There are two steps to reproduce this. The first is to find a way to
make a GTK program block on I/O. This most often happens to me when I am
using a media player (specifically Quod Libet) to access my music
collection over sshfs (the sftp fuse filesystem). If the network is
disconnected unexpectedly, then any program that subsequently tries to
access a file on an sshfs filesystem blocks indefinitely.

Once you do that, it only remains to have open the sort of window that
closes when you click outside of it. (Are these called transient?)
Examples include volume sliders and dropdown menus. Then, have the
program block on I/O while this window is open. For example, start
playing a song over sshfs, open a dropdown menu, and then unplug the
ethernet cord or stop the sshd on the server or otherwise cause an
unexpected disruption. Since these kind of windows monopolize all input
until they are closed, and since they cannot use any input while the
program blocks on I/O, all further input has no effect, and the X server
must be restarted. (This implies that the X shortcuts, like ctrl-alt-
backspace, ctrl-alt-F1, etc., still work.) Note that the X server does
not freeze. Other programs continue working as normal; only input is
disabled.

I wonder if you could make a program that artificially blocks on I/O
just to test this, like maybe read from a FIFO to which nothing is ever
written?

-- 
unkillable defunct program with popup menu disables all input
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/200834
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