mistruth

noun — 2 senses

mistruth

noun

UK /mɪsˈtɹuːθ/

Etymology From mis- + truth. Cognate with Middle High German missetriuwede.

1

Untruth; falsehood.

  • In my brief stay in Johannesburg, I had left a trail of mistruths and, in each case, the falsehood had come back to haunt me.1994, Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, London: Abacus, published 2010, page 81:
  • “The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works: no civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth. And it’s not an American problem. This is not about Russian ads. This is a global problem.”2017 December 12, Amy B Wang, “Former Facebook VP says social media is destroying society with ‘dopamine-driven feedback loops’”, in The Washington Post:
2

A statement which, while technically true, is dishonestly misleading.

Derived terms
mistruthful

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.