Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The state of being defenseless or without protection: as, the defenselessness of a man's condition.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The characteristic of being
defenseless ;vulnerability .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the property of being helpless in the face of attack
Etymologies
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Examples
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This position of defenselessness is a position which no free people should ever occupy.
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"The KMT legislature blocked Taiwan's military procurements during the Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) years, and thus ensured Taiwan's long-term defenselessness against China.
Taipei Times 2009
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"No. Although the law makes her helpless in my hands, to me her defenselessness is her best defense."
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And what of the asphalt toreadors who use their own defenselessness as a kind of weapon?
Pedestrian Detection Dan Neil 2011
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Risk – By placing his hand in the box, he risks losing it, and in the violent universe of Dune, that means defenselessness and likely death.
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The issue is one of innocence and defenselessness on the one hand, and a decision by one who truly does have a choice on the other.
Requiring viewing of pre-abortion ultrasounds: I’m with Crist on this one 2010
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So, where is the Vatican's outrage at the worldwide epidemic of sexual abuse of children perpetrated by its own clergy --- a sin of the very first order, given the defenselessness of the victims and the power and trust invested in the molesting men of God?
Carla Seaquist: Where is the Vatican's Outrage about Child Molestation? 2010
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So, where is the Vatican's outrage at the worldwide epidemic of sexual abuse of children perpetrated by its own clergy -- a sin of the very first order, given the defenselessness of the victims and the power and trust invested in the molesting men of God?
Carla Seaquist: Where Is the Vatican's Outrage About Child Molestation? 2010
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Her weak façade of control did not hide her utter defenselessness and need to be wanted.
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We naked apes, in the millennia since consciousness evolved into thought, have forged in our fear and defenselessness great clumsy creatures called nations, which have a momentum seemingly beyond human ability to control, and which are both modeled after and behave like the predators who terrorized us for most of our time here on this planet, according to Ehrenreich.
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