Robert Browning
Flaunt vs. Flout: Usage Guide
The "treat contemptuously" use of flaunt found in phrases like "those who flaunt the rules/laws" is common in informal use and sometimes appears in polished and published writing.
Oscar Lewis
David Gilbert
This use undoubtedly arose from confusion with flout, however, and is considered by many to be incorrect. Use of flout in the sense of "flaunt, parade" is also found occasionally.
Mike Royko
Did you know?
If you flout a rule or societal norm, you ignore it without hiding what you're doing, or showing fear or shame; you flout it "out" in the open. The similar-sounding word flaunt is sometimes used in the same way, though that word's older and more common meaning is "to display ostentatiously," as in "people who flaunt their wealth." Critics have been objecting to the confusion of these two words since the early 1900s, but use of flaunt with the meaning "to treat with contemptuous disregard" is found in even polished, edited writing, and so that meaning is included in dictionaries as an established use of the word. Nonetheless, you may want to avoid it: there are still many who judge harshly those who (they feel) are flouting proper English usage.
Examples of flout in a Sentence
Christian Edwards, CNN Money, 30 Oct. 2025
Anyone flouting the restriction could receive a £5,000 fine (around $6,700), the government said.
—Holly Ellyatt, CNBC, 26 Oct. 2025
By flouting all conventions in the face of rock and roll and making a mellifluous spectacle of the music that moved through his body like a thought from God, Jarrett has become a peerless symbol of artistic purity, his talent singular, his every note sui generis.
—David Ehrlich, IndieWire, 17 Oct. 2025
Definitely feeling some freedom to flout the rules due to the shut down.
—Stepheny Price, FOXNews.com, 14 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for flout
Cite this Entry
“Flout.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/flout. Accessed 9 Nov. 2025.
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