lightning rod

plural lightning rods · alternative lightning-rod

1. A metallic conductor that is attached to a high point of a building and leads to the ground to protect the building from damage by lightning.

   "My special business is to travel the country for orders for lightning-rods. This is my specimen rod;" tapping his staff; "I have the best of references"-fumbling in his pockets. "In Criggan last month, I put up three-and-twenty rods on only five buildings."

   1856, Herman Melville, The Lightning Rod Man

   Synonyms: lightning conductor

2. figurativelyA person or thing that is a target for negative reactions and distracts criticism from another target.

   Though hardly a novel claim nowadays[…] it made [Jean] Twenge a lightning rod in the research world, where some academics remain skeptical of the panic over smartphones.

   2025 September 6, Catherine Pearson, “She Started the Debate About Kids and Phones. Now She Wants to End It.”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

   1 more example

   Another factor was that when the two governments changed Stormont’s rules in 2006 they left the dual premiership as the “lightning rod for other difficulties”, said [Brendan] O’Leary.

   2023 October 13, Rory Carroll, “‘The hope we had is gone’: how 20 months of stasis has paralysed Northern Ireland”, in The Guardian, →ISSN