Meanings
alternative meat in the room
- informaluncountablePerson(s) present in a passive way or to make up the numbers; bystander(s).
There is a scene in the film In The Loop where an MP is asked to attend an important meeting. But as he enters the room he is warned, with some menace, to keep his mouth shut tight. "What?", he asks, "You've got me here as room meat?"
1 more example
How much of our lives as academics is spent as room meat: turning up to things because it would look bad if the numbers were small, or just because we are meant to be there?
2012 April 23, Jonathan Wolff, “Lecturers, are you talking to 'room meat'?”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name)
Origin
from the sense of "meat" that refers negatively to people as in meat puppet
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
room meat. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/room%20meat
“room meat.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/room%20meat. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “room meat,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/room%20meat.
Source: room meat on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.