English
lose face
Verb

lose face

  1. (idiomatic) To lose the respect of others; to be humiliated or experience public disgrace.
    • 1986, John Shelby Spong, Beyond Moralism: A Contemporary View of the Ten Commandments, HarperCollins (2000), ISBN 9781878282149, unnumbered page ↗:
      Ahithophel, Absalom's chief counsel, hanged himself when he lost face after his advice was rejected.
    • 2011, Mel Robbins, Stop Saying You're Fine: Discover a More Powerful You, Crown Archetype (2011), ISBN 9780307716729, page 221 ↗:
      When you start to feel unmotivated, you will look for ways to weasel out of your commitments. We all do it. If there's a stealth way to back out, without ever losing face, you will do it without hesitation.
    • 2012, Sharon Pincott, Battle for the President's Elephants: Life, Lunacy and Elation in the African Bush, Jacana Media (2012), ISBN 9781431403592, page 97 ↗:
      He had arranged for one of his managers to be present in the office with us, so I should have realised immediately that there was little chance of him backing down since that would have meant losing face in front of a subordinate.
Related terms Translations

This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002
Offline English dictionary