brutality

1 disposition to willfully inflict pain and suffering on others the police were accused of brutality for using excessive force in making arrests Synonyms atrociousness, atrocity, barbarity, barbarousness, cruelty, cruelness, fiendishness, heartlessness, inhumanity, inhumanness, sadism, savageness, savagery, truculence, viciousness, wantonnessRelated Words hard-heartedness, mercilessness, pitilessness, ruthlessness, unfeelingness; fellness, ferociousness, ferocity, fierceness, grimness; bloodlust, bloodthirstiness, murderousness, sanguineness, sanguinity; cattiness, despitefulness, hatefulness, malevolence, maliciousness, malignity, meanness, nastiness, spitefulness; hardhandedness, harshness, heavy-handedness, oppressivenessNear Antonyms tenderness, warmheartedness, warmness, warmth; charitableness, clemency, leniency, mercifulness, mercy, pityAntonyms benignity, compassion, good-heartedness, humaneness, humanity, kindheartedness, kindness, sympathy, tenderheartedness

2 the manifestation of the traits or the gratification of the appetites of a lower animal the disconcerting ease with which the people adopted the brutality of the enemy invaders Synonyms animalism, animality, beastliness, bestiality, brutishness, swinishnessRelated Words carnality, physicality, sensuality; boorishness, coarseness, crudeness, grossness, loutishness, rudeness; barbarity, cruelty, sadism, savagery, viciousness, wantonnessNear Antonyms intellectuality, spirituality; greatheartedness, high-mindedness, magnanimity, nobility; beneficence, benevolence, benignity, compassion, good-heartedness, kindheartedness, kindliness, kindness, tenderheartedness