Taking Advantage of Generosity



Generosity is considered a good thing. Milking generosity is not. Yet some characters do it anyway.

Say Bob offers Alice a little gift, or agrees to do Alice a favor, but Alice asks for more gifts or favors from Bob, or someone else, knowing she is likely to get it.

The reasons for this usually fall under varying degrees of gluttony, Greed and It's All About Me. Quite often those receiving these extra demands will feel obligated to fulfill them anyway, especially if these characters are Extreme Doormats, even when they feel like they are being taken for granted.

Usually, this is portrayed as being a very Jerkass thing to do.

Compare Moving the Goalposts, The Prima Donna, All Take and No Give (a variation of this with couples).

Film

 * Near the opening of Me Myself and Irene, a woman asks Charlie whether she can scoot ahead of him in line at the grocery store. She only has a few things, apparently, so he says yes. She calls her kids and their three full shopping carts over and Charlie has a psychotic breakdown.

Literature

 * The Children's Book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.
 * In Jeeves and Wooster, everyone regularly does this to Extreme Doormat Bertie.

Live Action TV

 * The John Larroquette Show: John wins an electric car. He charges it at home, where he gets free electricity included in his rent. His landlord complains and cuts him off, so John starts charging it at the bus station where he works.
 * In the Blackadder christmas special, everyone takes advantage of Ebenezer Blackadder, the only nice member of the Blackadder family tree.

Western Animation
"Moe: [dragging in a giant bag of peanuts] "I think you're taking unfair advantage of my generous offer.""
 * SpongeBob SquarePants falls victim to this a lot.
 * One time Squidward quits his job over an argument with the boss, and ends up on the street. SpongeBob agrees to take care of Squidward, but he then treats SpongeBob like a slave.
 * A few episodes revolve around SpongeBob trying to get past being an Extreme Doormat to the whole of Bikini Bottom, but realising he is okay with being stepped on (sometimes literally).
 * Another episode revolves around SpongeBob gaining a large amount of wealth. What starts as him buying someone an ice cream evolves to him basically throwing money to an enormous crowd of moochers.
 * My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic:
 * In the episode "The Secret of My Excess", Spike is offered a spontaneous present by one of the townsfolk he meets, upon that person learning it's Spike's birthday. Spike's inherent dragon greed starts to kick in, and he starts exploiting spontaneous presents from other people.
 * In "Suited for Success", Rarity offers to make dresses for all her friends, and she slaves over the project until she comes up with a gorgeous gown for each of her friends. But they weren't what her friends were expecting, and they offer all kinds of crazy suggestions for improvement. Rarity runs herself ragged trying to meet the demands of her friends, but she hates the way the dresses turn out and she ends up humiliated at a fashion show. The Aesop at the end of the episode is not to take advantage of a friend's generosity.
 * The Simpsons has several specific examples, but Bart and Homer have this trope as character traits.
 * Bart often does this whenever his parents give him a break. At one point he is denied pizza for another prank, after which Homer gives him a slice anyway so long as he promises to be good. Bart obviously lied, to the point that his behavior degrades to completely random and unsatisfying acts of destruction simply due to the knowledge that Homer will let him get away with it. Homer finally snaps and gives Bart a genuine punishment. This discipline is implied to have positive effects on Bart's life directions in the future.
 * Homer's infinite borrowing from Ned Flanders. It's been phased out, but Homer borrowed everything from a TV tray to tools to the downstairs bathtub, and actually considers it a point of pride that he's not returned any of it.
 * When Bart gets an elephant, Homer feeds it by taking it to Moe's bar, where Moe offers free peanuts to encourage people to drink.


 * Both of Garfield's animated shows at least once utilize a similar plot where Garfield befriends a mouse in his home, explaining he doesn't chase them. The mouse near immediately invites all of his friends to take over the place and rob it clean of food. This is obviously a sore spot for Garfield who decides to take action following this.