straitjacket

Etymology

From strait + jacket.

noun

1. A jacket-like garment with very long sleeves which can be secured in place, thus preventing the wearer from moving his or her arms. Often used in psychiatric hospitals to prevent patients from injuring themselves or others.
2. (figurative) Any situation seen as confining or restricting.
   [I]f we remain in one discipline, we remain in a straitjacket; an adequate theory of language evolution requires a lot of interdisciplinary work. 2009, Michael Giffin, Quadrant, November 2009, No. 461 (Volume LIII, Number 11), Quadrant Magazine Limited, page 99

verb

1. (literally) To put someone into a straitjacket.
2. (by extension) To restrict the freedom of, either physically or psychologically.
   But it has not always been like this. The last time human remains hit the headlines occurred when the government-sponsored Palmer Report was published. It was deeply antagonistic to research on human remains, and recommended straitjacketing archaeological research within the same framework as medical science. 2004-10-31, Robert Foley, “The Flores remains could have been lost to science”, in The Observer, →ISSN
   Where most primates have a respectable pair of grasping rear hands we have two changelings: long arched pads with rounded chins at one end and stumpy thumbs straight-jacketed to baby fingers at the other. 2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, page 118
   she couldnʼt wait to go to college, have a career and leave her parentsʼ straitjacketed lives behind 2019, Bernardine Evaristo, Girl, Woman, Other, Penguin Books (2020), page 280
   A Labour opposition that has straitjacketed its pledges and ambitions with its fears of blowing its strongest chance in years to gain power. 2023-08-07, Nesrine Malik, “British people are kinder and less divided than politicians give us credit for”, in The Guardian