1
as in cruelty
disposition to willfully inflict pain and suffering on others
the police were accused of brutality for using excessive force in making arrests
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in brutishness
the manifestation of the traits or the gratification of the appetites of a lower animal
the disconcerting ease with which the people adopted the brutality of the enemy invaders
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of brutality
To flee the brutality, Minasian’s ancestors sought new lives in America.
—
Justice Delos Santos, The Mercury News, 25 Mar. 2025
The regime’s brutality was evident in incidents such as the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre, where 69 unarmed protesters were killed by police, which, like in Gandhi’s Salt March, marked a turning point in international condemnation.
—Dan Pontefract, Forbes, 22 Mar. 2025
Public safety The pandemic collided with nationwide police brutality protests that peaked in Indianapolis with the fatal police shooting of Dreasjon Reed in May.
—Arika Herron, Axios, 20 Mar. 2025
Featuring works by renowned photojournalists and archival footage, the exhibit serves as a record of war crimes committed eight decades apart yet eerily similar in brutality.
—Katya Soldak, Forbes, 21 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for brutality
Justice Delos Santos, The Mercury News, 25 Mar. 2025
The regime’s brutality was evident in incidents such as the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre, where 69 unarmed protesters were killed by police, which, like in Gandhi’s Salt March, marked a turning point in international condemnation.
—Dan Pontefract, Forbes, 22 Mar. 2025
Public safety The pandemic collided with nationwide police brutality protests that peaked in Indianapolis with the fatal police shooting of Dreasjon Reed in May.
—Arika Herron, Axios, 20 Mar. 2025
Featuring works by renowned photojournalists and archival footage, the exhibit serves as a record of war crimes committed eight decades apart yet eerily similar in brutality.
—Katya Soldak, Forbes, 21 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for brutality
Recent Examples of Synonyms for brutality
Noun
-
Sullivan was arrested on March 12 and charged with first-degree assault, second-degree kidnapping, first-degree unlawful restraint, cruelty to persons and first-degree reckless endangerment.—
Peter D'Abrosca,
FOXNews.com,
2 Apr. 2025
-
Officers added at the time that she'd been arrested and charged with assault in the first degree, kidnapping in the second degree, unlawful restraint in the first degree, cruelty to persons and reckless endangerment in the first degree.—
Becca Longmire,
People.com,
2 Apr. 2025
Noun
-
Additionally, it was feared that acknowledgment of Khmer Rouge atrocities would validate the U.S. military endeavors in Indochina, which many people — especially leading scholars — had come to excoriate.—
Ray Cavanaugh,
Chicago Tribune,
3 Apr. 2025
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Such eye-opening depictions of 19th and 20th-century atrocities, much like the contemporary accounts on the issue of Missing or Murdered Indigenous Women, are not merely instructive, but necessary.—
Joe Leydon,
Variety,
28 Mar. 2025
Noun
-
Hope is something that Dior’s creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri can related to, having explored the dualities of hope and despair (as well as lightness and darkness, and fluidity and animalism) in her spring 2023 collection.—
Rosemary Feitelberg,
WWD,
22 Jan. 2025
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All of a sudden, that animalism has been incarnated.—
Hunter Ingram,
Variety,
25 Mar. 2024
Noun
-
This strangeness causes all sorts of internal agitation, an uneasiness about humanity’s closeness to animality.—
Nicholas Quah,
Vulture,
16 Feb. 2025
-
But also, something more intrinsic — something like her animality.—
Camille Bromley Gabra Zackman Krish Seenivasan David Mason,
New York Times,
6 Jan. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Brutality.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/brutality. Accessed 16 Apr. 2025.
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