lost cause


Also found in: Thesaurus, Idioms, Wikipedia.

lost cause

n
a cause with no chance of success
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014
ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:
Noun1.lost cause - a defeated cause or a cause for which defeat is inevitable
crusade, campaign, cause, drive, effort, movement - a series of actions advancing a principle or tending toward a particular end; "he supported populist campaigns"; "they worked in the cause of world peace"; "the team was ready for a drive toward the pennant"; "the movement to end slavery"; "contributed to the war effort"
Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2012 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.
Translations

lost cause

ncausa persa
Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995
References in classic literature ?
His very obstinacy and egoism now enabled him, blind, comparatively poor, and the representative of a lost cause, to maintain his proud and patient dignity in the midst of the triumph of all that was most hateful to him, and, as he believed, to God.
"He led a lost cause, and he was not afraid of God's thunderbolts," Wolf Larsen was saying.
One doesn't meet these in saloons, nor rallying to lost causes, nor flaming on the adventure-paths, nor loving as God's own mad lovers.
A swollen conscience caused him to see and hear even more than was warranted by his position, and his uncompromising nature compelled him to act on whatsoever he heard or saw: a savage custodian of public morals, he had in addition a perverse enthusiasm for lost causes, loved a minority for its own sake, and untenable tenets for theirs.
Heroin dealing kids earn PS5,000 a month in Huddersfield, BBC documentary Hometown reveals Huddersfield is not a lost cause - it's the people who think negative who think it's a lost cause.
Leicester v Exeter 4.30pm BY ALEX SPINK GEORGE FORD grew up being told there is no such thing as a lost cause.
The historic EDSA People Power Revolt that ended former President Ferdinand Marcos' dictatorship will never be a lost cause, some opposition senatorial bets believe.
Summary: California [United States], January 2 (ANI): Scarlett Johansson, who has been a victim of the internet's dark side, has concluded that fighting deepfake or the technology that uses artificial intelligence to create convincing but fake pornographic videos of her is a fruitless and lost cause.
President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday called ousted Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno a "lost cause" after she accused him of "recycling" officials he had already dismissed.
There is no doubt that Israel and its allies want the world to believe that Palestine is a lost cause. Richard Falk, who served as the United Nation's special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories, recounts a(https://www.thenation.com/article/lost-causes-and-future-palestine/) conversation he had with the French ambassador to the United Nations at the end of his tenure as rapporteur:
I am no lover of this Government, but in all fairness are they not fighting a lost cause here?