as in servility
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Recent Examples of obsequiousness
All of this amounts to a rounding error for the tech giants—averaged out, YouTube made more than $107 million from ad revenue every single day last quarter—but these are still acts of profound obsequiousness and corporate cowardice.
—
Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 1 Oct. 2025
Trump doesn’t have much to show for his obsequiousness.
—Steven Greenhut, Oc Register, 12 Sep. 2025
For another recent client, the board’s questions about his employer’s stock vesting schedule had Bari, the client, his agent, and the listing agent go through four rounds of revisions to ensure their response nailed a just-right level of obsequiousness.
—Matthew Sedacca, Curbed, 11 Aug. 2025
Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 1 Oct. 2025
Trump doesn’t have much to show for his obsequiousness.
—Steven Greenhut, Oc Register, 12 Sep. 2025
For another recent client, the board’s questions about his employer’s stock vesting schedule had Bari, the client, his agent, and the listing agent go through four rounds of revisions to ensure their response nailed a just-right level of obsequiousness.
—Matthew Sedacca, Curbed, 11 Aug. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for obsequiousness
Noun
-
Ray is the leader of a biker gang and demands utter subservience.—
Jason P. Frank,
Vulture,
2 Oct. 2025
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How does party capture — the subservience of entire systems — factor into this?—
Nikki McCann Ramirez,
Rolling Stone,
22 Sep. 2025
Noun
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Yet electing to be private doesn’t amount to complaisance or complicity.—
Lesley M.M. Blume,
Town & Country,
6 Dec. 2022
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Sammy’s awareness of his mother’s infidelity, his father’s complaisance, and how both were relieved by his creative Boy Scout merit-badge projects and fantasies requires a separate article.—
Armond White,
National Review,
16 Nov. 2022
Noun
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Mamdani tends to focus on Israel’s violations of international law, which are the basis of his pledge to arrest Netanyahu, in deference to a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court, if Netanyahu comes to New York.—
Eric Lach,
New Yorker,
9 Oct. 2025
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The judges also noted that the law grants deference to the president in determining when troop deployments are necessary to protect federal agents and property.—
Christopher Cann,
USA Today,
9 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Supreme Court has seen this before The ruling in Harvard’s favor follows a long legal tradition of Supreme Court rulings that bar the government from demanding ideological acquiescence in exchange for support.—
Stephanie A,
The Conversation,
17 Sep. 2025
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Yet, the lesson of the Voting Rights Act is that the response to these setbacks isn’t despair or acquiescence.—
Time,
Time,
12 Sep. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Obsequiousness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/obsequiousness. Accessed 19 Oct. 2025.
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