(n.) The quality or state of being flat, thin, or insipid; flat commonness; triteness; staleness of ideas of language.
(n.) A thought or remark which is flat, dull, trite, or weak; a truism; a commonplace.
Example Sentences:
(1) In any case, people had tired of combative rhetoric and wanted softer platitudes.
(2) It’s clear she lends a sympathetic ear to many reformist ideas; in London last year she said: “We must constantly renew Europe’s political shape so that it keeps up with the times.” Beyond the platitudes, Merkel is open to reforms to the internal market, to competitiveness, to the bureaucracy and even to some of the institutions.
(3) Mills said: "Young people are not going to settle for the political platitudes that were sold to the post-independence generation.
(4) She said no surprises about the election date should mean "no excuses", a clear barb at the conservative opposition leader, Tony Abbott, whom she has criticised as announcing "platitudes not policies" and giving few costings for his promises.
(5) The duke’s statements about business, which to our tin ears sound like simplistic platitudes of the first water, are in fact fantastically complex and prescient exercises of soft power without which our economy simply could not function.
(6) Of course, at the end of the day, though, what workers really need is pay, not platitudes.
(7) Don Berwick's report on patient safety in the NHS has been attacked for being "strong on platitudes" and lacking in clear instructions.
(8) Johnson is the master-builder of that image, deflecting every lie, every gaffe, dishonesty and U-turn with some self-deprecating metaphor: calling his feigned indecision “veering all over the place like a shopping trolley” was worth a world of worthy platitudes.
(9) She provides a strong contrast to her sanctimonious, humourless sister Mary, who spouts empty platitudes about acceptable female conduct.
(10) Time and time again Corbyn ducks saying things like that, preferring to shelter behind platitudes like “give peace a chance”.
(11) Humble and hard working” may be the standard response from footballers asked about their team-mates but with Gabriel it gets repeated so often and in a tone so convincing that it no longer sounds like a platitude.
(12) Such “we are all one world” platitudes infuriate those whose families and communities will bear the impact of any new migration, coming from those who have no intention of bearing it at all.
(13) By and large, however, Obama stuck to empty platitudes that no one could disagree with (“we need to ... protect our children’s information” and “I intend to protect a free and open internet”) rather than offering concrete new proposals.
(14) Please don't give me the "aunts are loved too" platitudes.
(15) Enough platitudes and excuses: here is the truth about this week of sexism Read more But you don’t just tell people to respect women, you show that you respect women.
(16) You know if you've read Capital or if you've got the Cliff Notes , you know that his imaginings of how classical Marxism – of how his logic would work when applied – kind of devolve into such nonsense as the withering away of the state and platitudes like that.
(17) Now we're onto the junior senator, Kirsten Gillibrand, who is spouting equally meaningless platitudes.
(18) "We need everybody to remember how we felt 100 days ago and to make sure that what we said was not just a bunch of platitudes.
(19) I’m not interested in platitudes or buzzwords like “anti-austerity” or “aspiration”.
(20) Malcolm Turnbull refuses to denounce Trump's travel ban Read more Facebook Twitter Pinterest Turnbull: ‘When I have frank advice to give an American president, I give it privately’ This is not the time for the Australian government to offer mealy-mouthed platitudes about not commenting on the policies of other countries.
Quoted
Definition:
(imp. & p. p.) of Quote
Example Sentences:
(1) Quotes Justin Timberlake: "Even more importantly customers love it … over 20 million listening on iTunes Radio, listened to over a billion songs.
(2) Those sort of year-to-year comparisons can be helpful to visualise changes in the market landscape, but in fast-changing markets it's not enough just to quote a single number.
(3) In a recent book about the life of Rudolf Höss who was the commandant at Auschwitz, he is quoted as saying of himself that he was not a murderer, he was “just in charge of an extermination camp”.
(4) Quoting the BBC-commissioned survey of more than 2,000 adults, Lyons said they had been given six choices what to do with the licence fee surplus once digital switchover was complete.
(5) Her success has not been universally welcomed - anonymous colleagues are occasionally quoted in the media portraying her as "ambitious" and "bossy".
(6) Nickname: SuperSarko the Omnipresident Quote: "What made me who I am now is the sum of all the humiliations suffered during childhood."
(7) Another source inside the centre, quoted earlier on the Detained Voices blog, said detainees had banged on their doors throughout the lockdown.
(8) Kerry presented Lavrov with a dossier of quotes from Russian media that “do not help improve Russian-American relations”, according to Russian television.
(9) This has "nothing to do with any of our businesses," Koch spokespeople were quoted as telling the congressman's staff members in a May 20 letter that Waxman sent to Reps. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the Energy and Commerce Committee chair, and Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), who chairs the Energy and Power Subcommittee.
(10) Mark Rasch, a cyber crime expert quoted by the FT, meanwhile said recent events have been “a serious and devastating attack to [Sony’s] reputation and image”, and his opinion is played out by a new YouGov poll into the public perception of Sony’s brand.
(11) "We are probably steering towards Russia turning off its gas provision," he was quoted as saying.
(12) However, LaBoeuf's subsequent apologies were themselves discovered to have been copied from other sources ; his quoting of Cantona's lines are entirely true to form.
(13) At the end of the article the Department for Work and Pensions is quoted as saying that it’s “misleading to link food bank use to benefit delays and sanctions”.
(14) As well as a portrait of Austen, the new note will include images of her writing desk and quills at Chawton Cottage, in Hampshire, where she lived; her brother's home, Godmersham Park, which she visited often, and is thought to have inspired some of her novels, and a quote from Miss Bingley, in Pride and Prejudice: "I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!"
(15) A 3 week immunization schedule is suggested where BCG and C. parvum are used as immunotherapeutic agents, in the doses quoted.
(16) A member of the P2PFA ThinCats ThinCats logo Date launched January 2011 Quoted returns Lenders can earn "between 6% and 13%".
(17) BUSH ON IRAQ TONIGHT: Mr President, if I can move on to the question of Iraq, when we last spoke before the Iraq war, I asked you about Saddam Hussein and you said this, and I quote: "He harbours and develops weapons of mass destruction, make no mistake about it."
(18) These concentrations were less than the routinely used half-saturated solutions and different from the sometimes quoted one-third-saturated solutions.
(19) US Banker magazine, which ranked her the fifth most powerful female banker in the US, has quoted her as admitting to preaching a work-life balance but admitting: "I don't have much of one myself."
(20) "Strong voices from across the Republican spectrum agree with the fundamental point – the nation, and the GOP, need to act on immigration.” • This article was amended on 31 January 2014 to correct the attribution of a quote.