resist

resist, withstand, contest, oppose, fight, combat, conflict, antagonize are comparable when they mean to set one person or thing against another in a hostile or competing way, and they may be roughly distinguished according to the degree to which one of the things or forces takes the initiative against the other. Resist and withstand suggest generally that the initiative lies wholly with the person or force competed against. Resist implies an overt recognition of a hostile or threatening force and a positive effort to counteract it, repel it, or ward it off

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the very region which had resisted and finally destroyed the Roman Empire— Malone

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it is hard to resist the thought that metaphor is one of the most important heuristic devices— R. M. Weaver

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resist the pressure of political orthodoxy

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Withstand may suggest a more passive yet often successful resistance in which if nothing is gained, at least nothing is lost

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most plants cannot withstand frost

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built to withstand work and worry— Yoder

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having withstood the pressure of her parents— Rose Macaulay

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Contest and oppose suggest a more positive action against a threatening or objectionable force.

Contest often stresses the raising of the issue or the bringing into open question of the matter over which there is conflict

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the board's power to inspect private welfare agencies was later contested and restricted— Amer. Guide Series: N. Y.

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it is impossible to contest your principle— Meredith

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attempt to reconcile contesting parties

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Oppose, perhaps the most general of the terms, can indicate almost any degree of protesting attitude from mild objection to positive belligerence, and can suggest any action from a mere contrastive setting of one thing against another to open violence against an opposing force, although in all instances positive action is implied

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the chronic objector, who opposes every popular measure— Crothers

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he had been much opposed by women, crossed, balked, wronged, misled— Hackett

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the only man in public life who dared oppose wholesale executions of the Sioux captives— Amer. Guide Series: Minn.

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human art, as opposed to mere tools and mechanical contrivances— Clodd

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Fight and combat suggest strong action.

Fight puts the initiative clearly in the hands of the subject of the verb and stresses the forthrightness or belligerence of the action

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my father was a servant of the people who fought Boston's biggest and crookedest politician fiercely— Cummings

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the steel companies . . . fought the strike with every weapon at their disposal— Amer. Guide Series: Ind.

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had to open his mouth wide and fight for breath— Caldwell

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Combat more often suggests a resisting than an initiating and stresses the force or impact or urgency of the resulting action, though it says nothing about the success of the resistance

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combat aggression

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Jefferson believed . . . that error of opinion may be tolerated so long as truth is free to combat it— Davis

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attempts to combat discriminatory practices were . . . evident— Collier's Yr. Bk.

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Russell combats the philosophers who denied the possibility of a three-dimensional non-Euclidean space— Kline

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Conflict and antagonize do not fit easily into the scale.

Conflict indicates merely the fact of competition, friction, or hostility between two forces

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two logical principles often conflict

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there was the smell of tar and ropes and sawdust to conflict with that of unsalt water faintly tinged with decaying vegetation— Archibald Marshall

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where his feeling conflicted with the facts, his vision flickered— Lippmann

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if the conflicting, indigenous elements in Korea and in Viet Nam were left to fight it out among themselves, which would prevail. . .?— Toynbee

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Antagonize has lost in general use the idea of placing oneself in opposition or in the position of an antagonist, a sense which persists in technical usage

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a new synthetic steroid . . . that antagonized the renal excretory effects of aldosterone— Science

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In current general use the term carries only the idea of arousing antagonism or making antagonistic

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it was inexpedient to antagonize these people— Cather

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they resented his extreme militancy ... he even antagonized a few of his fellow workers— Warner

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Analogous words: assail, *attack, assault: impugn, gainsay, contravene (see DENY): thwart, baffle, balk, foil, *frustrate

Antonyms: submit: abide