls from, metals in smelting the ore, or in the process of melting; recrement.
  • (n.) Rust of metals.
  • (n.) Waste matter; any worthless matter separated from the better part; leavings; dregs; refuse.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) We put stuff in there that was not really that good, but fortunately there were a couple of gleaming things that everyone remembers while they've forgotten the dross."
  • (2) In this region, nutritional deficiencies--a special diet for pregnant women composed of sour pomegranite seeds, black pepper, and garlic; consumption of bread contaminated with silica fibre; and ingestion of opium and opium dross--combined with long-lasting and daily thermal irritation of the esophagus with very hot tea play an important role in the development of this disease.
  • (3) Trump, who presents himself as a modern Midas even when much of what he touches turns to dross, has studied the conventions of journalists and displays more genius at exploiting them to his advantage than anyone else I have ever known.
  • (4) I’m going to enjoy being at Mardi Gras and going on that red bus because I can’t walk the distance.” Gary Schliemann, another 78er, says there is a lot of dross in the Mardi Gras parade but a lot of good floats shine through, such as No Pride in Detention.
  • (5) Even better, the Darwinian fact that these 21 books had remained in print for four decades meant that we did not have to wade through any dross – all our survivors had some merit – and, thanks to the open nature of the competition, I had the perfect opportunity to read several "genre" books I would not otherwise have picked up in a thousand years: the briny Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian, the aforementioned Bomber , which brilliantly describes the progress of an Allied air raid over 24 hours in the summer of 1943.
  • (6) Argentina 1-0 Switzerland (Di Maria 118) This game has been dross, but this goal is pure quality!
  • (7) Hopefully, sickened by the rancid, greedy human dross that runs and ruins our country, we will start to turn, respectfully, in our thousands to dogs, for a while, or even to the exclusion of anything else, because a dog is a flawless innocent.
  • (8) I'd rather have a career than a blazing penis of Freudian plant matter administered by a hack known for his dashing personal style, but thanks for the metaphor, Ross (aka "Dross").
  • (9) While that may be, as Palin suggests, because of "a couple of gleaming things that everyone remembers while they've forgotten the dross", it's also because they changed how comedy worked for ever.
  • (10) Fired up, as ever, with total enthusiasm for the next book, I immediately wrote UoW off as contemptible dross not worth bothering about.
  • (11) Yes, there were iconic shows from the US like Kojak and The Mary Tyler Moore Show, but these were just well made entertainments at the very tippy-topmost peak of a mound of dross.
  • (12) Cromwell protested at such "dross and dung", but consented to wear a purple gown and sit on Edward the Confessor's throne in Westminster Hall.
  • (13) By 1933, Adams was writing in the New York Times of the way the American dream had been hijacked: "Throughout our history, the pure gold of this vision has been heavily alloyed with the dross of materialistic aims.
  • (14) Having built one or two gems among the dross is hardly exclusive to Derry.
  • (15) It seems probable that in Iran an initiating carcinogenic factor may be the custom of eating opium dross, which has been shown to be mutagenic, as well as consumption of contaminated bread with extraneous seeds containing a large quantity of silica fibres, which is a strong stimulant of growth.
  • (16) His fiction was a product of this process, an inner alchemy that turned the dross of senseless suffering into something beautiful and life-affirming.
  • (17) The variation in CdB levels was not associated with child's age, nutritional status, iron status, family per capita income, blood lead level, being a child of a lead worker, the habit of pica, and contamination of child's peridomiciliar environment by smelter dross.
  • (18) Funnily enough though, he failed to mention that the academy that he felt was a beacon shining in a world of dross was in fact created by the Labour party.
  • (19) Pyrolysed substances, opium dross in north-east Iran and tobacco pipe residues in the Transkei, displayed mutagenic activity in Salmonella typhimurium strains TA98 and TA100 in the presence of rat liver microsomes.
  • (20) 11am: "Now dubbed 'The Battle of Beglin's Ear', last night's game was typical ITV fare: 95% total dross, 5% passable entertainment," harrumphs Justin Spencer.

Scum


Definition:

  • (v.) The extraneous matter or impurities which rise to the surface of liquids in boiling or fermentation, or which form on the surface by other means; also, the scoria of metals in a molten state; dross.
  • (v.) refuse; recrement; anything vile or worthless.
  • (v. t.) To take the scum from; to clear off the impure matter from the surface of; to skim.
  • (v. t.) To sweep or range over the surface of.
  • (v. i.) To form a scum; to become covered with scum. Also used figuratively.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) There, they learn that African Americans are the scum of the earth - then they are sent here.'
  • (2) The future is defined by the same old atavistic carnage as ever – which is, as Rosenbaum says, “an ingenious form of doublethink echoed in the very premise of a fantasy of the future beginning with “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away ...” Star Wars cast feel the Force after watching new trailer Read more I don’t hate Star Wars – I love the puppetry, just for starters, and all those beautifully dirty, scum-caked robots.
  • (3) I mean, these people have been described as evil, as scum of the earth, and if we’re paying them, bribing them, to turn back the boats, I mean that’s almost a crime.” Abbott: “Well Neil, the important thing is to stop the boats, that’s the important thing, and I think the Australian people are extremely pleased that that’s what happened.
  • (4) Though waterbirds, including moorhens and gulls, live on the margins, and a thin scum of litter is visible at the shore, the reservoir is not intended as a home to wildlife, and any fish living here are accidental visitors.
  • (5) Anyone who doubts or questions … will be relentlessly pursued by denouncers – “disgusting” is a modest term to describe this scum.
  • (6) Other Greeks with similar experiences said the far-rightists, catapulted into parliament on a ticket of tackling "immigrant scum" were simply doing the job of a defunct state that had left a growing number feeling overwhelmed by a "sense of powerlessness".
  • (7) The debate was interrupted after 20 minutes when about 30 student demonstrators walked into the hall and began to barrack Hunt, chanting "Minister of culture, Tory vulture" and "Tory scum".
  • (8) She was in my face saying, ‘You’re scum, you’re scum.’” That’s not accepted by Jordan.
  • (9) Liz Kendall, the former leadership contender, received a tweet calling for “a final solution to purge Blairite scum” like her from the party.
  • (10) The chants so far are the same as those at Millbank, and cries of "Tory scum" echo around the campus.
  • (11) When asked about Eddie Obeid's comments directed at her over the years, which included the allegations she had been " mixing with scum for so long that she no longer knows who is good and who is bad , what is real and what is made up," she said " It's not very nice, is it? "
  • (12) In the opening round of the tournament he shouted “dirty scum” during the third set of a comfortable victory over Diego Schwartzman.
  • (13) Half the class believed they represented “elitist scum”, but other prisoners defended their purpose, saying although they couldn’t attend one themselves, they now put their own children through private education.
  • (14) Liz Kendall, the former leadership contender, who is still undecided, received a tweet calling for “a final solution to purge Blairite scum” like her from the party.
  • (15) There were accusations of sexism when he gave a female candidate on The Apprentice the third degree about how she intended to organise her childcare and he prompted more outrage with an attack on professional footballers, which he described as "he biggest scum that walk on this planet".
  • (16) I will do everything it takes until we win full victory to free Ukraine from this scum, from this corrupt dirt which is capitalising on the blood of our soldiers and the victims of Maidan, and which has betrayed the ideas of the Ukrainian revolution,” said Saakashvili.
  • (17) Richard Davenport-Hines in his recently published An English Affair: Sex, Class and Power in the Age of Profumo writes that 1963 was the year when "the soapy scum flowed after the sluices of self-righteous scurrility were opened".
  • (18) We were just scared.” Witness reports describe protesters throwing snowballs at the bus and shouting “Let’s see what kind of vermin will get off here” and “asylum scum”.
  • (19) I'm just an ordinary person, I'm not scum, I'm not a thief or a junkie, but when you are desperate you end up resorting to desperate means.
  • (20) I salute them for that.” Class War, originally an eponymous newspaper as well as a movement, somewhat fizzled out during the 1990s but has been recently revived, standing six candidates in this year’s general election under the slogan: “Because all the other candidates are scum.” Class War is organising a protest this Sunday at a museum originally billed as celebrating the role of women in London but which ended up focusing on the crimes of Jack the Ripper .