as in rebel
someone who tries to overthrow or undermine a governing power
They were outted as subversives and exiled from the country.
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
as in violent
seeking to overthrow or undermine a governing power
A subversive organization determined to unseat a leader who they believed operated outside the law.
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for subversive
Noun
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The coming-of-age film tells the story of Ren (Bacon), a teen rebel who moves to a small Southern town that has outlawed dancing for religious reasons.—
Toria Sheffield,
People.com,
8 Mar. 2025 -
Besides, the Caribbean strife was thwarting trade and endangering American lives and livelihoods in the region. McKinley, sympathetic toward the rebels but not wanting war with Spain, dispatched a prominent Illinois trial lawyer to Cuba to study the situation and report back.—
Robert W. Merry,
Washington Examiner - Political News and Conservative Analysis About Congress, the President, and the Federal Government,
7 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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The Indiana Crime Guns Task Force was signed into law in 2021 and addresses violent crime in Boone, Hamilton, Hancock, Hendricks, Marion, Morgan, Johnson and Shelby counties, according to the Indiana General Assembly’s website.—
Maya Wilkins,
Chicago Tribune,
17 Mar. 2025
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The storm, which produced violent tornadoes, raging wildfires, and blinding dust storms, decimated homes, toppled vehicles, and left entire communities reeling from the devastation.—
Mark Davis,
Newsweek,
16 Mar. 2025
Noun
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While Syria's new rulers -- led by the Islamist former insurgent group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham -- have pursued IS cells since taking power, some fear a breakdown in overall security that could allow the group to stage a resurgence.—
arkansasonline.com,
arkansasonline.com,
15 Mar. 2025
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Turkey, a close ally of Mr. al-Shara’s rebel group, has for years sought to curb the power of the Syrian Democratic Forces, maintaining that the militia is linked to Kurdish separatist insurgents inside Turkey.—
Raja Abdulrahim,
New York Times,
25 Feb. 2025
Adjective
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The same is true of Ramaswamy, who seems to not realize that whatever revolutionary new drugs and treatments his biotech startups might produce will not simply appear magically in the marketplace ready to take on some of society’s most intractable diseases.—
Jeffery Vacante,
Hartford Courant,
16 Mar. 2025
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The trouble for Trump is that Columbia, despite its history of student activism, does not really fit the right-wing image of a revolutionary institution bent on D.E.I. indoctrination.—
Benjamin Wallace-Wells,
The New Yorker,
16 Mar. 2025
Noun
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The plutocrats and anarchists of the Gilded Age The novelist who explored the edges of normalcy Play/Pause Button Pause If current trends hold, each generation in Korea will be a third the size of the previous one.—
Hannah Jocelyn,
The New Yorker,
25 Feb. 2025
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Others on board included modernist Russian poet and a Trotskyite anarchist Victor Serge, Martinican poet and a founder of the anticolonialism Négritude movement Aimé Césaire, Cuban painter Wifredo Lam; influential Marxist psychiatrist and Pan-Africanist Frantz Fanon, along with fascinating others.—
Mark Swed,
Los Angeles Times,
9 Feb. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Subversive.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/subversive. Accessed 24 Mar. 2025.
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