cruel

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be cruel to be kind

To be blunt and honest with someone in order to help them realize something that may help them. This phrase expresses the idea that it is sometimes necessary to hurt someone's feelings in order to tell them the truth. I'm not going to sit here and tell Judith that she's a shoo-in when she's clearly not ready for her audition. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.
See also: cruel, kind, to

goodbye, cruel world

cliché An exclamation, note, or statement made immediately prior to one's death, especially by suicide. We felt as though we never had closure after Tom committed suicide. We never even knew he was contemplating taking his own life, and his note merely said "Goodbye, cruel world." The gunslinger lay on the ground, bleeding into the dust. "Goodbye, cruel world," he gasped with his last breath. And with that, he perished.
See also: cruel, world

you have to be cruel to be kind

You must be blunt and honest with someone in order to help them realize something that may help them; it is sometimes necessary to hurt someone's feelings in order to tell them the truth. I'm not going to sit here and tell Judith that she's a shoo-in when she's clearly not ready for her audition. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.
See also: cruel, have, kind, to
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2015 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

you have to be cruel to be kind

When people say you have to be cruel to be kind, they mean that sometimes if you are unkind to someone it will be the best thing for them. `I have to be cruel to be kind,' said Lindsay. `If I don't control his food, he will eat himself to death.'
See also: cruel, have, kind, to
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012

be cruel to be kind

act towards someone in a way which seems harsh but will ultimately be of benefit.
In Shakespeare 's Hamlet, ‘I must be cruel only to be kind’ was Hamlet's explanation of his reasons for bullying his mother about her second marriage.
See also: cruel, kind, to
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

be ˌcruel to be ˈkind

use unpleasant methods because they are necessary to help somebody: I was worried about Katie getting too involved with Steve so I eventually told her about his drug addiction — you’ve got to be cruel to be kind sometimes. OPPOSITE: kill somebody with kindness
See also: cruel, kind, to
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017
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References in periodicals archive ?
nicer bigger There is too much violence, crime, cruelness and hatred and it needs to be turned around.
If I was 'the Boss'... Meet the pint-sized PMs' who are calling for more rainbows, more giraffes, the jailing of more naughty people and enough money for everyone - who wouldn't elect them?: WHEN it comes to governing the country, everyone thinks they can do it better... even the kids, as MARIE TURBILL discovered
What he (Lu Xun) "saw" and "discovered" was not only the brutality of the execution or the brutality of the onlookers, but the directness, brutality and cruelness of the film medium (photography-image--the author's note) ...
Criticism of technical rationality in visual communication: a subject under discussion from Mcluhan's theory of "cool media"
According to Hatim Al-Saqr, professor of Modern Literary and Criticism in Sana'a University, the Handala cartoons imply the bitterness as well as the cruelness of desert life.
The journey of Naji al-Ali and his Handala character (Culture)
The court determined that the conduct was "not sufficiently frequent and serious." (144) It described the Harris factors and then stated that the totality of facts must show more than unpleasantness, cruelness, or vulgarity, (145) citing a 1997 Fourth Circuit case, Hartsell v.
Hidden in plain sight: achieving more just results in hostile work environment sexual harassment cases by reexamining Supreme Court precedent
Throughout his work he continued to ask questions about the slavery of intellectual repression, the perils of having limited perception, intolerance, the cruelness of society, the folly of mercenary pursuits, the corruption of childhood innocence by greed and the bonds wrought by materialism, rationalism, religion and even marriage.
Minds in chains: two exhibitions devoted to Blake and slavery reveal an artist of baffling ambiguities as well as savage polemical power
And as I looked at little Anil's smiling face, life's cruelness hit me.
Letter From The Heart: A mother in a million; When Baljit Singh's son was born prematurely, she kept a vigil at his bedside for three months. Tragically, a year later she died of a brain haemorrhage. Here, her husband, Sucha, 38, opens his heart to the wife and mother he loved..
It was like that moment in Forrest Gump when Tom Hanks - in defiance of the cruelness of the world around him - decides that he's going to run.
AT HOME WITH THE WALTONS: Daddy's walking back to flabbiness
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