Meaning & use
gatekeep
To control who is allowed access to something, especially in a way seen as unnecessarily strict or exclusionary.
See it in a sentence
Fans accused the moderator of gatekeeping the fan club by rejecting new members over trivial quizzes.
Some critics gatekeep the genre, insisting only certain bands count as 'real' punk.
A note on using this word
Gatekeep is a relatively recent back-formation from 'gatekeeper,' common in informal and online writing about cultural belonging.
Words with a similar meaning
Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.
Words with an opposite meaning
welcomeinclude
Make it your own
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