ridicule

ridicule vb Ridicule, deride, mock, taunt, twit, rally are comparable when they mean to make a person or thing the object of laughter.

Ridicule implies deliberate and often malicious belittling of the person or thing ridiculed

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the old State religion which Augustine attacks, ridiculing the innumerable Roman godlings whose names he perhaps found in Varro— Inge

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the man who wants to preserve his personal identity is ridiculed as an eccentric— Harris

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Deride implies a bitter or contemptuous spirit

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he took his revenge on the fate that had made him sad by fiercely deriding everything— Huxley

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sardonic wisecracks in which supposedly lofty ideals are mercilessly derided— Times Lit. Sup.

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Mock stresses scornful derision and usually implies words or gestures or sometimes acts expressive of one's defiance or contempt

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nowhere can men be entirely happy while human nature is still being mocked and tortured on other parts of the globe— Kennan

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When used in reference to things, mock often implies a setting at naught that suggests scorn or derision

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a perishing that mocks the gladness of the spring!— Wordsworth

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a joke was a good way to mock reality, to dodge an issue, to escape involvement— Maclnnes

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Taunt implies both mockery and reproach; it often connotes jeering insults

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taunted in fun or in earnest with the foibles and shortcomings of their fathers— de Lag una

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he . . . took no part in the revivals and usually teased and taunted those who did— J. M. Hunt

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Twit may come close to taunt and imply a mocking or cruel casting something up to someone

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the absence of ideas with which Matthew Arnold twits them— Inge

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a British author snooting American food is like the blind twitting the one-eyed— Liebling

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but twit, like rally, may imply no more than good-natured raillery or friendly ridicule

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the paper delights in twitting new laws— Newsweek

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a useful place for getting away from the cheery rallying of . . . the English governess— Nancy Hale

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Analogous words: *scoff, flout, jeer, gibe: caricature, burlesque, travesty (see under CARICATURE n)