bum steer
1
9.8
- noun
- /bʌm stɪr/
- Informal
:
consejo erróneo
- The advice he received about the stock market turned out to be a bum steer, resulting in significant losses.
Examples
-
- It's a bum steer!
-
I heard a story once of an old diviner—this was just after the First World War—who destroyed a bloke by giving him a bum steer.
Fiction book (2002) -
- They got me a bum steer.
-
- We gave them a bum steer.
-
But it's a bum steer, Mike, believe me.
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You gave us a bum steer.
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You've never given me a bum steer.
-
I wouldn't give you a bum steer.
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Somebody's been giving you a bum steer.
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It was a bum steer.
Synonyms
63
4.6
Information that is wrong and shared by mistake
3
7.0
Wrong directions or instructions that make people do the wrong thing
1
9.4
Bad advice or directions that make you go the wrong way
1
7.1
Wrong advice or information that makes someone make a bad decision
Antonyms
How Misleading
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is a straightforward adjective + noun composition: 'bum' (of low/unsatisfactory quality) modifies 'steer' (a piece of advice/direction), yielding the meaning 'bad or misleading advice'. This follows normal compositional semantics and is therefore readily inferable by a B1 learner who knows both constituents.
Etymology
The noun bum steer may come from farm life: if someone told a cowboy the wrong way to move a steer (a young male cow), that bum (bad) steer would cause trouble. So today bum steer means 'wrong or misleading' advice.