WORD OF THE DAY
If only the world were populated entirely with complaisant people! Complaisant means willing to do something to please others, and complaisant people or animals are wonderful to be around.
Don't confuse complaisant with its near-homonym complacent. Both derive from the Latin complacere "to please," but while complaisant means willing to do something to please another, complacent means smug and self-satisfied, something that you want to avoid when you're on the winning team.
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Commonly confused words with complaisant
complicit / complacent / complaisant
If someone is complicit, they're guilty of helping someone commit a crime or misdeed. If they're complacent, they're guilty of letting something happen even if they have the power to intervene or stop it. A complaisant person, on the other hand, is only guilty of one thing: being a people pleaser.
read moreVocabulary lists containing complaisant
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