A plight is a sad and difficult situation somebody is trapped in. Their plight, the plight of refugees, a desperate plight.
It is used with sympathy and almost always about people who cannot get themselves out — the plight of the homeless, the plight of the hostages. It is not used of self-inflicted trouble. There is a separate old verb plight meaning to pledge, which survives only in plight your troth, the marriage formula. Note that the two words are unrelated and only look alike.
1nounplightA sad and difficult situation somebody is trapped in.
“The documentary showed the plight of refugees living in cold tents.”
plight is a difficult situation.
Middle English plit meant a fold or condition, from Old French pleit. It was confused with a separate Old English pliht, danger, and the two senses blended into the modern word.
Middle English
plit — fold, wrinkle, bad situation
English, today
plight
From Middle English plit (“fold, wrinkle, bad situation”), conflation of Middle English plight (“risky promise, peril”) (from Old English pliht "danger, risk"; see Etymology 2) and Anglo-Norman plit (“fold, condition”), from Old French pleit (“condition, manner of folding”) (from Vulgar Latin plictum, from Latin plicitum (“fold”)).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA