fatuity

[ fuh-too-i-tee, -tyoo- ]

noun

, plural fa·tu·i·ties.

1. complacent stupidity; foolishness.
2. something foolish; bêtise.

fatuity

/ fəˈtjuːɪtɪ /

noun

1. complacent foolishness; inanity
2. a fatuous remark, act, sentiment, etc
3. archaic.
   idiocy

Derived Forms

• faˈtuitous, adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of fatuity¹

First recorded in 1530–40; from Latin fatuitās; fatuous, -ity

Example Sentences

Despite the fatuity of the arguments being posited by the ESG critics, the investment industry is running scared.

From Los Angeles Times

A melancholy Churchill, seeing the possibility of individual greatness doubted because of the modern preoccupation with “mass effects,” said in 1925: “There is a sense of vacancy and of fatuity, of incompleteness. We miss our giants. We are sorry that their age is past.”

From Washington Post

In his new book, Mamet is pessimistic on the market for challenging plays, warning that theater on Broadway has largely been replaced by pageantry, complaining of the “fatuity of issue plays” and bemoaning the demise of the “knowledgeable Broadway audience” in an era when its theatergoers are mostly tourists.

From New York Times

He larded this fatuity with dollops of the usual rhetorical fat that greases governmental grandstanding — references to the “unacceptable” status quo, the wonders that will be worked in conjunction with “our stakeholders” hither and yon, through “sustained, urgent, yet lasting commitment,” etc.

From Washington Post

Besides, she said, in another moment of utter fatuity, “Republicans are focused on the facts.”

From New York Times