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distract love

distract

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • transitive verb To cause (someone) to have difficulty paying attention to something.
  • transitive verb To attract (the attention) away from its original focus; divert.
  • transitive verb To cause to feel worried or uneasy; unsettle.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To draw apart; pull in different directions and separate; divide.
  • To turn or draw away from any object; divert from any point toward another point, or toward various other objects: as, to distract a person's attention from his occupation.
  • To cause distraction in; draw in different directions or toward different objects; confuse by diverse or opposing considerations; perplex; bewilder: as, to distract the mind with cares.
  • To disorder the reason of; derange; render frantic or mad.
  • Distracted; frantic; deranged: same as distraught.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To draw apart or away; to divide; to disjoin.
  • transitive verb To draw (the sight, mind, or attention) in different directions; to perplex; to confuse
  • transitive verb To agitate by conflicting passions, or by a variety of motives or of cares; to confound; to harass.
  • transitive verb To unsettle the reason of; to render insane; to craze; to madden; -- most frequently used in the participle, distracted.
  • adjective obsolete Separated; drawn asunder.
  • adjective obsolete Insane; mad.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To divert the attention of.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb draw someone's attention away from something
  • verb disturb in mind or make uneasy or cause to be worried or alarmed

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English distracten, from Latin distrahere, distract-, to pull away : dis-, apart; see dis– + trahere, to draw.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin distrahere ("to pull apart"), from dis- + trahere ("to pull").

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Examples

  • "The supporters of the government takeover of health care and the liberals who want to give health care to illegals are using my opposition as an excuse to distract from the critical questions being raised about this poorly conceived plan."

    Defiant Wilson raises more than $200,000 after outburst 2009

  • "The supporters of the government takeover of health care and the liberals who want to give health care to illegals are using my opposition as an excuse to distract from the critical questions being raised about this poorly conceived plan."

    Defiant Wilson raises more than $200,000 after outburst 2009

  • Let the media focus on the mess in the US rather than following her around looking for crumbs that can distract from the Democrapic mess. robertebob

    Media shut out from Palin's Hong Kong speech 2009

  • "The supporters of the government takeover of health care and the liberals who want to give health care to illegals are using my opposition as an excuse to distract from the critical questions being raised about this poorly conceived plan."

    Defiant Wilson raises more than $200,000 after outburst 2009

  • This whole issue is a blatant political effort to distract from the resistance to the administration's big government health care plans by returning to the campaign mode of "Bush is Bad."

    Republican calls Holder decision 'bulls**t' 2009

  • No need to distract from the center ring of this circus.

    Another present from Georgia Republicans (Blog for Democracy) 2009

  • They are rabbit trails designed to distract from the point at hand by miring us in long, unsolvable, and previously discussed semantic gamesmanship.

    Behe 2009

  • The truth of it is clear, in part, because there are no special considerations (eg the speech being “free”) that distract from the general truth being true on its face.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Could Students Be Suspended for “Beat the Jew” Game 2010

  • They are rabbit trails designed to distract from the point at hand by miring us in long, unsolvable, and previously discussed semantic gamesmanship.

    Behe 2009

  • He said "supporters of the government takeover of health care and the liberals who want to give health care to illegals are using my opposition as an excuse to distract from the critical questions being raised about this poorly conceived plan."

    Source: Joe Wilson racking up the dollars after 'you lie' comment 2009

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