benign neglect

noun

1. an attitude or policy of noninterference or neglect of a situation, which may have a more beneficial effect than assuming responsibility; well-intentioned neglect.

Word History and Origins

Origin of benign neglect¹

First recorded in 1970–75

Example Sentences

We bought a 100-year-old house about 2 1/2 years ago, and while it had good bones it suffered from benign neglect.

Read more on MarketWatch

Supreme Court has found that disability discrimination is “most often the product, not of invidious animus, but rather of thoughtlessness and indifference—of benign neglect.”

Read more on Slate

It is this lack of maternal attention that sends Ellis’ two older sisters on different paths, with the same goal in mind: to fill the lacuna left by their mother’s benign neglect.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Erstwhile liberals like Daniel Patrick Moynihan began flirting with conservatism, in his case proclaiming that the best antipoverty project for Black urban residents would be the government’s “benign neglect.”

Read more on Salon

“It wasn’t benign neglect but a designed robbery of the financial system,” the country’s new central bank governor, Dr Ahsan Mansur, told the BBC in an recent exclusive interview.

Read more on BBC