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to fall victim to

to fall victim to

25 4.6
Suffer harm you cannot avoid because of someone or something bad
  • phrasal verb
translation icon : ser víctima de
  • Many people fall victim to scams during the holiday season.
  • often fall victim to
  • fall victim to a disease

And then don't fall victim to what Harvard says most people do.

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Examples

  • After all, I have a feeling you've fallen victim to her illness.

  • I have fallen victim to this narrative.

  • But my wife told me I must not fall victim to that.

    Fiction book (2001)
  • And everybody falls victim to the comparison game, right?

  • In fact, large numbers of the social elite fell victim to the disease.

  • Everyone who ever lived here falls victim to some tragedy.

  • But this kind of rational planning inevitably falls victim to the reality of the political process.

    Academic text (1993)
  • Indeed, you can fall victim to this sort of thing quite apart from your conscious wishes, desires, whatever.

  • Another financial institution has fallen victim to his theatrics.

  • Love is an involuntary reflex, and I fell victim to it.

Synonyms

to fall for
vsto fall victim to
  • Informal
148 4.3

To be tricked into believing something that is not true

is harmed or affected by bad things rather than only being misled
to fall into a trap
vsto fall victim to
1 4.1

Become tricked into a bad or dangerous situation

is harmed or affected by bad events beyond the person's control

Antonyms

1.0

To stay away from something or not do it to stop something bad from happening

1.0

To get away from a place where you are kept or are in danger

How Affected

to succumb to
69 5.8
to fall victim to
25 4.6
to suffer
2.0
affected
3.6

Surface Forms

fall victim to infinitive
falling victim to present participle
falls victim to third person singular
fallen victim to past participle

Morphology

fall + victim + to

The noun 'victim' clearly signals someone who suffers and 'fall' can be used metaphorically to mean 'become' or 'come under' (as in many languages: Spanish 'caer víctima de', French 'tomber victime de'), so a learner who knows the parts can often infer the general idea. However the metaphorical use of 'fall' + the fixed preposition 'to' makes the exact sense and register slightly non-literal and thus not fully predictable without exposure.

Etymology

The phrase fall victim to paints a simple picture: think of the words fall and victim, where someone walks and suddenly falls into a trap or is caught by a trick and becomes the 'victim' of harm. So, to fall victim to something means 'to be harmed, tricked, or affected by something bad'.