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* [[Socrates]] discouraged writing, saying that insight is best gained from debate. People pore over the writings of [[Plato]], trying to find out what Socrates thought.

* Subverted in the first ''[[Harry Potter]]'' book. Harry, Ron and Hermione more-or-less teach this lesson to Neville after he's cursed by Draco Malfoy. Later on, this causes Neville to decide to try and stop the trio from sneaking out at night, unaware they need to in order to [[Save the World]]:

'''Ron:''' Yes, but not to ''us''. }}

** His action is rewarded by the end of the story anyway, with the Aesop that, even though not necessarily appropriate in the given situation, his actions were good.

* The ''[[Illuminatus]]!'' trilogy works with this issue quite a bit. Often charismatic, powerful leaders of the anarchist protagonists deliberately lie or spread false rumours of themselves painting them as monstrous villains, in order to make their followers suspicious of their motives and make up their own minds. The problems start when the followers choose to follow despite of this; it's implied that the evil Illuminati was born because of a mistake like this.

* One criticism sometimes leveled at ''some'' followers of Ayn Rand's philosophy of [[Objectivism]] is that, despite the fact that objectivism encourages thinking for oneself (the virtue of mental independence), some Objectivists are [[Hypocrite|hypocrites]] that implicitly believe Objectivist conclusions are the ''only'' reasonable conclusions that independent thinkers can reach (and any failure to do so consists of intellectual dishonesty). There is a reason that "Randroid" has become one of the more common criticisms leveled at Objectivists, fair or not.

* Subverted again in ''[[The Prisoner]]'' episode "Checkmate", the prisoner of the title teaches other prisoners how to tell real prisoners from guardians. They apply this lesson to him and conclude he's a guardian, foiling his escape plan.

* Another parody of the concept comes from ''[[Scrubs]]''. The Janitor has spent the episode (which spans about a month) growing sideburns and encouraging others to do likewise because he wants to bring them back into fashion. Then he reveals that his are fake, and hopes everyone has learnt an important lesson. Only...

'''Everyone''': "Unbelievable". }}

 

 

* Or, this segment from [[Steve Martin]]'s first comedy album:

'''Steve''': "Good!" }}