phony

He sat for a telephone interview with USA Today last week that was clearly meant to read as “heartfelt,” but only makes him sound like a phony.

From Salon ● Jun. 15, 2026

As AI technology becomes more and more sophisticated, online manipulation using phony influencers could "become even more personalized and difficult to control," he added.

From Barron's ● May 10, 2026

He suspected that they thought he might be carrying a phony passport, but he was happy to clear up any confusion.

From Slate ● Apr. 19, 2026

Zadie Smith quit keeping a diary because the exercise made her feel phony and self-conscious.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 6, 2026

In one way, he found making the phony tapes tedious; in another, he liked the simple sensation of it — pushing the tabs, feeling them latch.

From "Typical American" by Gish Jen

Soft know-it-alls from the city and phonies of any stripe receive rough treatment in his shows, such as the llama farmer from California who gets thrown under a Montana cattle guard in “Yellowstone.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 31, 2025

Mr. Musk trashed Mr. Zuckerberg’s Instagram as a dwelling for fakers and phonies in a Wednesday evening post to Twitter.

From Washington Times ● Jul. 6, 2023

But there’s also a touch of the juvenile Holden Caulfield rolling his eyes about phonies here.

From New York Times ● Oct. 13, 2022

Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye" famously denounced the bulk of humanity as "phonies" — epitomizing the human tendency to valued those who remain genuine and deride fakers.

From Salon ● May 24, 2022

Just as Holden Caulfield sees phonies everywhere, those same phonies can't recognize Eden's talent and they run him down.

From "Hole in My Life" by Jack Gantos

Angelenos can spot a phony from far away — and Spencer, you’re turning out to be phonier than the fake drama on any of the television shows you ever appeared in.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 10, 2026

Arthur Julian, a writer on “F Troop,” noted that “real audiences sound phonier than the laugh track. Sometimes they freeze up and act unnatural.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 22, 2026

But the screenplay, by David Benioff, Billy Ray, and Darren Lemke, can’t stand that level of scrutiny, and the closer we get to the actors mouthing their clunky, mock-allegorical dialogue, the phonier they seem.

From Slate ● Oct. 9, 2019

Corny Collins, the dance-show host, should be good-looking in a phonier, slicker way than Steven Beckingham is here, for instance.

From New York Times ● Jul. 16, 2010

The phonier it got, the more she cried.

From "The Catcher in the Rye" by J. D. Salinger

But in the past those moments were often the phoniest, as though she’d entered a kind of stage-school zombie state.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 9, 2017

When it came to decorating his own new home, he threw out all the rules of good taste and embraced the phoniest of fakes.

From New York Times ● Apr. 10, 2014

What would be the phoniest thing of all would be for me to all of the sudden not be his friend.

From Washington Post ● Oct. 26, 2011

NEWPORT, Wales -- So it was, inevitably and predictably, the phoniest of conflicts.

From Golf Digest ● Sep. 30, 2010

“That was the phoniest thing I’ve ever heard.”

From "Glitch" by Laura Martin

She was indicted for inducing her client, convicted Kidnaper John William Irwin, to testify falsely in an effort to prove that Sinatra phonied up the kidnaping as a publicity stunt.

From Time Magazine Archive

Every time I go anywhere now it's all phonied up.

From Time Magazine Archive