› Something that blinds, literally or figuratively.
1
A bag or cloth put over the head of a difficult horse while it is being handled or mounted.
2
Often A screen attached to a horse's bridle preventing it from being able to see things to its side.
From both sides of his head a blackness swiftly grew like blinders on a horse and darkly narrowed his field of vision.1969, Kenzaburō Ōe, chapter 5, in John Nathan, transl., A Personal Matter, New York: Grove Press, page 84:
3
Something that impairs visual or mental perception in a way figuratively compared to horses' blinders.
Orientalism itself, furthermore, was an exclusively male province; like so many professional guilds during the modern period, it viewed itself and its subject matter with sexist blinders.1978, Edward Said, Orientalism, New York: Vinatage, published 2003, Chapter 3, Part I, p. 207:
As it was, innocence was his blinder.1924, Herman Melville, chapter 15, in Billy Budd, London: Constable & Co.:
1 more example
I, I, got a new girlfriend / She feels like he's on top / And I don't feel no remorse / And you can't see past my blinders2016 February 5, Wesley Schultz and Jeremy Fraites, “Ophelia”, in Cleopatra, performed by The Lumineers:
He played a blinder this afternoon on the cricket ground.
And we asked the blue winger, who in our game / had played what they call a blinder, to help out1992, Glyn Maxwell, “Out of the Rain”, in Boys at Twilight: Poems 1990 to 1995, New York: Houghton Mifflin, published 2000, page 91:
If a man goes out on a blinder, he might be charged with being drunk and incapable and therefore have a criminal record, although he is an honourable man.1985 May 2, John Maxton, Hansard:
6
Entertainment, Lifestyle, Theater A bright light used to blind the audience temporarily during a scene change.
When the 'blinders' are switched off, and the audience's eyes given time to re-adjust, the new scene is in place […]1992, The Lighting Journal, page 9:
[…] We climb in hopes / Of such seeing up the leaf-shuttered escarpments, / Blindered by green, under a green-grained sky1958, Sylvia Plath, “Above the Oxbow”, in The Collected Poems, New York: Harper & Row, page 88:
They think they're being focussed when they're really just blindering their eyes, as a farmer would a plough horse, to ways of getting to their goal faster.1986, Tessa Albert Warschaw, Rich is Better: How Women Can Bridge the Gap Between Wanting and Having It All — Financially, Emotionally, Professionally, Penguin, page 248: