condemning

Pluralcondemnings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of condemn.

   Critics are condemning the new policy as unfair to small businesses.

   Condemning the violence, the community leaders called for calm.

   Note

   Every meaning of condemn travels with this form, so the object decides the sense. Condemning a policy is denouncing it. Condemning a prisoner is sentencing them, and condemning a building is declaring it unfit for use. As a verb form it always takes that object. This is the easy way to tell it from the gradable adjective, where a very condemning remark describes a tone rather than an action.

2. 2
   adjective

   Expressing strong disapproval or blame; condemnatory.

   The report's condemning tone left no doubt about the board's anger.

   Reporters highlighted the senator's condemning remarks about the scandal.

   Similarcondemnatory

   Oppositeapproving, complimentary, laudatory, admiring

   Note

   An adjective that grades like any other. Spurgeon preaches in 1871 that sinning against a tender conscience is "a very condemning thing," and Gibbs and Colston's Irony in Language and Thought (2007) finds ironic remarks "more condemning" than literal ones. Very, more and most are the test: they fit the adjective, not a verb with an object. Condemnatory means the same and can usually stand in its place.

3. 3
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act or expression of strong disapproval; condemnation.

   Public condemning of the regime grew louder after the report appeared.

   The committee's swift condemning of the fraud reassured worried investors.

   Similarcondemnation, denunciation, censure, criticism

   Oppositepraise, approval, commendation, endorsement

   Note

   A noun made straight from the verb, and one that can be counted. Anna Trapnell's The Cry of a Stone (1654) speaks of living "without the condemnings or reproaches of men." The plural treats each reproach as a separate act of blame. Used uncountably, it covers the same ground as condemnation, which is the familiar equivalent for a single settled judgment.

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