cheat vs whitewash

cheat

verb
  • To violate rules in order to gain, or attempt to gain, advantage from a situation. 

  • To deceive; to fool; to trick. 

  • To be unfaithful to one's spouse or partner; to commit adultery, or to engage in sexual or romantic conduct with a person other than one's partner in contravention of the rules of society or agreement in the relationship. 

  • To manage to avoid something even though it seemed inevitable. 

noun
  • A card game where the goal is to have no cards remaining in a hand, often by telling lies. 

  • A hidden means of gaining an unfair advantage in a video game, often by entering a cheat code. 

  • Someone who cheats. 

  • An act of deception or fraud; that which is the means of fraud or deception. 

  • The weed cheatgrass. 

whitewash

verb
  • In various games, to defeat (an opponent) so that they fail to score, or to reach a certain point in the game; to skunk. 

  • To cover over errors or bad actions. 

  • To paint over with a lime and water mixture so as to brighten up a wall or fence. 

  • To make over (a person or character, a group, an event, etc) so that it is or seems more white, for example by applying makeup to a person, or by discounting the participation of people of color in an event and focusing on only white participation. 

noun
  • The most basic type of thickening agent, flour blended with water to make a paste. 

  • A lime and water mixture for painting walls and fences bright white. 

  • A complete victory or series of victories without suffering any losses; a clean sweep. 

  • A campaign to paper over unfavorable elements. 

How often have the words cheat and whitewash occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )