parlour game

See also: parlour-game

English

Alternative forms

• parlor game, parlor-game, parlour-game

Noun

parlour game (plural parlour games)

1. Any of a number of amusing games played indoors with few props by the members of a social gathering.
   • 1918, Arthur Quiller-Couch, Foe-Farrell, Prologue:

     Do you know that parlour-game, Yarrell dear? Are you a performer at Musical Chairs?

   • 2024 November 22, Theodore Schleifer, “Elon Musk Gets a Crash Course in How Trumpworld Works”, in The New York Times‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC:

     Doubts abound as to whether he will graduate in 2028 with a four-year degree in Trumpism: It is now a parlor game in Washington and Silicon Valley to speculate just how long the Musk-Trump relationship will last.

     (Can we archive this URL?)

2. (politics, figuratively) The use of deliberately nebulous or confusing language.

   Synonym: doublespeak

Translations

amusing game played indoors with few props

• German: Gesellschaftsspiel (de) n
• Swedish: sällskapsspel (sv) (usually card games or board games or the like)