Pussyfooted
adj, verb ·4 syllables ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 simple past and past participle of pussyfoot form-of, participle, past
- 1 Overly circumspect or euphemistic.
"At that point, I couldn't help wondering how many ignorant, homophobic and outing-phobic viewers recoiled in horror. But relief was on the way in the form of the pussyfooted Alexis Smith. While referring to [Cole] Porter's 1946 film (alleged) biography, Night and Day, she mentions there were "certain aspects of the story which at that time they could not do." Was "certain aspects" a euphemism for gay? Smith's misplaced politeness here is truly retrograde."
Example
More examples"At that point, I couldn't help wondering how many ignorant, homophobic and outing-phobic viewers recoiled in horror. But relief was on the way in the form of the pussyfooted Alexis Smith. While referring to [Cole] Porter's 1946 film (alleged) biography, Night and Day, she mentions there were "certain aspects of the story which at that time they could not do." Was "certain aspects" a euphemism for gay? Smith's misplaced politeness here is truly retrograde."
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.