I think we agree about the phenomena, it's just that the word "signaling" has a false lucidity -- it has an everyday meaning and a related technical meaning tha

I think we agree about the phenomena, it's just that the word "signaling" has a false lucidity -- it has an everyday meaning and a related technical meaning that's easy to overlook. The technical meaning is about an equilibrium in a game where "talk is cheap", so that your message would be discounted by observers unless some cost (not necessarily in money) is tied to it. With countersignaling there's an extra level to the game where your message has the form "I have this quality over and above merely affording the first-level cost" -- now the cost you're paying is the risk of being taken for riff-raff. Those with more of that quality, whatever it is, have to be better at pulling that gambit off, for it to work as a countersignal.