800-pound gorilla

English

Etymology

a. 1971, from a riddle: "Where does an 800-pound gorilla sleep?" / "Anywhere it wants."

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU):

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Noun

800-pound gorilla (plural 800-pound gorillas)

1. (idiomatic) An entity that dominates its environment.
2. (idiomatic) Something dangerous, menacing, or frightening that is obvious but not addressed.

Usage notes

• The weight in the metaphor can be varied quantitatively.
• Occasionally other nouns are substituted, most commonly elephant from another idiom, but also more context-specific nouns, such as rutabaga in an article on gardening.
• Occasionally adjectives are inserted to modify gorilla to bring the metaphor closer to the context.

Synonyms

• elephant in the room

Derived terms

• 800-pound gorilla in the room

References

• “800-pound gorilla”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• Instances of variation by weight from Spy