Definition: When two powerful, morally bankrupt figures are locked in a public feud, but abruptly retreat into silence because they both possess equally devastating, mutually destructive dirt on each other. It’s a fragile stalemate where exposing the other guarantees your own spectacular downfall, forcing a cowardly retreat.
The term highlights how their conflicts are ultimately performative theater. Both cockroaches scatter back under the fridge when the light gets too bright, preserving their rotten empires through shared secrets and a complete lack of accountability or courage.
Example:
After weeks of trading barbs, the rival CEOs suddenly stopped all public attacks, paralyzed by the knowledge each held proof of the other’s massive fraud.
The senator and the lobbyist called an abrupt truce, their vitriolic tweets vanishing as both realized leaking the other’s scandal meant destroying themselves too.