cretinize

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   rare and offensive: to make a person intellectually dulled, degraded, or treated as though unintelligent

   The essay argues that repetitive labor can cretinize workers by denying them judgment or variety.

Formed from cretin + -ize. Cretin was once a medical label and later became an insult for a person considered unintelligent; both uses are now offensive, and modern medicine uses specific diagnostic terms instead. The verb survives chiefly in critical or historical writing.

Topics

External links

• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary
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