Thesaurus.com
Dictionary.com
Definitions

brutalize

[broot-l-ahyz] / ˈbrut lˌaɪz /




Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

Whether or not he decides to appear at the trial, scheduled to begin later this year, the A.G. can use his videoed deposition testimony to brutalize him the same way Carroll’s lawyers did.

From Slate ● May 11, 2023

Specifically, a few decades of drought pushed the Huns to the brink, forcing them to brutalize others in pursuit of survival.

From Salon ● Dec. 24, 2022

He said the new commissioner should also commit to firing police officers who “abuse, harass, brutalize, and kill” and promote transparency by releasing more disciplinary records.

From Seattle Times ● Jan. 6, 2022

“It will consume government. It will brutalize people. It will cost taxpayers millions of dollars,” he said.

From Washington Times ● Aug. 10, 2021

The weight of the sand began to brutalize her shoulders.

From "The Princess Bride" by William Goldman

Any overacting brutalizes Cheever's prose; mugging is the artistic equivalent of a mugging.

From Time Magazine Archive

All punishment which is not tempered with forgiveness is brutal; and brutalizes both punisher and punished.

From Practical Ethics by William De Witt Hyde

It is not the Creator who so brutalizes lives and emotions.

From Highland Ballad by Christopher Leadem

A sophist is a forger, and this forger sometimes brutalizes good sense.

From The Man Who Laughs by Victor Hugo

It brutalizes the men and prevents the growth of feminine qualities, coyness among others.

From Primitive Love and Love-Stories by Henry Theophilus Finck

This is not the first time I have encountered a situation where the hapless staff find themselves brutalized by loud, idiotic, or culturally discordant music.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 15, 2025

This is about as much of a review of “All’s Fair” worth venturing at this point, since pretty much every critic has brutalized the show.

From Salon ● Nov. 6, 2025

When, in the mid-20th century, President Dwight Eisenhower’s “mighty network of highways” spread its tentacles across the landscape, it brutalized nature.

From Slate ● May 25, 2024

Do we want them to leave prison alienated, brutalized, stigmatized and lacking in employable skills?

From New York Times ● Mar. 25, 2023

In the kitchen, she hacked at a chunk of ham with a knife and brutalized an onion.

From "Out of Darkness" by Ashley Hope Pérez

Dahlia and Mark sort through the brutalizing, even lethal implications for asylum seekers and more than 1 million recipients of temporary protected status, or TPS.

From Slate ● Jun. 25, 2026

In an interview with the New York Times, he said he hopes the Revolutionary Guard will simply “surrender” to the opposition forces it was brutalizing only a month ago.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 2, 2026

Los Angeles built off the momentum, brutalizing Arizona with eight straight designed runs to start off a 75-yard touchdown drive to open the third quarter.

From Washington Times ● Oct. 16, 2023

In Philipps’s meticulously assembled and brilliantly written account, he is not a warrior driven mad by the stress of combat, a good guy gone rogue or a victim of a brutalizing culture.

From New York Times ● Sep. 3, 2021

Three thousand children crowded into this ugly brutalizing school that had facilities for only one thousand.

From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith




Vocabulary lists containing brutalize


Vocabulary.com logo
by dictionary.com

Dictionary.com's Learning Companion

Go beyond just looking up words.
Remember them forever with VocabTrainer.

Start training