How to Use direct action in a Sentence

direct action

noun
Definition of direct actionnext
  • Minus proof of direct action or provocative words, how can an organizer of a protest be responsible for the irresponsible actions of someone in a large crowd?
    — Dan Rodricks, Baltimore Sun, 23 Apr. 2024
  • The death of Judge Miller, in 1851, freed Frances to take direct action.
    — Dorothy Wickenden, The New Yorker, 18 Jan. 2021
  • Very little is asked of the reader in terms of direct action.
    — Colin Dickey, The New Republic, 7 Aug. 2020
  • Some faiths proscribe taking direct action that could cause the death of the unborn child or the mother.
    — Martin Shenkman, Forbes, 20 Feb. 2024
  • Both of them wanted to enact social change: Mom through direct action and Dad through the law.
    — Washington Post, 16 Apr. 2021
  • His army was in the world of immediate and direct action.
    — Fintan O’Toole, The New York Review of Books, 21 Dec. 2022
  • But Crow said the philosophy of Antifa is based on the idea of direct action.
    — Jessica Suerth and Leah Asmelash, CNN, 2 July 2019
  • The Fed won’t take any direct action based on the results released Thursday.
    — Telis Demos, WSJ, 21 June 2018
  • For instance, fever is something that’s driven by your body fighting the virus, not by direct action of the virus.
    — Isaac Chotiner, The New Yorker, 16 Apr. 2020
  • Salsa is the music that narrated the direct action of the Young Lords and to a certain extent the Black Panthers.
    — Damaly Gonzalez, Rolling Stone, 26 Oct. 2023
  • It should be said that direct action will be just as important if Democrats don’t take the Senate or if Trump wins.
    — Osita Nwanevu, The New Republic, 21 Aug. 2020
  • In order for direct action to succeed and be sustainable, all those pieces need to be in place.
    — refinery29.com, 29 May 2020
  • The private sector can both take direct action and be the driving force to push governments to step up.
    — Mark Dybul and serhat Gümrükçü, Fortune, 1 Dec. 2021
  • But the limited test may not lead to any direct action on the tweets flagged by users, according to the company.
    — Brian Fung, CNN, 17 Aug. 2021
  • What would distract us from taking direct action on a comet that’s going to destroy most life on earth?
    — Kate Aronoff, The New Republic, 13 Dec. 2021
  • There’s a defense of direct action to stop animal abuse.
    — Daniel A. Gross, The New Yorker, 25 Apr. 2021
  • Dibee also told Aiken then that direct action and protests don’t really work.
    — oregonlive, 21 Apr. 2022
  • They were asked to direct action as if they were seated courtside at an actual game.
    — oregonlive, 10 Jan. 2020
  • The phone record subpoenas mark the first direct action the committee has taken against a member of the Trump family.
    — Benjamin Siegel, ABC News, 18 Jan. 2022
  • To defend, conserve and protect the world’s oceans using direct action.
    — Liam Freeman, Vogue, 2 June 2021
  • There is no starker illustration of the fact that, in the body politic as in the bodies the virus infects, the host’s response can matter far more to the course of the disease than the direct action of the pathogen itself.
    — The Economist, 23 Mar. 2021
  • On Monday, Vladimir Putin moved on from diplomacy to direct action.
    — Daniel Treisman, CNN, 22 Feb. 2022
  • James’s run is all about taking direct action to address his frustration with the status quo.
    — Lucy Diavolo, Teen Vogue, 21 Feb. 2020
  • And with the direct action of these little hammers on the strings, with the natural decay in the mechanism, there’s suddenly a lot more space between the notes.
    — Alex Ross, The New Yorker, 14 Nov. 2022
  • Folks are running out of patience with the pace of nonviolent direct action.
    — Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times, 17 June 2023
  • Some of those conversations have led to direct action from the football program.
    — Cameron Teague Robinson, The Courier-Journal, 8 June 2020
  • Rather, Nadasen credits direct action for pushing the dial.
    — Sarah Jones, The New Republic, 13 June 2018
  • The_Donald’s ban is the most direct action a major social media site has taken against Trump or his supporters.
    — Robert Peck, Wired, 3 Aug. 2020
  • The new due diligence requirements apply not only to the direct actions of the company, but also to their subsidiaries and supply chain.
    — Jon McGowan, Forbes, 28 Feb. 2024
  • Anyone who says, after seeing his recent Indiana Jones fifth-quel, that Mangold can’t direct action should look here.
    — Declan Gallagher, EW.com, 21 Jan. 2024

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'direct action.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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