heavy-handed
/ˌhɛvɪˈhandɪd
/adjective
1Clumsy, insensitive, or overly forceful: heavy-handed policing...
- It is narrative driven, without being heavy-handed or overly literal.
- But protesters claimed they had not come to fight and many accused the police of heavy-handed tactics and attacking them for no reason.
- But Ms Smith, who got caught up in the brawl, said she would be complaining to the police about their heavy-handed approach.
Synonyms
clumsy, awkward, maladroit, unhandy, inept, unskilful, inexpert, graceless, ungraceful
informal ham-handed, ham-fisted, cack-handed
British informal all thumbs, all fingers and thumbs
insensitive, oppressive, overbearing, high-handed, harsh, hard, stern, severe, tyrannical, despotic, autocratic, ruthless, merciless;
tactless, undiplomatic, thoughtless, inconsiderate, inept
1.1Using too much of something: beware of being heavy-handed with the flour...
- This intrusion shows how heavy-handed the movie's efforts to be relevant and political are.
Derivatives
heavy-handedly
/ adverb ...- It is 1980s country house hotel cooking: complicated, rich, protein-intensive, heavy-handedly peppered with foods that shriek out Scottishness.
- I really think it's just an extension of that adolescent need to define one's individuality as heavy-handedly as possible, but specifically in the area of intelligence.
- As an added inducement, it was heavy-handedly hinted that co-operation by Bucharest would assist Romania's ambition to join the European Union.
heavy-handedness
- Meanwhile, here in London, events passed off peacefully amidst accusations of police heavy-handedness.
- Critics have been quick to accuse the monolith of Soviet-style heavy-handedness for this particular innovation, but given that the only real inconvenience this poses is making it harder to pirate the stuff, we can't really complain.
- In talking with him before coming on the air, as to what made him switch parties in 1994, and he was saying it was the heavy-handedness of the administration at the time, that of course being President Clinton.