extremist

Pluralextremists

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A person who holds extreme views, especially one who actively promotes them; a radical or fanatic.

   Investigators identified the attacker as a religious extremist.

   Political extremists on both sides rejected any compromise.

   Similarradical, fanatic, zealot, militant, hardliner

   Oppositemoderate, centrist

   Note

   A political label built from extreme plus -ist, the suffix that names adherents of a position. It is usually applied from outside: it measures a person's distance from what mainstream opinion accepts as legitimate, whether or not they act on those views. Edo Konrad's 2018 article on settler violence uses it for people spray-painting "Death to Arabs" in Urif, where the views have become acts. A rarer synonym is jusquaboutist.

2. 2
   adjective

   Far from moderate in opinion, particularly on questions of politics or religion.

   The party's extremist wing demanded an immediate revolution.

   Their extremist beliefs left no room for dialogue.

   Similarradical, fanatical, militant, hardline, extreme

   Oppositemoderate, mainstream, centrist

   Note

   The adjective that describes people and groups, usually placed before a noun: extremist movements, extremist youth, an extremist wing. Because it measures how far someone's views go, it can be graded as more extremist or most extremist. Keep it apart from the "relating to extremism" meaning, which classifies things rather than people. Extremist propaganda belongs to a movement, but the propaganda itself holds no views.

3. 3
   adjective

   Relating to or characteristic of extremism.

   The report traced the spread of extremist propaganda across social media.

   Investigators flagged the channel for hosting extremist content.

   Similarradical, militant

   Oppositemoderate, mainstream

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