blameable
Americanadjective
Usage
What does blameable mean? Blameable is used to describe someone or something that deserves to be blamed for something negative that has happened. It is also spelled blamable. The word blameworthy means the same thing and is more commonly used. Another synonym is blameful. To blame someone for something is to accuse them of having caused it or to hold them responsible for it. The word blame is always used in the context of something bad that happened—you don’t blame someone for something good. However, when someone is blamed for something, it doesn’t mean they are guilty of it—it simply means they are being accused of being guilty of it. The word blame can also be used as a noun referring to the responsibility for something negative that happened. This is how the word is used in the phrase assign blame. As a noun, blame can also mean the disapproval, condemnation, or criticism for something bad that happened, as in He deserves most of the blame for the loss. Calling a person blameable indicates the belief that they are responsible for what happened and that they should receive the criticism for having caused it. Example: Those who participated in the fraud should be held responsible, but those who knew about it and did nothing are also blameable.
Other Word Forms
- blameably adverb
Vocabulary lists containing blameable
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Gillibrand is not the only candidate to suffer and her woes are not solely blameable on her gender.
From The Guardian • May 20, 2019
Being a spectator that year, we do not hesitate to say that the conduct of the umpires was extremely blameable.
From Wrestling and Wrestlers: Biographical Sketches of Celebrated Athletes of the Northern Ring; to Which is Added Notes on Bull and Badger Baiting by Gilpin, Sidney
It may now be time to inquire how far the master may be considered blameable for the conduct of this youth, and by what means the latter forfeited his affection and his respect.
From Life of Beethoven by Schindler, Anton
And in the first place, they are blameable in this, that they use a most captious kind of interrogation.
From The Academic Questions, Treatise De Finibus, and Tusculan Disputations, of M.T. Cicero, With a Sketch of the Greek Philosophers Mentioned by Cicero by Yonge, Charles Duke
That gross ingratitude I could never forgive, and if in reprisal, the cause I once advocated suffers, can I be held blameable?
From Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, December 10, 1887 by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.