Meaning & use
hypocrisy
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Meanings
noununcountabledisapproving
Behavior in which a person demands standards of others that they do not meet themselves.
Grammar: Normally uncountable: it is hypocrisy, not 'a hypocrisy'.
Patterns
- the hypocrisy of something
- accuse someone of hypocrisy
It was hypocrisy for the manager to lecture us about punctuality while arriving late every day.
Critics pointed to the hypocrisy of a politician who preached thrift but spent lavishly.
She hated the hypocrisy of people who praised honesty and lied constantly.
nouncountabledisapproving
A specific act or statement that shows this gap between claimed values and real conduct.
Grammar: Countable in the plural: the hypocrisies of public life.
Patterns
- the hypocrisies of something
He listed the hypocrisies of the new policy one by one.
The film exposes the small hypocrisies of a polite dinner party.
One of her biggest hypocrisies was condemning gossip while spreading it.
Word forms
| plural | hypocrisies |
|---|
Common combinations
- accuse someone of hypocrisy
- They accused the senator of hypocrisy over the tax bill.
- sheer hypocrisy
- Complaining about noise while hosting loud parties is sheer hypocrisy.
- expose hypocrisy
- The article exposed the hypocrisy of the company's green claims.
- smack of hypocrisy
- His speech on fairness smacked of hypocrisy.
- charge of hypocrisy
- He denied the charge of hypocrisy.
Synonyms and how they differ
- double standards
- Double standards describe unequal rules for different people, while hypocrisy centers on someone who breaks the rules they set.
- insincerity
- Insincerity is wider, covering any false feeling, not only a mismatch with stated morals.
- duplicity
- Duplicity is deliberate deceit, whereas hypocrisy may be a failure of consistency.
- cant
- Cant is older and describes empty moral talk, but hypocrisy needs a contradiction in behavior.
Opposites
Word family
- hypocrite noun
- a person who shows hypocrisy
- hypocritical adjective
- showing hypocrisy
- hypocritically adverb
- in a hypocritical way
Commonly confused: hypocrisy or hypocrite? hypocrisy or hypothermia?
hypocrisy vs hypocrite
Hypocrisy is the behavior; a hypocrite is the person who does it.
hypocrisy vs hypothermia
Hypothermia is dangerously low body temperature, unrelated despite the similar start.
Practice
Which situation is the clearest example of hypocrisy?
Choose one answer.
Hypocrisy is a gap between the standards you demand and your own behavior, as with the doctor. The others are mistakes or bad luck, not contradictions.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “hypocrisy”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.