Cruella

English

Etymology

After the fictional character Cruella de Vil, from cruel.

Noun

Cruella (plural Cruellas)

1. (colloquial) A cruel, despicable, or otherwise unpleasant woman.
   • 2009 January 22, Congressional Record, volume 155, part 1, Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, page 1403, column 2:

     But I am left to wonder, what kind of a government, what kind of a Cruella, could cut retirement benefits to a group of Eskimos in their eighties, in the dead of an Alaskan winter, and say: Sorry, there is nothing we can do.

   • 2010, Gabriela Cora, ExecutiveHealth.com’s Leading Under Pressure: Strategies to Avoid Burnout, Increase Energy, and Improve Your Well-Being, Pompton Plains, N.J.: Career Press, →ISBN, pages 109–110:

     One person may be a refined aristocrat in a social setting, and switch to a Cruella at the steering wheel. If you believe you are in good shape and find yourself snapping at others with less power than yourself, watch out, as your emotional stability may only be a façade.

   • 2014, Charles Decker, Gene Ference, Priceless: Beyond Customer Care to Customer Delight, Bloomington, Ind.: iUniverse, →ISBN:

     Ari immediately liked this woman he had heard about for more than a year. She didn’t seem like a Cruella at all.

   • 2017, Deanna K Willmon, Negatively Ever After: A Skeptic’s Guide to Finding Happiness, Berkeley, Calif.: She Writes Press, →ISBN:

     This is not to say that I’m advocating using negativity to make others miserable. (No one likes a Cruella.)

   • 2022 May 3, Kate Kulniece, “WED THE HELL?! My uncle’s girlfriend wore a white gown with a TRAIN to my sister’s wedding – she’s an attention seeking Cruella”, in The Sun‎^[1], London: News Group Newspapers, →ISSN, archived from the original on 2022-05-03
   • 2023, Teresa A. Deygoo, “Moving Forward”, in A Corporate Psychopath: Tactics Used to Destroy Good Workers, Altona, Man.: FriesenPress, →ISBN, page 131:

     There are Cruellas out there and should any new recruits have the misfortune to meet a Cruella in the workplace then this resource would give you information of some behaviours and actions that you would encounter since the core natures of criminal and corporate psychopaths are the same.

   • 2023, M.H. Williams, Notes from a Restricted Land, London: Austin Macauley Publishers, →ISBN:

     We begged. We cried. We asked her not to call the principal. But, sadly enough, it didn’t work. She was a Cruella. We begged someone who didn’t know what forgiveness was.