scabby

comparative scabbier · superlative scabbiest

1. Affected with scabs; full of scabs.

   Her wrizled skin, as rough as maple rind, So scabby was, that would have loath'd all womankind.

   1590, Edmund Spenser, “(please specify the book)”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC

   Synonyms: reef

2. Diseased with the scab (mange): mangy.
3. mediaHaving a blotched, uneven appearance.
4. Injured by the attachment of barnacles to the carapace of a shell.
5. Working against union policies, working to bust unions; in particular, being a scab (worker who crosses a union picket line).

   [They're a] scabby right-to-work company and they don't care how much the sharp edges on that dust screw up a guy's lungs.

   2016 August 31, David M. Caulfield, Ever a Fighter: The Adventures of Katherine Wilkinson, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   The police, the governor, and the "scabby" Hearst Examiner "received a tremendous razzing," according to the Waterfront Worker, while all along the line of march "the workers on the sidelines cheered[…]"

   1990, Bruce Nelson, Workers on the Waterfront: Seamen, Longshoremen, and Unionism in the 1930s, University of Illinois Press, →ISBN, page 166

   Hoochie's dad said, “All eight drivers are former 'scabby' employees who couldn't get hired by any reputable union trucking companies.”

   2021 July 28, Michael F. McCarthy Colonel USAF (Ret), Memories of a Jane Street Boy: Family Influences and The Early Years, Dorrance Publishing, →ISBN, page 295

6. IrelandUKslangstingy; scrounging.

   The chipper was a bit scabby on the vinegar today.

   2 more examples

   I lent you a fiver last week and you still haven’t paid me back, you scabby bastard!

   You never bring you’re own pen but always ask to borrow mine, you scabby git!