What's the difference between relentless and ruthless?

Relentless


Definition:

  • (a.) Unmoved by appeals for sympathy or forgiveness; insensible to the distresses of others; destitute of tenderness; unrelenting; unyielding; unpitying; as, a prey to relentless despotism.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) That is why you will be held relentlessly to account for those choices; why what you said in February invites forensic scrutiny.
  • (2) The history of events at the end of 2010, from the moment on 4 November when Cable called in the regulators, shows how relentlessly James Murdoch and his PR man Frédéric Michel lobbied and berated the politicians who were trying to stand in their way.
  • (3) It is the combination of his company's pan-African and industrialist vision – reminiscent of the aspirations of African independence pioneers like Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah – and its relentless financial growth that has set Dangote apart.
  • (4) Los Angeles were relentless in their vicious pursuit of a game-tying goal on Wednesday, bidding to send Game 4 into overtime.
  • (5) While none of the fears that have rattled markets are yet realised, the relentless focus on possible risks will likely see another soggy Asia-Pacific trading session.
  • (6) But when he decided to teach you a lesson, he was relentless, and he took no prisoners.
  • (7) A handful of the global superstars – Usain Bolt and now Mo Farah – have enhanced their personal value, but most have driven themselves relentlessly for the glory alone.
  • (8) The pressure from Fulham became relentless and in the 66th minute West Ham's defences burst.
  • (9) The last few months have seen the former secretary of state dogged by a relentless focus over her use of a private email server , dipping favorabillity numbers and the rise of Bernie Sanders, the socialist senator who is challenging her for the Democratic party’s nomination.
  • (10) The competition has dozens of star players, almost all the most famous managers, and creates enough drama to feed a relentless media appetite.
  • (11) The story of the past 30 years has been the relentless hollowing-out of industrial Britain, the single biggest change to the British economy in the postwar era.
  • (12) Medication, splintage, and physiotherapy are useful in helping to suppress and reduce the effects of the disease, but in some patients arthritis attacks in acute episodes, while in others arthritis chronically and relentlessly pursues its destructive course.
  • (13) Each sentence seems more absurd than the last until you are finally and irredeemably overwhelmed by its relentless meaningful meaninglessness.
  • (14) In language eerily familiar to student politicians across the land, Abetz continued: “The new managing director will inherit an unbalanced and largely centralised public broadcaster which has become a protection racket for the left ideology.” For decades the highly trusted public broadcaster has weathered a relentless stream of attacks by the crusaders of the (increasingly) hard right in Australia.
  • (15) He’s extra confident in my ability to get forward and to develop as a player.” Of his role under the German, Clyne says: “I’ll say definitely pressing on the front foot, setting the trap for the opposition team, and getting more forward on the pitch, and [being] solid defensively as well.” Despite a near-perfect performance when Liverpool handed Manchester City a lesson in high pressing and relentless energy during their 4-1 victory at the Etihad Stadium on 21 November, Klopp never stopped shouting on the touchline.
  • (16) It doesn't look like that, of course, when the doctor's surgery starts putting up signs in Polish, or your child can't get in to the nearest primary school, and the trajectory of the jobless figures seems relentlessly upwards – even when it is not.
  • (17) Joanne Segars, NAPF's chief executive, said: "The pressures on final-salary pensions are relentless and their rate of decline seems to be shifting into a new gear.
  • (18) The movement has been relentlessly promoted by Fox News, which belongs to a more familiar billionaire.
  • (19) This report demonstrates that it’s time we applied the same relentless focus on transparency and results to funding to the private sector,” he said.
  • (20) Right-to-work advocates are relentless, he indicates: “We have seen a literal campaign from the other side sprout up in the early summer: ‘Don’t forget to leave the union.’” He calls the 5,000 members who have jumped ship “not a tremendous loss” in the context of current workers.

Ruthless


Definition:

  • (a.) Having no ruth; cruel; pitiless.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) AB InBev has cut costs ruthlessly as it has bought up companies around the world, including Anheuser-Busch, the brewer of US beer Budweiser.
  • (2) As Greece pleads with its eurozone creditors for more time in meeting its fiscal adjustment targets, Dombrovskis is a fierce champion of surgical austerity applied quickly and ruthlessly.
  • (3) Rather than ruthlessly efficient, I have found them sweet and a bit hopeless."
  • (4) This thread ran through his later writings, which focused particularly on questions of the transformation of work and working time, envisaging the possibility that the productivity gains made possible by capitalism could be used to enhance individual and social life, rather than intensifying ruthless economic competition and social division.
  • (5) "Sometimes a handshake is just a handshake, but when the leader of the free world shakes the bloody hand of a ruthless dictator like Raúl Castro , it becomes a propaganda coup for the tyrant," said Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Republican Congress member in Florida, told the US secretary of state, John Kerry.
  • (6) But Hilton insists critics are wrong to see the group as ruthless youngsters who meet purely to further their own careers.
  • (7) This is how powerful a hold it has over them.” Mossino, who works with refugees and asylum seekers as well as victims of trafficking, says that in the past decade the trade in Nigerian women has become a hugely profitable and ruthless criminal industry, controlled largely by Nigerian gangs that took root in Italy in the 1980s.
  • (8) On 12 September 1980, the head of the military, Kenan Evren, sent tanks rolling through the streets of the Turkish capital and installed a ruthless military government.
  • (9) The "consultation" and "informed consent" the reports insist must take place before the project goes ahead are a sick joke in a region in which dissent is ruthlessly crushed and people are imprisoned and tortured simply for speaking their own language.
  • (10) She is also waiting to hear if she has won a second Olivier award, this time for her role as the ruthless Hollywood agent in The Little Dog Laughed, the play that transferred from Broadway to the West End last year.
  • (11) A boss on some astronomic pay packet may be held back by shame from paying his cleaners too little relative to that, but emotion will not get in the way of ruthlessness if the process all takes place behind the veil of some corporate contract.
  • (12) "What is clear is that they are as ruthless as any Islamist group or terrorists anywhere in the world," said Antony Goldman, a west Africa risk analyst at London-based PM Consulting.
  • (13) The often confusing circumstances that led to their courts martial and the ruthlessness of their punishments only fully came to light with the publication in 1989 of Julian Putkowski and Julian Sykes's history Shot at Dawn .
  • (14) If there was reason to be worried following five successive defeats, their worst run of the century, they showed no sign of panic during a ruthless attacking performance which guarantees they will spend Christmas in the top six.
  • (15) She was ambitious, and Colonel Gaddafi has always promoted ruthless people.
  • (16) Every couple of years, evidence emerges to underline the unparalleled nature of the state onslaught and ruthless rule-breaking to overcome resistance in the mining communities, bought at a cost of £37bn in today's prices .
  • (17) The footage underscores the ruthlessness of fighting in Pakistan's border areas, where the army has also faced allegations of massacres.
  • (18) 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."
  • (19) In the past decade, European migration was used as a sort of 21st-century incomes policy in Britain as employers ruthlessly exploited migrant labour to hold down wages – which have since been cut in real terms for four years in a row as a result of the crisis.
  • (20) But we can all probably do without Fifa's "fair play in marketing" lectures, which clothe commercial ruthlessness in the language of sporting decency, apparently oblivious to the impression given by wallpapering every stadium with signs that push BP or declare "We proudly accept only Visa".