Crimes are always heinous.
Raping someone is a heinous act.
Terrorist bombings are heinous actions.
Each of these acts reeks of wickedness and evil. That is what heinous is all about: being evil, wicked and intolerable.
The dictionary definitions for Heinous are as follows:
1. Evil; atrocious (adjective)
Masters tip to learn Heinous:
A quote from Mahatma Gandhi can come to your aid here: “The most heinous and the most cruel crimes of which history has record have been committed under the cover of religion or equally noble motives”.
The word heinous is repeatedly used in conjunction with history, in order to represent the evil deeds of the past. The Nazi concentration camps during World War 2 were one such heinous place.
Word in Context
The following is an extract from The Washington Post used for educational purposes:
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