weed

Fig. to remove someone or something unwanted or undesirable from a group or collection. (Fig. on removing weeds from the soil.) We had to weed the less productive workers out one by one. The auditions were held to weed out the actors with the least ability. I'm going through my books to weed out those that I don't need anymore.

to remove someone or something not wanted The school needs to weed out wasteful spending. You need to be able to weed people out if they can't do a good job.

Eliminate as inferior, unsuited, or unwanted, as in She was asked to weed out the unqualified applicants. This expression transfers removing weeds from a garden to removing unwanted elements from other enterprises. [First half of 1500s]

No good will come from criminal schemes. The Shadow was a very popular radio detective series that began in the early 1930s. Its hero, playboy Lamont Cranston, had “the power to cloud men's minds,” a form of hypnosis by which he appeared off to the side of where people thought he stood (contrary to popular belief, the Shadow did not make himself invisible). After the credits at the end of every episode, the Shadow intoned, “The weed of crime bears bitter fruit. Crime does not pay! The Shadow knows,” and then utter a sardonic laugh. Another famous Shadow-ism was “Who knows what evil lurks in the minds of men?—The Shadow knows!”

Female mourning costume. The word “weed” comes from an Old English word for “garment.” As a phrase to wear widow's weeds simply means to be in mourning. Many cultures have had or still have a custom of wearing distinctive clothing to mark a husband's death. In Victorian England, for example, a widow wore black for the first year and a day, then moved through dark purple and other somber colors to lighter shades. However, the queen who gave her name to the era wore no other color than black after the death of her beloved husband Prince Albert. Many widows in many Mediterranean countries, most notable Greece and southern Italy, wear black for the rest of their lives.