do-gooding

[ doo-good-ing ]

/ ˈduˌgʊd ɪŋ /

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noun, adjective

earnestly doing good; focusing on humanitarian causes in a naive and often ineffectual way.

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Origin of do-gooding

First recorded in 1935–40; do¹ + good + -ing²

Words nearby do-gooding

dognap, dog officer, Dogon, do-good, do-gooder, do-gooding, do-goodism, dog paddle, Dogpatch, dog-poor, Dogrib

How to use do-gooding in a sentence

When they thought about Lewis, what struck the players most was that he never acted like a do-gooder.
A West Point MVP Who Never Played a Down|Nicolaus Mills|December 13, 2014|DAILY BEAST
A bunch of books and a TV movie, starring Cuba Gooding Jr., followed.
Ben Carson’s Bizarrely Serious, Seriously Bizarre Campaign Crew|Olivia Nuzzi|November 12, 2014|DAILY BEAST
First on the to-do list, the profiling exercises to help the Western masses understand the nature of the wretched beast.
ISIS and BS|Amal Ghandour|October 15, 2014|DAILY BEAST
If someone wants to dismiss this as do-goodism, fine, but it has real world effects.
Confronting George Clooney’s Critics on South Sudan|John Avlon|October 7, 2014|DAILY BEAST

That contestant also happens to be Cuba Gooding, Jr., Oscar-winner for Jerry Maguire and major hockey fan.
Viral Video of the Day: Cuba Shows Us the Money On Ice|Jack Holmes|September 25, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The ne'er-do-well blew, like seed before the wind, to distant places, but mankind at large stayed at home.
The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice|Stephen Leacock
With time this land had mounted to great values and the holders had been made well-to-do thereby.
The Homesteader|Oscar Micheaux
His parents were of the well-to-do farming class, occupied from one year's end to the other with the work of the fields.
Bastien Lepage|Fr. Crastre
“But it certainly was a great to-do,” murmured Jessie, as she tried to see what the boys were doing.
The Campfire Girls of Roselawn|Margaret Penrose
Widder Morse wants to ape these well-to-do folks that live tother end o Whiffle Street.
The Girls of Central High on the Stage|Gertrude W. Morrison