turn a blind eye
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
Meaning · English
Pretend not to notice.
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
It sounds as though Maurin was paying him to keep Barbara there and she was paying him to run errands — deliver the note to you and the photograph to Nice Matin — and to turn a blind eye when she went out.’
Hal, while he was flipping over some burgers, ‘ turned a blind eye’ and pretended not to notice her ‘ mistake’.
British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Figurative class: Metaphor (PIE-English corpus, CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-31).
Equivalents & related
Common questions
What does “turn a blind eye” mean?
Pretend not to notice.
Is “turn a blind eye” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.
What is the closest equivalent?
“dung túng” (Tiếng Việt) — near equivalent.