invidious
/ɪnˈvɪdɪəs
/adjective
1(Of an action or situation) likely to arouse or incur resentment or anger in others: she’d put herself in an invidious position...
- These 6,000 teachers are in an invidious situation.
- This question seems a valid one, but one should remember that such a stance might put the possessor of the truth in an invidious situation.
- They now face the most invidious dilemma imaginable - and they have only four weeks in which to solve it.
Synonyms
unpleasant, awkward, difficult;
undesirable, unenviable
1.1(Of a comparison or distinction) unfairly discriminating; unjust: it seems invidious to make special mention of one aspect of his work...
- Not all distinctions are invidious comparisons.
- England is not best understood by invidious comparison with France.
- In reality, of course, all such comparisons are invidious, and the loss of any human being is tragic.
Synonyms
unfair, unjust, prejudicial, discriminatory, iniquitous, weighted, one-sided;
offensive, objectionable;
deleterious, detrimental, unwarranted
Derivatives
invidiously
/ adverb ...- Not all the people who compared us invidiously with the Soviet Union or other communist countries were communists.
- What is required by Congress is the removal of artificial, arbitrary, and unnecessary barriers to employment when the barriers operate invidiously to exclude on the basis of racial or other impermissible classification.
- What attracted liberal intellectuals to socialism was something else: mainly, the idea of community, which they contrasted invidiously to the individualism and competition of a market society.
invidiousness
/ noun ...- The real invidiousness is now in the record, implying as it does that Pasolini's work has a dangerous quality to it that Breillat's doesn't.
- That is why, of course, we do not rely upon either the artificiality or the incongruity of the exercise, let alone its invidiousness.
Origin
Early 17th century: from Latin invidiosus, from invidia (see envy).
envy from Middle English:
One of the traditional seven deadly sins, envy is said to lead to damnation in Christian theology. Early senses included ‘hostility, enmity’. It comes from Latin invidere ‘regard maliciously, grudge’, formed from in- ‘into’ and videre ‘to see’, also found in invidious (early 17th century).