complicit
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complicit
Shouldn't this word render down to "with" and "legitimate"? Yet it partners only with nefarious type fellows, such as complicit in crime. What gives?
William A. Hupy
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Re: complicit
Etymology is interesting and useful, but it does not always explain the current definition of a word. Although the source of complicit is silent about the nature of the complicity, our present definition requires complicity to be toward nefarious acts. If one is peripherally involved in the commission of a good deed, he/she is not complicit to the action. It is not ours to reason why, it is but ours to accept what the dictionaries say. Well, not always. We can march to the beat of a different drummer, but we risk being out of step with the total system. If your drummer tells you that complicity can be applied to good actions, by all means try using it that way. Don’t be surprised, though, when the world does not understand you.
It is dark at night, but the Sun will come up and then we can see.
- Slava
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Re: complicit
Why do you think it should? What I've seen is that the "plicit" here comes from folded.Shouldn't this word render down to "with" and "legitimate"?
Life is like playing chess with chessmen who each have thoughts and feelings and motives of their own.
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Re: complicit
Related to accomplice. The folding implies togetherness and comradeship. Accomplice and complicity are technically neutral, but tend in us to refer to criminal activity though often used humorously.
pl
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- Slava
- Great Grand Panjandrum
- Posts: 8158
- Joined: Thu Sep 28, 2006 9:31 am
- Location: Finger Lakes, NY
Re: complicit
Licit may mean legal, but plicit means fold.
Life is like playing chess with chessmen who each have thoughts and feelings and motives of their own.
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