Word.ws English Dictionary

useful idiots

useful idiots is the plural of useful idiot.

Meaning of useful idiot

Noun

useful idiot (plural useful idiots)

  1. (derogatory, historical) A Communist sympathizer in Western countries, from the perspective of the political right.
    • L'Umanita said the Communists would give the “useful idiots” of the left-wing Socialist party the choice of merging with the Communist party or getting out.1948 June 21, Arnold Cortesi, “Communist Shift Is Seen In Europe”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 08 Aug 2025, page 14
  2. (derogatory) One who unwittingly supports a malignant cause through naive attempts to be a force for good.
    • But what should the Obama Cult do now? The man has turned off the switch on the "Hopenosis" and has revealed the "Change Brigade" for the useful idiots they were.2009 January 22, Alex Knepper, “Obama's cabinet appointments contradict with message”, in The Mirror (Fairfield University), volume 34, number 15, page 3

Questions about useful idiots

What is useful idiots the plural of?
Useful idiots is the plural of useful idiot.

Words near useful idiots in the dictionary

  1. usees
  2. useful
  3. useful as a chocolate teapot
  4. useful as tits on a bull
  5. useful idiot
  6. useful idiots
  7. useful life
  8. useful lives
  9. usefulish
  10. usefull
  11. usefuller

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: useful idiots (page history and authors); useful idiot (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “useful idiots.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/useful_idiots. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.