What's the difference between ploy and subterfuge?

Ploy


Definition:

  • (n.) Sport; frolic.
  • (v. i.) To form a column from a line of troops on some designated subdivision; -- the opposite of deploy.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) 10.36am BST Mind Games Well come on then, let's have your thoughts on the best psychological ploys in football history.
  • (2) Chelsea , however, will not be too concerned if this match is added to the long list of games that is used to knock José Mourinho's ploys of conservatism and, ultimately, it is proven to be a valuable result.
  • (3) He wrote: “The NHS in Wales will not be the victim of any Conservative party ploy to drag its reputation through the mud for entirely partisan political purposes.
  • (4) The unsuspecting public may not realise that the call to avoid palm oil is nothing more than a trade ploy since in recent years palm oil has been very competitive and has gained a major share of the world's edible oils and fats market.
  • (5) Will he really go in the slower group of elite runners and not the pace set by Haile Gebrselassie, allowing his rivals a 30-second advantage at halfway, or is it a clever psychological ploy?
  • (6) But in an interview with Buzzfeed , he claimed the choice of lead, played by Jeremy Irvine, was a deliberate ploy to appeal to a heterosexual crowd.
  • (7) Yet Wenger talked about it jarring with his principles to base his entire strategy around ploys of conservatism.
  • (8) This is in part due to planned obsolescence – a devious ploy by manufacturers bolstered by marketing strategies to make us fall out of love with a product hastily.
  • (9) The link between Lynton Crosby and the tax haven could make uncomfortable reading for the prime minister, who has described legal ploys to avoid tax as morally wrong.
  • (10) For the most part, however, the home side were unashamed about their ploys of conservatism.
  • (11) That was Nigeria’s outlet ball all game, and was clearly a deliberate ploy on the part of Keshi.
  • (12) If the ploy had worked, Texas conservatives might have seen Dewhurst as the hero who saved the anti-abortion bill.
  • (13) This ploy has proven unsuccessful in all cases where scientific evidence was adequately presented by the state and in all important court cases where the issue was critically examined.
  • (14) The essence of his argument is that the programme is a ploy to displace poor people from their homes to divert resources to consultants and developers.
  • (15) What giant new claim on our fast-depleting personal wealth is the chancellor going to spring on us that requires such an elaborate ploy?
  • (16) For the owners, this bafflement is a deliberate ploy to enhance the wow factor of reaching the lively reception and bar.
  • (17) Earlier this month a federal district judge, Nelva Gonzales Ramos, struck down the law , slamming it as a cynical ploy on the part of Republicans to fend off the growing strength of the minority electorate in Texas by “suppressing the overwhelmingly Democratic votes of African Americans and Latinos”.
  • (18) This campaign is nothing but a self-interested and cynical ploy by the newspaper, a childish way of hitting back at the growing chorus of anti-Page 3 voices .
  • (19) Although light-hearted in character, Klinsmann’s ploy seems to have a serious purpose behind it as American interest in the World Cup reaches unprecedented levels.
  • (20) Boxer described the Republicans’ letter as “bizarre, inappropriate” and a “desperate ploy to scuttle a comprehensive agreement” that she said is “in the best interests of the United States, Israel and the world”.

Subterfuge


Definition:

  • (n.) That to which one resorts for escape or concealment; an artifice employed to escape censure or the force of an argument, or to justify opinions or conduct; a shift; an evasion.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Such a coalition could break through the inertia and subterfuge now deadlocking the negotiations.
  • (2) "It is LSE's view that the students were not given enough information to enable informed consent, yet were given enough to put them in serious danger if the subterfuge had been uncovered prior to their departure from North Korea," the university said in an email sent to all staff and students on Saturday.
  • (3) In my own new novel I hope to contribute in some small way to the subterfuges of what may be England's most secretive literary county.
  • (4) In Paris, Cahun had played a major part in Georges Bataille 's Contre-Attaque resistance group, and in Jersey she soon instigated an outrageous – not to mention dangerous – game of subterfuge, producing fake letters and tracts advertising unrest among the occupying forces.
  • (5) Supporters of Cable were also looking to see if they have a case to take the Daily Telegraph to the police or Press Complaints Commission for using false names, addresses and subterfuge to inveigle Liberal Democrat ministers into expressing doubts about some coalition policies.
  • (6) At a dinner I attended in Krakow, a Polish woman in her 30s said she believed the Smolensk crash to be a tragic accident caused by human error, not divine intervention – a lack of judgment not Russian subterfuge.
  • (7) But such subterfuges do little to hide a crude reality that Eritreans who have fled are desperate to describe.
  • (8) The magazine editor also defended the use of subterfuge by media organisations.
  • (9) Under the terms of the Ipso code the Sunday Mirror has 28 days to respond to the complaint and is expected to argue that the subterfuge used is justified by the public interest in exposing Newmark.
  • (10) Factitious hypoglycemia, on the other hand, results from deliberate subterfuge by the patient and may thus elude proper diagnosis for some time.
  • (11) Allardyce is a man who, as the recordings obtained by subterfuge show , can be lured by promises of cash into making unguarded jibes about his peers and colleagues.
  • (12) In sometimes choosing not to answer simple questions, Cookson has been criticised as a career politician when he strives to be a genuine cycling man who shares the overwhelming distaste for corruption and subterfuge.
  • (13) The talks – which ended in disarray after the US, working with a small group of 25 countries, tried to ram through an agreement that other developing countries mostly rejected – were marked by subterfuge, passion and chaos.
  • (14) Proud to be a "provincial" writer, in his novel Kept (2006) Taylor begins with a bravura passage describing his home county: "A land of winding backroads and creaking carts and windmills, a land of flood, and eels and elvers and all that comes from water, a land of silence and subterfuge, of things not said but only whispered, where much is kept secret which would be better laid open to scrutiny."
  • (15) In Kim, people die rather casually; engage in deceit and subterfuge, and tell each other fabulous stories.
  • (16) Simon Ringrose, specialist prosecutor in the CPS’s Special Crime Division, said: “Mr Mahmood portrayed himself as the master of subterfuge and as the ‘King of the Sting’, but on this occasion it is he and Mr Smith who have been exposed.
  • (17) Beyond this, there was the oddity that the subterfuge-laden missive originally emerged in the Uxbridge constituency office of Mr Mitchell's deputy, John Randall, which made it doubly destabilising.
  • (18) The Labour party was furious with the Tories because it believes their opponents, whose general election campaign is being run by the controversial Australian Lynton Crosby, stepped over an unofficial mark to embark on subterfuge and entrapment.
  • (19) The 36-year-old, who held the position of managing director at Leeds until April, has not been charged with a criminal offence and denies all the allegations against him, saying he may have been lured to Dubai through “subterfuge”.
  • (20) But the party felt that using material obtained by subterfuge from "students" was unacceptable.