as in brute
having or showing the nature and appetites of a lower animal
years of grinding poverty that had reduced them to a subhuman existence
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Recent Examples of subhuman
Yet today’s LLMs are distinctly subhuman in their ability to absorb and understand large quantities of information.
—
Ars Technica, 20 Dec. 2024
Cinematographers Alejandro Chávez and Trevor Roach shoot the underworld where the victims work and live with limited light sources creating a drab, oppressive environment that highlight the subhuman conditions they are subjected to.
—Carlos Aguilar, Variety, 30 Aug. 2024
So, yeah, there are Muslim terrorists, but they are also shown as people with lives and interests and not subhuman villains, which, umm, could’ve been worse.
—Jesse David Fox, Vulture, 16 Mar. 2024
Others, including Gali, say the term took on a darker tone that denigrates Native women, relegating them to a subhuman stature.
—Melissa Gomez, Los Angeles Times, 30 Jan. 2024
See All Example Sentences for subhuman
Ars Technica, 20 Dec. 2024
Cinematographers Alejandro Chávez and Trevor Roach shoot the underworld where the victims work and live with limited light sources creating a drab, oppressive environment that highlight the subhuman conditions they are subjected to.
—Carlos Aguilar, Variety, 30 Aug. 2024
So, yeah, there are Muslim terrorists, but they are also shown as people with lives and interests and not subhuman villains, which, umm, could’ve been worse.
—Jesse David Fox, Vulture, 16 Mar. 2024
Others, including Gali, say the term took on a darker tone that denigrates Native women, relegating them to a subhuman stature.
—Melissa Gomez, Los Angeles Times, 30 Jan. 2024
See All Example Sentences for subhuman
Recent Examples of Synonyms for subhuman
Adjective
-
Plymouth’s two-door brute was built from 1964 to 1974, and within that decade, saw three generations.—
Robert Ross,
Robb Report,
20 June 2025
-
The events on the ground maintain the basic, brute pleasures of the initial premise.—
Bilge Ebiri,
Vulture,
16 June 2025
Adjective
-
That was a brutal era of NBA basketball where the winning final score sometimes didn’t hit 80.—
Mac Engel,
Fort Worth Star-Telegram,
17 June 2025
-
Jasmin Paris, who in 2024 became one of only 20 people ever to finish the brutal 100-mile Barkley Marathons race in under 60 hours —while pumping breast milk.—
The Washington Post,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
17 June 2025
Adjective
-
Advertisement Dawn of the Dead (1978) There's a credible case to be made that Romero's 1973 movie The Crazies, about a biological weapon that causes residents of a small town to go feral, qualifies as a zombie movie.—
James Grebey,
Time,
20 June 2025
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There are tribes of fast, feral predators that resemble the second coming of neanderthals.—
David Fear,
Rolling Stone,
18 June 2025
Adjective
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Despite bestial brutality and life-limiting economic and social injustices made legal—some existing still—our foreparents clung fiercely to their humanity and envisioned ours.—
Essence,
Essence,
25 June 2025
-
Fitzgerald used these wealthy, African Americans described in bestial terms, as a point of humor and as a way of showing how the place his protagonist found himself in was outlandish and preposterous to the point that Black men could be wealthy enough to hire a white driver.—
Kyra Davis Lurie
June 11,
Literary Hub,
11 June 2025
Cite this Entry
“Subhuman.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/subhuman. Accessed 30 Jun. 2025.
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