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Shocking vs Offensive - What's the difference?

shocking | offensive | Related terms |

As adjectives the difference between shocking and offensive

is that shocking is inspiring shock; startling while offensive is causing offense; arousing a visceral reaction of disgust, anger, or hatred.

As nouns the difference between shocking and offensive

is that shocking is the application of an electric shock while offensive is an attack.

As a verb shocking

is present participle of lang=en.

shocking

English

Adjective

(head)
  • Inspiring shock; startling
  • Unusually obscene or lewd
  • (colloquial) Extremely bad
  • Synonyms

    See

    Verb

    (head)
  • Noun

    (en noun)
  • The application of an electric shock.
  • * 2005 , Will Tuttle, The World Peace Diet
  • We terrorize millions of vulnerable and defenseless animals daily with painful shockings , beatings, brandings,

    Anagrams

    *

    offensive

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Causing offense; arousing a visceral reaction of disgust, anger, or hatred.
  • Relating to an offense or attack, as opposed to defensive.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author= Ed Pilkington
  • , volume=188, issue=26, page=6, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= ‘Killer robots’ should be banned in advance, UN told , passage=In his submission to the UN, [Christof] Heyns points to the experience of drones. Unmanned aerial vehicles were intended initially only for surveillance, and their use for offensive purposes was prohibited, yet once strategists realised their perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.}}
  • Having to do with play directed at scoring.
  • Usage notes

    * Nouns to which "offensive" is often applied: content, material, language, word, comment, remark, statement, speech, joke, humor, image, picture, art, behavior, conduct, act, action. * When the second syllable is emphasized, "offensive" is defined as "insulting". When the first syllable is emphasized, it refers to the attacker of a conflict or the team in a sport who possesses the ball.

    Synonyms

    * aggressive * invidious (Intending to cause envious offense)

    Antonyms

    * inoffensive (not causing offense or disgust ) * defensive (relating or causing defence )

    Derived terms

    * offensiveness

    Noun

  • (countable, military) An attack.
  • The Marines today launched a major offensive .
  • (uncountable) The posture of attacking or being able to attack.
  • He took the offensive in the press, accusing his opponent of corruption.