To refuse is to say "no." A person who refuses does not cooperate or participate in an activity largely out of principal or a strongly held belief, but sometimes a person refuses to do something out of fear or caution.
simple
past
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refused
refused
I refuse.
I refuse to do that.
I absolutely refuse to do that. I won’t do it.
She refuses to go along with the idea.
She refused to do what everyone else was doing.
The children refused to eat their broccoli.
The students refused to cooperate with the teacher.
Kevin refuses to believe that climate change is affected by human activity.
If someone asks you to do something that you don’t want to do, just refuse.
He refuses to wear shoes.
The word "refusal" is a noun:
The woman’s refusal to cooperate with the police resulted in a night in jail.
The child’s refusal to eat his vegetables was met with a stony silence from his mother.
When the young man asked the girl to go out with him, he expected a refusal but instead was surprised by her quick acceptance.
The word "refuse" is a noun. Refuse is garbage. The meaning and pronunciation of "refuse" is different from "refuse," but both words are spelled the same way.
Please put your refuse in the garbage bins.
The park was strewn with refuse following the concert.
"Give me the tired, the poor…the wretched refuse of your teeming shore." (an exerpt from The New Collosus.)
