whitewash

Plural: whitewashes

Noun

• a defeat in which the losing person or team fails to score
• wash consisting of lime and size in water; used for whitening walls and other surfaces
• a specious or deceptive clearing that attempts to gloss over failings and defects
• A lime and water mixture for painting walls and fences bright white.
• A complete victory or series of victories without suffering any losses; a clean sweep.
• A campaign to paper over unfavorable elements; (everyday life) pretense.
• The most basic type of thickening agent, flour blended with water to make a paste.
• Any liquid composition for whitening something, such as a wash for making the skin fair.
• A glass of sherry as a finale, after drinking port and claret.

Verb

• cover up a misdemeanor, fault, or error
  • "Let's not whitewash the crimes of Stalin"
• cover with whitewash
  • "whitewash walls"
• exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data
• To paint over with a lime and water mixture so as to brighten up a wall or fence.
• To cover over errors or bad actions.
• To repay the financial debts of (another person).
• To prevent a team from scoring any runs.
• In various games, to defeat (an opponent) so that they fail to score, or to reach a certain point in the game; to skunk.
• To make over (a person or character, a group, an event, etc) so that it is or seems more white, for example by applying makeup to a person, or by discounting the participation of people of color in an event and focusing on only white participation.

Examples

• Australia whitewashed West Indies 3-0.
• In his sermon, the minister didn’t try to whitewash over the sins of his church.
• The houses looked very bright when they whitewashed the whole neighborhood.

Synonyms

gloss over, hush up, sleek over, cover up, gloss over#English:_cover up, figuratively, paper over

Antonyms

blackwash

Related Words

colourwash