> For the third party person reading the interaction without or with lesser context, it’s a thought-terminating cliche.

if one's thought is so easily terminated, maybe there wasn't as much thought as one might think to begin with.

If good faith weren't a prerequisite for reasoned debate, perhaps.

remember, we're talking about somebody getting triggered by the words "virtue-signalling", so I think good faith left the conversation a few stops back.

This is part of why it’s a bad term - its meaning is almost impossible to understand even in context because it means different things to different people and people read a lot into it. It’s kind of overloaded and seems like flamebait to me, I guess.

Some interesting bits here as well (italics added for emphasis):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue_signalling

> However, some argue that these expressions of outrage or moral alignment may reflect genuine concern, and that accusing others of virtue signalling can itself be a form of signalling. This has led to the coining of a related concept, vice signalling, which refers to the public promotion of negative or controversial views to appear tough, pragmatic, or rebellious, often for political or social capital.

I would add on and argue that using the term virtue signaling is itself an example of virtue signaling.