as in exploiting
to control or take advantage of by artful, unfair, or insidious means
played upon the customer's vanity to convince her to buy the expensive makeup kit
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for playing (upon)
Verb
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The approach against City is likely to be similar, to avoid Haaland exploiting space in transition.—
Andy Jones,
New York Times,
9 Nov. 2025 -
Oakland, meanwhile, arrives off a brutal 121-78 road loss to Michigan, exposing defensive issues, particularly against a team capable of exploiting zones and creating open perimeter shots.—
Ben Verbrugge,
MSNBC Newsweek,
7 Nov. 2025
Verb
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By manipulating phase distribution, engineers can craft internal ion highways rather than relying on chance material behavior.—
Neetika Walter,
Interesting Engineering,
7 Nov. 2025
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This summer, after initially targeting Punch, the president of SZA’s label TDE, Minaj dissed SZA herself on X, mocking her physical appearance, questioning her level of success, and accusing her of manipulating charts with her release of Lana, the deluxe version of 2022’s SOS.—
Brian Hiatt,
Rolling Stone,
6 Nov. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Playing (upon).” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/playing%20%28upon%29. Accessed 16 Nov. 2025.
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