basher

plural bashers

1. One who bashes something, figuratively or literally.

   Consider the cold-eyed thrush, that springy carnivore of lawns, worm stabber, basher to death of snails.

   1967, J. A. Baker, The Peregrine, page 14

   1 more example

   [S]ideshowmen rang bells and shouted themselves as near hoarse as is possible for sideshowmen as they exhorted the public to ‘see the fat lady’ or ‘stay two rounds with the basher to win a fiver.’

   1961, Tom Mead, Killers of Eden, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 109

   1. artsBefore the days of pneumatic rivet guns, the member of a riveting team who hammered the rivet to upset the bucktail to form the field head (see rivet).
2. informalOne who engages in gratuitous physical or verbal attacks on a group or type of people.

   a Paki-basher

   2 more examples

   He was beaten up by a queer-basher.

   It's impossible to count how many harassers and bashers are growing discouraged at the sight of 12 or so queers in black and teal uniforms walking down the street in tight formation. The message is simple: queer folk are banding together and walking the streets in cities around the United States to protect their own.

   1991 August 17, Steve Karpf, “Don't Tread On Us!”, in Gay Community News, volume 19, number 5, page 1

3. UKslangA trainspotter, especially one who likes to travel on specific trains or trainlines.

   Determined 'bashers' do still ride trains, of course, seeking to cram the largest number of route-miles into 24 hours.

   2017, Ian Carter, British railway enthusiasm, page 102

   2 more examples

   There are bashers and bashers, of course. Most of them, like 'Bob', try to travel as far as possible behind a particular type of locomotive. 'Bob' likes Class 37 diesels.

   2004, Ian Marchant, Parallel Lines, Bloomsbury, →ISBN

   Nose around any modest-sized station and the odds are you'll find that the chargeman's office doubles as a bashers' club, a place where shivering spotters can get warm and catch up on the gen.

   2015, Nicholas Whittaker, Platform Souls: The Trainspotter as 20th-Century Hero

4. slanggovernmentA rainproof sheet for sleeping under.

   Suddenly awake she looked around, startled, it was light, hot, intensely hot and she was sleeping in a shell scrape under a basher.

   2014, LA Clarke, Callsign Whiskey, page 24

   1 more example

   I was well used to sleeping out under the stars whatever the weather. I had a hammock and a basher, a rain sheet to go over where I was sleeping.

   2018, John-Paul Jordan, Joys of War

5. slangA shelter built from improvised materials by a homeless person.
6. broadcastingA kind of small floodlight.

plural Bashers

1. A surname from Arabic.