wall of silence
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
A situation where people refuse to talk or give information
Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt
một tình huống mà mọi người từ chối nói hoặc cung cấp thông tin
Machine-translated — suggest a fix
Literally: a physical wall that blocks sound
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
The police were met with a wall of silence when they asked for witnesses to come forward
AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “wall of silence” mean?
A situation where people refuse to talk or give information Literally: a physical wall that blocks sound
Is “wall of silence” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.