as in Victorian
given to or marked by very conservative standards regarding personal behavior or morals
the novel's wildly off base portrayal of 18th-century aristocrats as nice-nelly exemplars of decorum
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
as in puritan
a person who is greatly concerned with seemly behavior and morality especially regarding sexual matters
some nice nelly bowdlerized this collection of wartime ditties that were lustily sung by the men around the campfire
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
as in puritanism
a tendency to care a great deal about seemly behavior and morals especially in sexual matters
a misguided nice-nellyism prompted the city-owned art museum to cancel its scheduled exhibit on the nude in photography
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for nice-nelly
Adjective
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The best scalloped bedding may be the trend du jour and a true companion of cottagecore bedding, but the charming design goes back to the Renaissance and Victorian periods.—
Yelena Moroz Alpert,
Architectural Digest,
26 Apr. 2025 -
Currently in its first full season since the pandemic, the company staged a play about book banning in 1950s Alabama at two Chicago booksellers last fall, followed by a holiday production of Victorian ghost stories at the Driehaus Museum’s 19th-century mansion.—
Emily McClanathan,
Chicago Tribune,
25 Apr. 2025
Adjective
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While the #MeToo movement toppled scores of powerful men in Hollywood, in France it was viewed suspiciously by some as a puritanical American import that was tainting an essential part of France’s intellectual and cultural identity.—
Catherine Porter,
New York Times,
24 Mar. 2025
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Raising the stakes were the injunctions of the Hays Code, whose puritanical rules demanded that studio filmmakers in Hollywood shy away from depictions of interracial romance.—
Mayukh Sen,
The Atlantic,
1 Mar. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Nice-nelly.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/nice-nelly. Accessed 4 May. 2025.
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