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Glite Dictionary
to fearmonger

to fearmonger

1 8.4
To make people feel afraid on purpose to change what they think or do
  • verb
  • /ˈfɪrˌmɔŋɡər/
translation icon : infundir miedo
  • So it's not the fact that I'm trying to fearmonger here and say vaping is the devil.

So it's not the fact that I'm trying to fearmonger here and say vaping is the devil.

Examples

  • He can coat it in happy talk one way and fearmongering about fiscal problems ahead another way, but what he's saying makes his proposal necessary; it actually only makes a proposal necessary, not merely his.

    Blog text (13)

  • Where is the right-wing fearmongering about these individuals?

    Blog text (4)

  • Those things prove that a lot of what the opponents are fearmongering about has no basis.

    Academic text (2006)

  • President Romney will thank us all for fearmongering our own voting base his way.

    Blog text (24)

  • Directing his comments to BART administrators, he said, "You know, it's just fearmongering and you should be ashamed."

    Blog text (17)

  • He also calls out Alex Jones and co. for being the fearmongering distractors that they are.

    Blog text (34)

  • Romney and Bush laugh as we fearmonger our own voting base over to the Tea Party by condemning the voters' children to the greenhouse gas ovens of a climate change crisis.

    Blog text (11)

  • It was quite a contrast to listen to emotion-laden fearmongering from the pulpit and then to come home and hear this nice man calmly lay out the case for an alternative view.

    Blog text (10)

  • The politician's speech aimed to fearmonger by exaggerating the dangers of the proposed policy.

  • Many news outlets tend to fearmonger about crime rates to capture viewers' attention.

Synonyms

to scare
vsto fearmonger
∞ 1.0

To make someone feel afraid or unsure of themselves

targets groups to influence opinions rather than causing brief individual fear
to frighten
vsto fearmonger
540 1.0

To make someone feel afraid

aims to spread fear widely to change opinions rather than just cause fear
to play on fears
vsto fearmonger
5 7.4

Use people's fears to make them do what you want

deliberately spreads fear to shape opinions rather than only exploit existing fears
to prey on fears
vsto fearmonger
1 7.4

To use people's fears to get money or power

spreads fear to influence opinion rather than primarily for personal profit
to scaremongering
vsto fearmonger
7.5

To spread exaggerated fear on purpose to make people worry

aims to influence opinions by spreading fear rather than by exaggeration alone

Antonyms

to comfort
172 1.0

To make someone feel less upset or in pain

to reassure
163 3.4

To make someone feel less worried and more confident

How Scary

to terrorize
  • NSFW
145 6.7
to fearmonger
1 8.4
to alarm
133 1.9
to unsettle
7 4.9

Surface Forms

fearmonger infinitive
fearmongered past
fearmongered past participle
fearmongering present participle
fearmongers third person singular

Morphology

fearmonger = fear + monger (transparent) = fear + monger

Meaning is directly derived from 'fear' + 'monger' = one who spreads or promotes fear; the agentive compound is predictable.

Etymology

The word fearmonger joins fear and monger, where monger meant 'seller', as in fishmonger or warmonger. So a fearmonger is someone who 'sells' fear by spreading it on purpose to make people worried or to change what they think.