as in harshness
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Recent Examples of Synonyms for oppressiveness
Noun
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The bass doesn’t overpower vocals, and the treble avoids harshness.—
Prakhar Khanna,
Forbes.com,
11 Aug. 2025
Noun
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Shari escapes, but not without realizing that her mother’s malevolence has permanently marked her sense of self.—
Rebecca Mead,
New Yorker,
3 Sep. 2025
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President Donald Trump's careless personnel decisions, slapdash executive orders, whiplash-inducing policy pivots, and general malevolence have combined to make this among the most disruptive yet least successful first six months of any presidency in American history.—
David Faris,
MSNBC Newsweek,
21 July 2025
Noun
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His Cyrano is the play’s hero, even if the character’s psychological limitations are as much a factor in the story as the machinations of De Guiche, whose malignity is sent up in Nathanson’s flamboyantly comic turn.—
Charles McNulty,
Los Angeles Times,
10 Sep. 2024
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For a decade, the central drama of Trumpism has concerned the Republican élites who continued to support him—the story has been about their malignity, or opportunism, or willful moral blindness.—
Benjamin Wallace-Wells,
The New Yorker,
16 Sep. 2023
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“Oppressiveness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/oppressiveness. Accessed 11 Sep. 2025.
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