as in imposing (on or upon)
to take unfair advantage of
the candidate played on the voters' prejudices
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for playing (on or upon)
Verb
-
The government wasn’t using autonomous weapons and claimed no mass-surveillance plans—but for a company to ask for those assurances in writing was to sign its own death warrant.—
Gideon Lewis-Kraus,
New Yorker,
14 Mar. 2026 -
To resolve this issue, the team developed a criterion that estimates the overlap between the prepared input state and the true ground state using the energy and energy variance of the initial state.—
Rupendra Brahambhatt,
Interesting Engineering,
14 Mar. 2026
Verb
-
The differences were minimal, but Silver had told me that exploiting even the tiniest advantage was crucial.—
McKay Coppins,
The Atlantic,
12 Mar. 2026
-
The jury concluded the NFL violated antitrust law through its 32 teams pooling broadcasting rights for out-of-town fans and, supposedly, exploiting that pooling to charge higher prices.—
Michael McCann,
Sportico.com,
11 Mar. 2026
Verb
-
Although this may change, as people who have acquired Irish citizenship but aren't Irish-born are abusing it, adding to the immigration woes in Britain.—
Arkansas Online,
Arkansas Online,
14 Mar. 2026
-
The thought of giving a platform to someone abusing their staff is something to lose both my appetite and sleep over.—
Jenn Harris,
Los Angeles Times,
10 Mar. 2026
Verb
-
The new partnership aims to address this challenge by leveraging H2Pro’s Decoupled Water Electrolysis (DWE) technology.—
Mrigakshi Dixit,
Interesting Engineering,
12 Mar. 2026
-
Musiel recently launched a new construction company, leveraging his extensive appraisal expertise to build spec homes across the Dallas–Fort Worth, Houston, and Austin metro areas.—
Kaitlyn Gomez,
USA Today,
12 Mar. 2026
Verb
-
For example gerrymandering, or the practice of manipulating electoral district boundaries to favor one political party, is an ongoing, albeit controversial tactic among both Democrats and Republicans.—
Los Angeles Times,
Los Angeles Times,
11 Mar. 2026
-
The skills could include tasks such as folding boxes, assembling components, or even manipulating objects, activities that still remain challenging for many robotic systems.—
Georgina Jedikovska,
Interesting Engineering,
10 Mar. 2026
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
show current usage.
Read More
Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
Send us feedback.
Cite this Entry
“Playing (on or upon).” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/playing%20%28on%20or%20upon%29. Accessed 18 Mar. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
