hooey

noun

hoo·​ey ˈhü-ē 

informal

: nonsense

What sort of melodramatic hooey is this?

—Brock Yates

Pretentious, contrived hooey, purporting to show and tell how all teens have the same—gulp—feelings.

—Stephen Schaefer

Allen's opinion is that the figures the bowling establishment touts are, in a word, hooey.

—Frank Deford

—often used in phrases like a bunch of hooey and a load of hooey

Here's somebody, surely, who'd never try to sell you a bunch of hooey.

—David Gates

… there's only one way to describe it: It's a load of hooey.

—The Animals Advocate

As usual, the fight scenes are powerful, but Rocky's total fall from grace … and the street-fight finale are just a lot of Hollywood hooey.

—Ed Weiner

Synonyms

• applesauce [slang]
• balderdash
• baloney
• boloney
• beans
• bilge
• blah
• blah-blah
• blarney
• blather
• blatherskite
• blither
• bosh
• bull [slang]
• bunk
• bunkum
• buncombe
• claptrap
• codswallop [British]
• crapola [slang]
• crock
• drivel
• drool
• fiddle
• fiddle-faddle
• fiddlesticks
• flannel [British]
• flapdoodle
• folderol
• falderal
• folly
• foolishness
• fudge
• garbage
• guff
• hogwash
• hokeypokey
• hokum
• hoodoo
• horsefeathers [slang]
• humbug
• humbuggery
• jazz
• malarkey
• malarky
• moonshine
• muck
• nerts [slang]
• nonsense
• nuts
• piffle
• poppycock
• punk
• rot
• rubbish
• senselessness
• silliness
• slush
• stupidity
• taradiddle
• tarradiddle
• tommyrot
• tosh
• trash
• trumpery
• twaddle

Examples of hooey in a Sentence

Don't waste your money on that book—it's a lot of hooey.

stories about the inn being haunted are just a lot of hooey

Recent Examples on the Web

The old line about the 28 gauge having a square load is hooey. —Ron Spomer, Outdoor Life, 11 Dec. 2019

But as comforting as a toddy may be, the notion of a dose of booze as a cold cure has always struck me as a load of hooey. —M. Carrie Allan, charlotteobserver, 23 Jan. 2018

The scene where Skerrett has a highland fling with a blond, bearded hunk is more than a wee bit full of hooey. —David Wiegand, San Francisco Chronicle, 10 Jan. 2018

There was a whole lot of narrative hooey to explain the theme, which mostly had to do with caterpillars becoming butterflies, girls becoming women, et cetera. —Vanessa Friedman, New York Times, 22 Sep. 2017

Contrary to the previous load of hooey dispensed by Junior and the first family, this dude was not a translator. —Charles P. Pierce, Esquire, 18 July 2017

John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, and not the most substantial waffle in the breakfast buffet, has been particularly energetic in slinging this hooey at the American people. —Charles P. Pierce, Esquire, 7 July 2017

And that 38 percent believes accusations that Trump's campaign conspired with Russian hackers and spies to influence the election's outcome -- and the FBI's investigation into Russian interference in the election -- are nothing but hooey. —Douglas Perry, OregonLive.com, 15 June 2017

Word History

Etymology

origin unknown

First Known Use

1912, in the meaning defined above