chip on one's shoulder

Definitions

1. A form of challenge, in the same spirit as a medieval knight throwing down his gauntlet.
2. A habitually combative attitude, usually because of a harbored grievance, a sense of inferiority, or a desire to prove something.
   idiomatic
3. A tendency to take offence quickly.
   idiomatic

Equivalents

Examples

“‘Oh! if I only could get⟳ him to knock⟳ a chip off my shoulder, and so get⟳ round the law, I would give⟳ him one of the soundest thrashings he ever had.’”

“Leland, in his last⟳ issue⟳, struts out with a chip on his shoulder, and dares Bush to knock⟳ it off.”

“The city of Herculaneum […] held its neighbors in hearty contempt, like⟳ the youth who has suddenly found his man's strength, and parades round with a chip on his shoulder.”

“People are staying home / When they got chips on their shoulder”

“The young John McCain was a constant breaker of rules, a brawler and a slob, an undersize punk with an oversize chip on his shoulder.”

“[O]ne minute this "Jihadi John" was struggling to get⟳ by, and get⟳ accepted, in drizzly England, unemployed with a mortgage to pay⟳ and a chip on his shoulder, and the next he stands in brilliant Levantine sunlight, where everything is clear and etched, at the vanguard of some Sunni Risorgimento intent on subjecting the world to its murderous brand of Wahhabi Islam.”

CEFR level