take off one's gloves

Verb

take off one's gloves (third-person singular simple present takes off one's gloves, present participle taking off one's gloves, simple past took off one's gloves, past participle taken off one's gloves)

1. To be unrestrained, especially in acting in a violent or punitive manner.
   • The public's duty is to take the role of prosecutor in seeking out the truth: and we ought to roll up our sleeves, take off the gloves, and wade into action.1952, United States. Congress, Congressional Record, page 8391
   • Ben-Gurion's self-restraint was soon exhausted and the British now took off their gloves to crush the Arabs by all and any means: they collectively punished villages and at one point destroyed a whole neighbourhood of Jaffa.2011, Simon Sebag Montefiore, Jerusalem: The Biography – A History of the Middle East, page 541

   Antonyms:

   handle with kid gloves, treat with kid gloves

2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see take off, glove.