Everyone at the table understood what was meant by "private equity", the term has entered common parlance. Pulling out the dictionary just makes the "whoosh" sound even louder.
So you'd be fine with statements like "cyclists are assholes", or maybe even "undocumented migrants are assholes"? After all, in both cases you could argue that you're not meant to take those groups literally, only the bad elements within those groups. This is even a pretty common refrain by some. ie. "oh I don't hate all migrants, just the ones that's causing trouble". Where do you draw the line between "it's fine to seemingly bash an entire group of people because everyone knows you're not literally bashing the entire group" and "false rhetoric"?