choke out

verb chokes out · choking out · choked out

1. transitive To say (something) with difficulty, while or as if choking. Language failed. Pause—impotent struggle for further words—then he gave it up, choked out a deep, strong oath, and departed for good.
2. transitive To prevent (something) from growing by overwhelming it or robbing it of nutrients. We had reached the end of the grass where the bush and trees of the mountain slope had choked it out […]
3. transitive To extinguish (fire) (by depriving it of oxygen or fuel). Of many people, his friends, he had asked that they would kindle again the smouldering embers of their experience; he had blown the low fires gently with his breath, and had leaned his face towards their glow, and had breathed in the words that rose like fumes from the revived embers, till he was si
4. figuratively, transitive To destroy (something) by depriving it of a vital resource. […] he would earnestly and pathetically plead that we should not, as Priests, suffer the serving of tables to choke out that inner life of the spirit which it was our first duty to feed and nourish.

   Similar: smother, starve, stifle

5. transitive To prevent (light) from passing through. Although this ivy had choked out what little light might have trickled into the room, it was not strong enough to prevent the birds from finding a way through and from visiting Lady Gertrude at any hour of night or day.

   Similar: block, obstruct

6. transitive To cause (a person) to lose consciousness by applying a chokehold. We got out of the car, the guy resisted, and I choked him out. The bar arm was the tool of choice in those days. If anybody resisted, we just choked him out.