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worthlessness

noun

1
as in valuelessness

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2
as in inferiority

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Example Sentences

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.
Recent Examples of worthlessness He is simultaneously convinced of his own worthlessness and angry with the world for failing to recognize his unlimited potential. — Big Think, 29 Apr. 2026 Johnson said depression often manifests as persistent negative self-perception, hopelessness, feelings of worthlessness and social withdrawal. — Sarah Rumpf-Whitten, FOXNews.com, 8 Mar. 2026 Kitty, whose worldly possessions fit into two plastic bags, is seen repeatedly in the same clothes, and bourgeois hostility to her presence in Beth’s middle-class neighborhood compounds her feelings of worthlessness. — Inkoo Kang, New Yorker, 5 Feb. 2026 Feeling Worthless or Guilty Many people with depression grapple with feelings of worthlessness. — Sarah Bence, Verywell Health, 15 Dec. 2025 Like regular depression, SAD can cause negative feelings like hopelessness, worthlessness, irritability, and guilt; fatigue or reduced energy; a loss of interest in hobbies and activities; and even physical aches and pains (including headaches, cramps, and digestive problems). — Maggie O'Neill, SELF, 20 Oct. 2025 The feelings of postpartum depression — despair, guilt, shame and worthlessness — began creeping in. — Alyssa Goldberg, USA Today, 3 Sep. 2025 As many as one in eight women in the United States will experience postpartum depression, which can manifest in feelings such as anger, social withdrawal, and worthlessness, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) research. — Jessica Zucker, Condé Nast Traveler, 9 Apr. 2021
Recent Examples of Synonyms for worthlessness
  1. emptiness
  2. inferiority
  3. insignificance
  4. badness
  5. adequacy
  6. acceptability
  7. sufficiency
Noun
  • Treating emptiness as sophistication becomes incapable of distinguishing moral from aesthetic judgment.
    — Frank Porcu, New York Daily News, 20 Sep. 2026
  • Markets have seen through the emptiness of Bessent’s remedy, as ‘bond vigilantes’ have driven bond yields even higher despite Bessent’s band-aids.
    — Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Fortune, 10 Sep. 2026
Definition of emptiness
Noun
  • Iran’s conventional military power could not match that of Israel or the United States, but Tehran had spent decades building the ability to compensate for its conventional inferiority by creating military capacity outside its territory.
    — NADIA SCHADLOW, Foreign Affairs, 18 Sep. 2026
  • Your instinct might be to see it as proof of your inferiority.
    — Marisa G. Franco, CNBC, 9 Sep. 2026
Definition of inferiority
Noun
  • The rooms were part of Kusama’s ongoing exploration of self-obliteration and her career-long ambition to create work that provokes a keen awareness of both one’s individual insignificance and place in the wider cosmic system.
    — Leah Dolan, CNN Money, 28 Aug. 2026
  • Artist Meredith Reynolds believed Platner’s past paled into insignificance when compared with his opponents.
    — David Millward, The Washington Examiner, 7 June 2026
Definition of insignificance
Noun
  • On one side, a satanic figure named Randall Flagg who gathers his forces of badness to Las Vegas; on the other, the good guys, led by 108-year-old Mother Abigail in, of all places, Boulder.
    — Barbara Ellis, Denver Post, 15 Jan. 2026
  • The show premiered over Thanksgiving weekend, when people were tired and full and bored (and probably also horny), and countered our world’s unceasing badness with its world’s buoyant sweetness.
    — Fran Hoepfner, Vulture, 12 Jan. 2026
Definition of badness
Noun
  • The court allowed friend-of-the-court briefs to be filed over the adequacy of the consent decree.
    — Winston Cho, HollywoodReporter, 24 Sep. 2026
  • Public reporting has raised concerns about system stability, new workflows, call handling and callback functionality, delayed information, and the adequacy of hands-on training.
    — Sara Machi, CBS News, 21 Sep. 2026
Definition of adequacy
Noun
  • Attacks aimed at Democrat Abdul El-Sayed have brought back painful memories for some in a contest that has raised questions about the acceptability of Islamophobia in politics.
    — Laura Beveridge, Washington Post, 19 Sep. 2026
  • Today, everyone from the Economist to the New York Times has heralded the coming psychedelics renaissance, as hallucinogens begin to gain greater cultural, medical and commercial acceptability.
    — Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 29 July 2026
Definition of acceptability
Noun
  • Rex Frazier, a former deputy commissioner at the California Department of Insurance, said that in the situation that the insurers find themselves, the state regulator will be looking at a company’s capital sufficiency.
    — Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 16 Aug. 2026
  • Since then, the case has remained in the pleading stage, where the county has challenged the sufficiency of the claims without answering them, and the child’s attorneys have revised their complaint three times.
    — Bay City News, Mercury News, 1 Aug. 2026
Definition of sufficiency

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Cite this Entry

“Worthlessness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/worthlessness. Accessed 2 Oct. 2026.

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