sugarcoat
verbUS /ˈʃʊɡɚˌkoʊt/ · UK /ˈʃʊɡəˌkəʊt/
Etymology From sugar + coat; figurative sense from the practice of coating medicinal tablets or pills with sugar in order to disguise their unpleasant taste (sugarcoating the pill).
1
To coat with sugar.
2
Figuratively To make superficially more attractive; to give a falsely pleasant appearance to.
- There's no way to sugarcoat the loss of the space shuttle; it was an unmitigated disaster.
- I went to the unheard-of trouble of re-writing the letter and saying the same harsh things softly, so as to sugarcoat the anguish and make it a little more endurable […]1876 November 1, Mark Twain, “Letter to Mr. Burrough, of St. Louis”, in The Letters Of Mark Twain,, volume 3:
3 more examples
- The only difference is I got the balls to say it in front of y'all / And I don't gotta be false or sugarcoat it at all2000, “The Real Slim Shady”, in The Marshall Mathers LP, performed by Eminem:
- […] And I don't think we can sugarcoat both the human toll that is unfolding in Ukraine, but also how it is reordering the international architecture in ways that we haven't seen in decades.2022 March 23, Barack Obama, 2:52 from the start, in Centennial Celebration Conversation with President Barack Obama and Yo-Yo Ma, Chicago Council on Global Affairs, via YouTube:
- "The insurgents killed them all?" "Very likely." Scout's expression was kindly, but he was apparently not the sort to sugarcoat things. Then again, maybe he had simply read her receptivity well.2023 October 12, HarryBlank, “Fire in the Hole”, in SCP Foundation, archived from the original on 02 Sep 2024:
- Derived terms
- sugarcoat a bitter pill, sugarcoated, sugarcoating
- Coordinate terms
- glaze