beat up

verb beats up · beating up · beat up · beated up · beaten up

1. transitive To give a severe beating to; to assault violently with repeated blows. I got beaten up by thugs on my way home.

   Similar: do over, rough up, work over

2. transitive To wake up earlier than (somebody). I wanted to beat you up this morning and make breakfast for you for once.
3. obsolete To attack suddenly; to alarm. At Breach of Wall, or Hedge-ſurprize, ¶ She ſhar’d in th’ hazard and the prize : ¶ At beating quarters up, or forrage, ¶ Behav’d her ſelf with matchleſſe courage ;
4. To cause, by some other means, injuries comparable to the result of being beaten up. He [= a paraglider pilot] flew into a hill and beat himself up pretty badly.
5. reflexive To feel badly guilty and accuse (oneself) over something. Don’t beat yourself up over such a minor mistake.
6. To make (someone) feel badly guilty and accuse (them) over something. It's getting louder and louder Every time I think about you, about you I'll be better off without you, without you I wish my heart would stop, wish my heart would stop Beating me up (whoa, oh, whoa) Beating me up (whoa, oh, whoa) Beating me up
7. WW2 air pilots' usage To repeatedly bomb a military target or targets.
8. To get something done (derived from the idea of beating for game).
9. intransitive To sail to windward using a series of alternate tacks across the wind.
10. dated, intransitive To disturb; to pay an untimely visit to.
11. dated, intransitive To go diligently about in order to get helpers or participants in an enterprise. to beat up for recruits, or for volunteers

Similar: process

adjective more beat up · most beat up · beat-up

1. slang Battered by time and usage; beaten up.

   Similar: beat, beaten up, dilapidated

noun beat ups · beat-up

1. A person who, or thing that, has been beaten up. Well, two beat ups (the bullied kids) would split that cash fifty-fifty.
2. UK, slang A raid. These hit-and-run LRDG attacks — “beat-ups,” the patrols were beginning to call them — continued, and added to the enemy's mounting difficulties.

   Similar: hazing

3. A beating; a hazing. We gave him wedgies and did mock beat-ups. We never hurt him or intended to hurt him, but he went along with our tough guy sort of image, and took it tongue in cheek and got it.

   Similar: hazing

4. Australia, New Zealand, UK An artificially or disingenuously manufactured alarm or outcry, especially one agitated by or through the media. To the people of CQ^([Central Queensland]) the Internet is nothing more than the subject of media beat ups about pornography and bomb making.
5. A tree planted later than others in a plantation. The data include measurements from both the original tree plantings and subsequent beat-ups.