bend the rules

verb

Etymology

A metaphor where, instead of breaking the rules, the rules are only being "bent", lessening the effect.

Definitions

  1. To do something that is not normally allowed but is also not explicitly prohibited.

    • Such a mechanism could preserve individuals with mainly prosocial inclinations by enabling them to bend the rules in minor ways without suffering from guilt and without losing out in competition with free-riders.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for bend the rules. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA