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Scapegoat vs Suffer - What's the difference?

scapegoat | suffer |

As verbs the difference between scapegoat and suffer

is that scapegoat is to punish someone for the error or errors of someone else; to make a scapegoat of while suffer is to undergo hardship.

As a noun scapegoat

is in the mosaic day of atonement ritual, a goat symbolically imbued with the sins of the people, and sent out alive into the wilderness while another was sacrificed.

scapegoat

Noun

(en noun)
  • In the Mosaic Day of Atonement ritual, a goat symbolically imbued with the sins of the people, and sent out alive into the wilderness while another was sacrificed.
  • * 1646 , Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica , Book II, ch 5
  • alluding herein unto the heart of man and the precious bloud of our Saviour, who was typified by the Goat that was slain, and the scape-Goat in the Wilderness
  • Someone punished for the error or errors of someone else.
  • He is making me a scapegoat .
  • * 1834 , Thomas Babington Macaulay, "William Pitt, Earl of Chatham" [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2332]
  • The new Secretary of State had been long sick of the perfidy and levity of the First Lord of the Treasury, and began to fear that he might be made a scapegoat to save the old intriguer who, imbecile as he seemed, never wanted dexterity where danger was to be avoided.

    Synonyms

    * fall guy, patsy, whipping boy

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To punish someone for the error or errors of someone else; to make a scapegoat of.
  • :: Don't scapegoat me for your mistake.
  • * 1950 , Rachel Davis DuBois, Neighbors in Action: A Manual for Local Leaders in Intergroup Relations , p37
  • People tend to fear and then to scapegoat ... groups which seem to them to be fundamentally different from their own.
  • * 1975 , Richard M. Harris, Adam Kendon, Mary Ritchie Key, Organization of Behavior in Face-to-face Interaction , p66
  • They had been used for centuries to justify or rationalize the behavior of that status and conversely to scapegoat and blame some other category of people.
  • * 1992 , George H.W. Bush, State of the Union Address [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/5047]
  • And I want to add, as we make these changes, we work together to improve this system, that our intention is not scapegoating and finger-pointing.
  • * 2004 , Yvonne M. Agazarian, Systems-Centered Therapy for Groups , p208
  • Then either the world or others or the self becomes the target for the human tendency to scapegoat .
  • To blame something for the problems of a given society without evidence to back up the claim.
  • suffer

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To undergo hardship.
  • To feel pain.
  • To have a disease or condition.
  • To become worse.
  • To endure, undergo.
  • * Shakespeare
  • If your more ponderous and settled project / May suffer alteration.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-06, volume=408, issue=8843, page=68, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= The rise of smart beta , passage=Investors face a quandary. Cash offers a return of virtually zero in many developed countries; government-bond yields may have risen in recent weeks but they are still unattractive. Equities have suffered two big bear markets since 2000 and are wobbling again. It is hardly surprising that pension funds, insurers and endowments are searching for new sources of return.}}
  • (archaic) To allow.
  • * The U.S. Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. ยง 203:
  • "Employ" includes to suffer or permit to work.
  • * Section 31-36 of the Code of Montgomery County, Maryland:
  • *KJV, Matthew 19:14
  • *:But Jesus said, suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.
  • Synonyms

    * (l)

    Derived terms

    * insufferable * sufferer * suffering * suffer fools gladly * suffer by comparison

    Anagrams

    * ----