Immoralized

Part of speech: verb, adjective

Definitions

1. To have lost or deprived of moral qualities or principles; to be rendered unethical or corrupt in character or behavior; to have become detached from accepted standards of right conduct
2. Having undergone a process where ethical values or virtues are diminished or disregarded; exhibiting a state of depravity or moral decay; existing without adherence to societal moral norms
3. Describing someone or something that has been stripped of morality or virtuousness; showing a decline into unethical or improper actions; characterized by absence of accepted moral sense or integrity

Etymology: "Immoralized" is the past tense and past participle of "immoralize," which is formed from "immoral" plus the suffix "-ize," a common English verb-forming ending that turns adjectives and nouns into verbs meaning "to make" or "to treat in a certain way." So the verb means, roughly, to make someone or something immoral, or to treat it as such. The base adjective "immoral" is the older and more familiar piece. It is built from the Latin prefix "in-," meaning "not," and "moralis," from "mos" (plural "mores"), meaning custom or conduct. Put together, "immoral" literally describes what falls outside accepted custom or behavior. The "-ize" ending then allowed English speakers to turn that quality into an action, so that something could be "immoralized" by being corrupted or degraded.