Disgust
Etymology
From Middle French "desgouster," “to have a distaste for,” from "des-" (opposite of) + "goust" (taste), from Latin "gustus." Disgust is literally “un-taste,” bad taste in the mouth. Its origin in eating explains why moral disgust still borrows the language of the stomach — we find corruption “sickening,” a betrayal “hard to swallow.”
noun · /dis-GUST/
A visceral revulsion that makes you recoil from something as contaminating or repellent.
What it names
Use it for the gut-level “ugh” — the aversion that starts in the body and can spread to ideas and people.
Example
A wave of disgust hit him when he lifted the lid on the forgotten leftovers.
Related idea
Against contempt: disgust recoils from a thing as contaminating and wants distance; contempt looks down on a person as inferior and wants nothing. Psychologists note that when disgust attaches to a group of people, it becomes uniquely dangerous — it reframes them as vermin rather than rivals.