humanewash
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
21
Scrabble Score
10
Letters
2
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To engage in the animal welfare analogue of greenwashing.
Example Sentences
- "Now, a new report from the anti-factory farming group Farm Forward seeks to outline the differences between independent and industry animal welfare labels and expose what it calls “humanewashing” among both types of groups. Like the now widely recognized practice of “greenwashing,” Farm Forward says that companies use humanewashing to deceive consumers who care about animal rights, leading them to believe animals were raised according to their expectations of humane treatment even when they were not."
Etymology
From humane + wash, following the established pattern of greenwash, pinkwash, and similar forms (which came ultimately from the figurative-extension sense of whitewash as "to slap a paintjob over the truth to hide it and to give a specious nice appearance"); this form also rhymes with brainwash, as does sustainwash.