“Cultures” Versus “White Girls” As you can probably sense from my scare quotes, you can never be too careful these days.
Mrs. Deshales ordered an ambulance, which managed to scare off Wahlberg and his pals.
As we have seen, it is not just the fact that they scare people.
Keep the scare quotes around gay “marriage,” or at least put an asterisk after it.
An HIV scare, Rand Paul talking points, and a (maybe) proposition.
What's any of them little haythen been coin' to scare ye, missy?
You've played jokes on her, and told her things to scare her—and my grief!
I just know he's a cowardy-cat, because he's always trying to scare ME.
With Mr. Morris at the front end of that log, there's no hope of scare.
Not just because I was frightened, it wasn't so simple as a scare.
1590s, alteration of Middle English skerren (c.1200), from Old Norse skirra "to frighten; to shrink from, shun; to prevent, avert," related to skjarr "timid, shy, afraid of," of unknown origin. In Scottish also skair, skar, and in dialectal English skeer, skear, which seems to preserve the older pronunciation. To scare up "procure, obtain" is first recorded 1846, American English, from notion of rousing game from cover. Related: Scared; scaring.
"something that frightens; sudden panic, sudden terror inspired by a trifling cause, false alarm," 1520s, alteration of Middle English sker "fear, dread" (c.1400), from scare (v.). Scare tactic attested from 1948.
