What is another word for extenuating?

Pronunciation: [ɛkstˈɛnjuːˌe͡ɪtɪŋ] (IPA)

Extenuating is a word that refers to circumstances or factors that help to make a situation less serious or severe. There are several synonyms for the word extenuating, including mitigating, justifying, explaining, excusing, pardoning, and condoning. Other words that can also be used as synonyms for extenuating include minimizing, moderating, attenuating, lessening, alleviating, and reducing. These words are all related to the idea of making something seem less serious or significant, and are often used to describe factors that might be taken into account when making a decision about a particular situation. Whether you use the word extenuating or one of its many synonyms, the meaning remains the same - something that lessens the seriousness or severity of a situation.

What are the paraphrases for Extenuating?

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What are the hypernyms for Extenuating?

A hypernym is a word with a broad meaning that encompasses more specific words called hyponyms.

What are the opposite words for extenuating?

The word extenuating refers to something that could lessen the seriousness or negative impact of a particular action or situation. The opposite of extenuating would be aggravating, which means to make something worse or more severe. Other antonyms for extenuating include aggravating, exacerbating, worsening, inflaming, and intensifying. All these words indicate that something not only fails to ameliorate a situation but actively works to make it worse. Those antonyms highlight that, unlike extenuating circumstances, aggravating factors only increase the gravity and consequence of a wrongdoing or problem. Thus, it is necessary to recognize these opposite words to have a better understanding of the opposite effects that a situation or action can have.

What are the antonyms for Extenuating?

Usage examples for Extenuating

And then, in a voice that never trembled nor varied, she narrated briefly the scene which had just occurred, not extenuating in the slightest her own share in the transaction, or offering a single syllable of excuse.
"The Martins Of Cro' Martin, Vol. II (of II)"
Charles James Lever
I've no doubt I should cast about for extenuating circumstances, though you would not deserve my doing so.
"The Locusts' Years"
Mary Helen Fee
He simply waited, leaning over his safe, for Mr. Dainopoulos to explain his intrusion, his existence on earth, and his intentions as to the future, and anything else which might be regarded as extenuating his conduct.
"Command"
William McFee

Famous quotes with Extenuating

  • 3135. Every one is for denying, extenuating, or throwing the Blame on others, and never will confess a Fault, and take it upon himself ; but this, instead of getting it excused and pardoned aggravates it, and makes it worse, and angers the Party concerned, and so it doth Mischief instead of Good. I advise therefore (unless it be a furious, unforgiving Person, and the Thing be a Crime that must not be owned) frankly to own it, to shew how thou wast brought into it, and wish thou hadst not done it. It's likely this ingenuous dealing and throwing thyself upon his Kindness, may work upon his good Nature, and so the storm may pass off without more Mischief ; but this must be managed artfully in a middle Way between Sneaking and Arrogancy.
    Thomas Fuller (writer)
  • Moved by a generous eagerness to turn men's attention to the power which dwelt in circumstances, Mr. Owen devised the instructive phrase, that "man's character was formed him and not him." He used the unforgettable inference that "man is the creature of circumstances." The school of material improvers believed they could put in permanent force right circumstances. The great dogma was their charter of encouragement. To those who hated without thought It seemed a restrictive doctrine to be asked to admit that there were extenuating circumstances in the career of every rascal. To the clergy with whom censure was a profession, and who held that all sin was wilful, man being represented as the "creature of circumstances," appeared a denial of moral responsibility. When they were asked to direct hatred against error, and pity the erring — who had inherited so base a fortune of incapacity and condition — they were wroth exceedingly, and said it would be making a compromise with sin. The idea of the philosopher of circumstances was that the very murderer in his last cell had been born with a staple in his soul, to which the villainous conditions of his life had attached an unseen chain, which had drawn him to the gallows, and that the rope which was to hang him was but the visible part. Legislators since that day have come to admit that punishment is justifiable only as far as it has preventive influence. To use the great words of Hobbes, "Punishment regardeth not the past, only the future."
    George Holyoake

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