Abusive \A*bu"sive\, a. [Cf. F. abusif, fr. L. abusivus.]
1. Wrongly used; perverted; misapplied.
[1913 Webster]
I am . . . necessitated to use the word Parliament
improperly, according to the abusive acceptation
thereof. --Fuller.
[1913 Webster]
2. Given to misusing; also, full of abuses. [Archaic] "The
abusive prerogatives of his see." --Hallam.
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3. Practicing abuse; prone to ill treat by coarse, insulting
words or by other ill usage; as, an abusive author; an
abusive fellow.
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4. Containing abuse, or serving as the instrument of abuse;
vituperative; reproachful; scurrilous. "An abusive
lampoon." --Johnson.
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5. Tending to deceive; fraudulent; cheating. [Obs.] "An
abusive treaty." --Bacon.
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Syn: Reproachful; scurrilous; opprobrious; insolent;
insulting; injurious; offensive; reviling.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
abusive
adj 1: expressing offensive reproach [syn: insulting, opprobrious,
scornful, scurrilous]
2: characterized by physical or psychological maltreatment;
"abusive punishment"; "argued...that foster homes are
abusive"
WordNet (r) 2.0
122 Moby Thesaurus words for "abusive":
Rabelaisian, atrocious, back-biting, backhand, backhanded,
belittling, bitchy, blackening, blameful, blasphemous, bludgeoning,
blustering, browbeating, brutal, bulldozing, bullying,
calumniatory, calumnious, catty, censorious, comminatory,
condemnatory, contemptuous, contumelious, corrupt, crooked, cruel,
cursing, damnatory, defamatory, degrading, denunciatory,
deprecative, deprecatory, depreciative, depreciatory, derisive,
derisory, derogative, derogatory, destructive, detractory, dirty,
dishonest, disparaging, dysphemistic, epithetic, excommunicative,
excommunicatory, execrating, execrative, execratory,
fear-inspiring, filthy, foreboding, foul, fulminatory, harmful,
hectoring, humiliating, hurtful, imminent, imprecatory, improper,
incorrect, injurious, insolent, insulting, intimidating, invective,
inveighing, judgmental, left-handed, libelous, lowering,
maledictory, maligning, menacing, minacious, minatory, minimizing,
misapplied, objurgatory, obscene, odious, offending, offensive,
ominous, opprobrious, outrageous, pejorative, perverted, priggish,
profane, raw, reproachful, reprobative, reviling, ribald,
ridiculing, risque, rude, scandalous, scatologic, scoffing,
scurrile, scurrilous, slanderous, slighting, smutty, terroristic,
terrorizing, threatening, threatful, truculent, unspeakable, venal,
vile, vilifying, vituperative, vulgar, wrong
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
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