tar with the same brush

English

WOTD – 2 September 2022

Etymology

From tar (“to coat with tar; to besmirch”), in the sense of two or more persons or things being soiled with the same thing.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈtaː wɪ‿ðə seɪm ˈbɹʌʃ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈtaɹ wɪ‿ðə seɪm ˈbɹʌʃ/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ʌʃ

Verb

tar with the same brush (third-person singular simple present tars with the same brush, present participle tarring with the same brush, simple past and past participle tarred with the same brush)

1. (transitive, figuratively) To characterize (someone or something) using the same undesirable attribute, especially unjustly.

   Synonyms: paint with the same brush, (dated) tar with the same stick

   The C Party have tarred themselves with the same brush as the B Party.

   • 1837 June 10, “Debates and Proceedings in Parliament. [The Currency.]”, in The Spectator: A Weekly Journal of News, Politics, Literature, and Science, volume X, number 467, London: Joseph Clayton, […], →ISSN, →OCLC, page 534, column 1:

     The merchants of London, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, and Birmingham, were tarred, one and all, with the same brush.

   • 1841, Alain René Le Sage [i.e., Alain-René Lesage], “The Subject of which is Inexhaustible”, in Joseph Thomas, transl., Asmodeus; or, The Devil on Two Sticks. […], London: Joseph Thomas, […], →OCLC, page 200:

     We may mark that gentleman with black, at all events, said Leandro Perez. We may indeed, replied the Devil; and you may tar his nearest neighbour with the same brush, while you are about it—an original of an auditor, who, because he keeps a carriage, blushes whenever he is obliged to put his foot into a public vehicle.

   • 1864 May – 1865 November, Charles Dickens, “Cut Adrift”, in Our Mutual Friend. […], volume I, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1865, →OCLC, book the first (The Cup and the Lip), page 52:

     They are both tarred with a dirty brush, and I can't have the Fellowships tarred with the same brush.

   • 1900, E[dward] Phillips Oppenheim, chapter XLI, in A Millionaire of Yesterday, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown, and Company, published 1906, →OCLC, page 308:

     Were you tarred with the same brush as those canting snobs who doomed a poor old man to a living death?

   • 1921, L[ucy] M[aud] Montgomery, “The Valley of Decision”, in Rilla of Ingleside, Toronto, Ont.: McClelland and Stewart, →OCLC, page 163:

     Susan still persisted in thinking that poets and tramps were tarred with the same brush— […]

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 13: Nausicaa]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC, part II [Odyssey], page 356:

     Place made me think of that I suppose. All tarred with the same brush. Wiping pens in their stockings.

   • 1964 November, D[aniel] S[tephen] Halacy Jr., “Fire Danger: Extreme”, in Harry A. Harchar, editor, Boys’ Life: The Magazine for All Boys, volume LIV, number 11, New Brunswick, N.J.: Boy Scouts of America, →OCLC, part I, page 57, column 1:

     I'd say Marvin is still eating his heart out over what happened. You work for Sanders Aero and so that tars you with the same brush.

   • 1988 April 21, Olin B. King, “Statement of Olin B. King, Chairman of the Board, SCI Systems, Inc.”, in U.S. Economic Relations with the Asian Newly Industrialized Countries: Hearing before the Subcommittee on International Finance, Trade and Monetary Policy of the Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs, House of Representatives, One-hundredth Congress, Second Session […] (Serial No. 100-57), Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 17:

     There are marked differences between them, and it is terribly important that we as a country not tar all of these people with the same brush. They are very, very much different kinds of countries.

   • 2008 June 6, Terry Sweetman, “Kevin Rudd’s public service demands nothing new”, in The Courier-Mail‎^[1], Brisbane, Qld.: Queensland Newspapers, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 27 June 2013:

     And few would distinguish between state and federal public servants, tarring them with the same brush of disdain.

   • 2013, Kim Wheatley, “Coleridge, Jeffrey, and the Edinburgh: Romanticizing ‘Personalities’”, in Romantic Feuds: Transcending the “Age of Personality”, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, New York, N.Y.: Routledge, published 2016, →ISBN, page 63:

     [Samuel Taylor] Coleridge's third allegation emphasizes the idea of tarring with the same brush: [Francis] Jeffrey, he alleges, is guilty of lumping Coleridge with his friends as well as the dramatist Joanna Baillie: […]

Translations

to characterize (someone or something) using the same undesirable attribute, especially unjustly

• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 一竹篙打沉一船人 (jat¹ zuk¹ gou¹ daa² cam⁴ jat¹ syun⁴ jan⁴), 一竹篙打死一船人 (jat¹ zuk¹ gou¹ daa² sei² jat¹ syun⁴ jan⁴), 一竹篙打一船人 (jat¹ zuk¹ gou¹ daa² jat¹ syun⁴ jan⁴)

  Mandarin: 一竿子打翻一船人 (yī gānzi dǎfān yī chuán rén)

• Dutch: over een kam scheren
• Finnish: niputtaa yhteen, rinnastaa (fi)
• French: fourrer dans le même sac, mettre dans le même panier (fr), mettre dans le même sac (fr)
• German: über einen Kamm scheren
• Italian: fare d'ogni erba un fascio
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: skjære alle over én kam

• Polish: generalizować (pl) impf
• Romanian: arunca în aceeași oală
• Russian: косить под одну гребёнку (kositʹ pod odnu grebjónku)
• Spanish: meter en el mismo saco (es)
• Swedish: dra alla över en kam (sv), skära alla över en kam (sv)

See also

• pigeonhole

Further reading

• “tarred with the same stick (or brush)” under “tar, v.¹”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, March 2022.
• “tar people with the same brush, phrase”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “tar someone with the same brush”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present.
• “be/get tarred with the same brush” in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, Longman.