How to Use torture in a Sentence

torture

1 of 2 noun
Definition of torturenext
Synonyms for torturenext
  • Waiting is just torture for me.
  • Listening to him can be torture.
  • His body was found with 44 bullet wounds and signs of torture.
    — Andy Rose, CNN, 11 Oct. 2023
  • After all the torture, Peter lived to serve in the Union Army, working as a guide.
    — Deneen L. Brown, Washington Post, 17 Dec. 2022
  • Even this year, some of the references toward to the end of the season spoke to the events of the early 2000s, like the Iraq War and the idea of the detainees and torture.
    — Hunter Ingram, Variety, 12 Jan. 2024
  • Enter Daryl, once again a Saviors hostage and now the subject of their torture.
    — Daniel Dockery, Vulture, 7 Sep. 2023
  • Today’s great reads Adults with autism faced ‘torture’ at this L.A. group home.
    — Anthony De Leon, Los Angeles Times, 26 Mar. 2024
  • During the hours-long torture last year, deputy Hunter Elward shot Michael Jenkins in the mouth.
    — Emily Palmer, Peoplemag, 19 Mar. 2024
  • Here the threat would seem to be that of a trial based in part on evidence obtained through torture.
    — WSJ, 12 Feb. 2023
  • All war is torture and bombing and killing and raping and burning.
    — Joseph Hudak, Rolling Stone, 8 Feb. 2024
  • The torture set pieces in the ‘Saw’ films are lavish gifts of baroque horror presented to the audience.
    — Rudie Obias, Variety, 20 Oct. 2023
  • After the motel got noise complaints about the room during the torture, staff went to the room, officials said.
    — Paloma Chavez, Sacramento Bee, 6 Feb. 2024
  • There are videos of tortures, of dead people in the desert, there is plenty of material.
    — Nick Vivarelli, Variety, 6 Sep. 2023
  • That diary, along with lurid rape and torture videos, proved a gut-wrenching record of Lake and Ng's cruelty.
    — Devan Stuart Lesley, Peoplemag, 17 Feb. 2023
  • McGee also shared the same child torture post on Instagram.
    — Drew Harwell, Washington Post, 27 July 2023
  • According to the trailer, the torture traps this time include forcing a man to perform his own brain surgery.
    — Brendan Morrow, The Week, 22 Aug. 2023
  • Yet in a brief appearance before the media, the suspects all showed outward signs of torture and duress.
    — Charles Maynes, NPR, 25 Mar. 2024
  • If ballet was all self-effacing torture, there would be no need to wrestle with it.
    — Madison Mainwaring, The New Republic, 19 Apr. 2023
  • My AirPods died halfway through my five-mile run, and I was subjected to my own thoughts, trapped in a torture prison of my own making.
    — Jenny Arimoto, The New Yorker, 21 July 2023
  • In some ways, the intoxication is an antidote to the torture and loss portrayed in the earlier parts of the book.
    — Carolyn Kellogg, Los Angeles Times, 27 Feb. 2024
  • To the families’ dismay, a focus of the court’s attention has been whether torture has tainted the case, a thorny topic that has slowed the path to a trial.
    — Carol Rosenberg, New York Times, 16 Aug. 2023
  • Three of the four victims are Cecilia’s Mexican helpers, and they’ve all been gathered in the same torture warehouse.
    — Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 27 Sep. 2023
  • During one torture session in Uganda, according to the suit, two of his fingers were cut off.
    — Justin Wm. Moyer, Washington Post, 2 Jan. 2024
  • In both cases, the boys were known to child protective services before their torture and murder, for which their guardians were sent to prison.
    — Mackenzie Mays, Los Angeles Times, 4 Jan. 2024
  • There are achievements in the way of having overcome slavery and torture—for the most part, by no means entirely, but seeing it as bad.
    — Masha Gessen, The New Yorker, 12 Nov. 2023
  • Residents said the bodies bore marks of severe torture.
    — Aijaz Hussain The Associated Press, arkansasonline.com, 24 Dec. 2023
  • Among others, the archdiocese’s list now includes John Merzbacher, a former Catholic teacher who spent the last 28 years of his life in prison for the rape and torture of a student.
    — Lee O. Sanderlin, Baltimore Sun, 30 June 2023
  • Throughout his torture and his beating, Kiyota stayed silent, refusing to beg for his life or scream out loud.
    — Jake Adelstein, Rolling Stone, 17 Oct. 2023
  • This was four years of abuse and 14 straight days of torture, starvation, dehydration and then murder.
    — Noah Goldbergstaff Writer, Los Angeles Times, 23 Feb. 2023
  • Many bore signs of torture, according to a court document detailing the May 2019 find.
    — Teri Figueroa, San Diego Union-Tribune, 1 Mar. 2024
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torture

2 of 2 verb
  • Don't torture yourself over the mistake.
  • The report revealed that prisoners had been repeatedly tortured.
  • He was tortured, abused, and beat up by inmates and guards.
    — Lisa Deaderick, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 Aug. 2023
  • His lawyer also wants to bar a video of him torturing a bird.
    — Tresa Baldas, USA TODAY, 19 July 2023
  • Sure, there were the local drunks, the teenage hooligans who tortured stray cats, but even these wayward bees had a place in the hive.
    — Alexander Nazaryan, New York Times, 20 Feb. 2024
  • Who would abduct him, torture him for days and toss him onto a rubbish tip?
    — Tom Nolan, WSJ, 27 May 2022
  • Gao Zhisheng was a human rights lawyer who spent years in jail and was tortured, and then disappeared in 2017.
    — Li Yuan, New York Times, 29 Feb. 2024
  • Hundreds of young people at a peace concert died, many raped and tortured.
    — Brian T. Allen, National Review, 23 Dec. 2023
  • Arm off at the elbow with a knife, and then combs was tortured by others in the group, and then his body was thrown into a mass grave and not found for a year.
    — Laura Johnston, cleveland, 17 July 2023
  • At Smith’s trial, jurors were shown hard-to-watch footage of Smith torturing her there.
    — Christine Pelisek, Peoplemag, 27 Mar. 2024
  • In Colombia he’d been tortured for seven weeks straight.
    — Junot Díaz, The New Yorker, 30 Oct. 2023
  • On the way, he was kidnapped by military forces, tortured, and detained for weeks.
    — Graciela Mochkofsky, The New Yorker, 6 Feb. 2024
  • Legend has it that the place was used to extort, torture and kill those who crossed the mob, and the spirits of those unlucky victims still haunt the place today.
    — Los Angeles Times, 31 Oct. 2022
  • What’s more, among activists who were tortured, those with a strong commitment to their cause were the least likely to have symptoms of PTSD.
    — Ana Marie Cox, The New Republic, 14 Sep. 2023
  • The child was eventually tortured and killed; his body was dissolved in acid.
    — Stefano Pitrelli, Washington Post, 25 Sep. 2023
  • After the family dog ate the cake, the girls disclosed that Tituba was the person who was torturing them.
    — Rayna Reid Rayford, Essence, 31 Oct. 2023
  • That’s his trainer, Julian Bah, who Ellis says loves to torture him.
    — Milan Polk, Men's Health, 17 May 2022
  • In the absence of a free press, news spread by word of mouth: thousands of people were tortured, or left to die, in detention centers.
    — Stephania Taladrid, The New Yorker, 11 Sep. 2023
  • His mother was tortured for eight hours and his father murdered.
    — Robert D. McFadden, New York Times, 20 Sep. 2023
  • Demna was racked by fear that they would be captured and tortured, or that his father would kill them rather than submit.
    — Lauren Collins, The New Yorker, 20 Mar. 2023
  • Tom Brady and his 232 fourth-quarter/overtime passing yards has moved on to Tampa Bay to torture new teams on the way to a championship.
    — Tara Sullivan, BostonGlobe.com, 16 Nov. 2021
  • There is no indication that this is the place where Emmett Till was beaten and tortured.
    — Andrew Aoyama, The Atlantic, 18 Dec. 2023
  • She was removed from the box only to be repeatedly raped and tortured.
    — Diana Pearl, Peoplemag, 5 Sep. 2023
  • Why add to all that risk with a suitcase that may or may not reappear on the baggage claim belt torn, pancaked, and looking like it's been tortured in-flight?
    — Leena Kim, Town & Country, 2 Aug. 2023
  • Davis shares several electric scenes with Blyth as Gaul plots new ways to torture the tributes.
    — Katcy Stephan, Variety, 15 Nov. 2023
  • His parents said he had been tortured and suffered brain damage.
    — Claire Reid, USA TODAY, 17 Aug. 2023
  • Over 1,300 Israelis were killed in the attack, with thousands more wounded and many taken hostage by Hamas, and raped, tortured and murdered.
    — Greg Wehner, Fox News, 1 Nov. 2023
  • The jokes Asher scripts for himself become, in performance, tortured and grotesque rather than just flat.
    — Margaret Lyons, New York Times, 4 Jan. 2024
  • The animatronics turn on their former master and drag him away, but keep him alive to torture him.
    — Megan McCluskey, TIME, 27 Oct. 2023
  • In some very deep and existential way, the Cincinnati Bengals exist to torture you.
    — Paul Daugherty, The Enquirer, 2 Nov. 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'torture.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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