abase

VERB
[WITH OBJECT]usually abase oneself

Behave in a way that belittles or degrades (someone)

I watched my colleagues abasing themselves before the board of trustees

More example sentences

o How easily an ancient civilization can be made to abase itself completely.

o But my brother abased himself intellectually the same way they all did.
o I abased myself in such a way that it makes me cringe to even remember it.
o Heand his lawyers will need to seriously abase themselves before the Committee if he's going
to escape a similar fate.
o She recently remarked that the adoption of foreign accents for jobs in call centres shows how
easily an ancient civilisation can be made to abase itself completely.
o It's an icky daddy-daughter comedy featuring character actors abasing themselves horribly for
the money.
o Come fall, the rich and the powerful abase themselves for a seat in the owner's box.

When Fosca abases herself in front of the hero crying, one loves a dog, an animal she
is both using emotional blackmail and exposing her raw passion.
No, Cyril, you need not kneel and abase yourself.
How these gestures will be interpreted by the electorate is not clear, but it is clear that
they will do anything, even abase themselves in public, to gain power.
And please let me, or any other liberal, know if there is anything else we can do to
abase ourselves.
Their president abased himself with ritual abject apologies.
Eleven million people took to the streets last weekend to show their solidarity in the face
of terror, and two days later voted to abase themselves before it.
Countless bank executives have abased themselves at her feet.
Thus he enters the dining room ready to abase himself because he disdains everyone
else.
They find a secret delight in abasing themselves before men of violence.
The more politics abases itself before the values of TV entertainment, the less it
represents the real political process.
One begins to wonder perversely whether the artist will soon utterly abase herself
before our eyes.
 Generally, those of the lower orders abased themselves through prostration in front of
those who outranked them.

Some protest that this affirmation comes at a cost: you cannot receive it unless you first
abase yourself as a hopeless and helpless sinner in need of redemption.

Synonyms
humble, humiliate, belittle, demean, lower, degrade, disgrace, disparage, debase,
cheapen, discredit, mortify, bring low, demote, reduce