Glurge: Difference between revisions
Rescuing 1 sources and tagging 0 as dead.) #IABot (v2.0.8.6
(Not only is this a distortion of BioShock as well as the argument made by Rand's work, it is incorrect to classify Rand as "glurge" due to the fact her work completely lacks any "tastes like diabetes" factor.) |
(Rescuing 1 sources and tagging 0 as dead.) #IABot (v2.0.8.6) |
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* [[White Man's Burden]]
* [[Whoopi Epiphany Speech]]
* [[You Know Who Said That?]]
Not to be confused with [[Tastes Like Diabetes]], though that is a common feature of such stories. Believe it or not, some people are [[Glurge Addict]]s.
Compare [[Crap Saccharine World]].
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== Comic Books ==
* This happens much too often in super-hero comics when it comes to a sympathetic villain. Sure, they may have been psychologically screwed up by their parents, or whatever, but they're still evil, and because [[There Are No Therapists]], they're always going to be evil, and nothing can change that.
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*** [[The Areas of My Expertise|Teacher v. Unruly class; both learn lessons.]]
*** It's especially poignant and "inspirational" if the students are from gang-ridden ghettos, and the teacher is white. The teacher's ability to "overcome racial differences" to "reach the kids" is hailed as something amazing and not at all racist, as most of the other teachers in the school are often black, Hispanic, or other non-white. ''[[Dangerous Minds]]'' is an example. It can all get a bit [[Rudyard Kipling|"White Man's Burden."]] ("[[South Park|How do I reach these keeds?]]")
** ''[[To Sir, With Love]]'' avoids this very well—possibly because it's a true story—yet it still makes it clear that ''lowered expectations'' allowed Sir and his students to succeed.
** ''Lean On Me'' also avoids falling into the typical trap, mainly by stressing discipline and control as the only effective methods of instruction. Also, because he doesn't quite manage to save everyone, just (presumably) the core student body. The principal also unceremoniously throws dozens of "troublemakers" out of the school, but faces this issue head-on with brutal practicality.
** ''[[Half Nelson]]'' subverts this by making the aspiring inspirational white teacher a hypocritical drug addict. To the young black female student he'd like to inspire, her jailed brother's drug dealer partner is a better role model.
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* There's an urban legend that Mel Gibson was the inspiration for the movie "The Man Without A Face". As the story goes, he was in a fight that left him with a jaw almost completely torn from his skull and a nose hanging from his face. This is untrue.
* As mentioned in ''[[The Boondocks]]'': The film ''Soul Food'' which is about a grandmother who shows her love for her family by cooking delicious but unhealthy "soul food." She dies of clogged arteries and her family honors her by eating the same unhealthy food that killed her.
* ''[[Forrest Gump]]'' itself runs into some rather creepy implications if you consider that the reason why the protagonist makes good is that it never occurs to him to do anything that falls outside of conservative American ideas about morality. [https://web.archive.org/web/20140312133255/http://www.agonybooth.com/video275_Forrest_Gump_1994_Tom_Hanks.aspx Michael A. Novelli] at [[The Agony Booth]] has more information here.
* ''[[Rain Man]]'': Autistic guy exists to help his brother become a better person.
* ''[[Patch Adams]]'', which is especially bad because it's [[Based on a True Story]], but deliberately ignored most of the real Patch Adams' philosophy<ref>which includes that medicine should be available to everyone who needs it, alternative and traditional treatment methods should be integrated, and emotional health is just as important as physical health</ref> in favor of [[The Theme Park Version|"funny doctor who shakes up the establishment."]] [[Creator Backlash|Said real Dr. Adams hates the movie for exactly that reason]].
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* ''Rock: It's your decision'' is supposed to be an educational and supportive movie about a Christian teen realizing that he must stop listening to sinful rock music (i.e. all of it). As to the result...
{{quote|'''[[The Cinema Snob]]:''' I'm not kidding, [[Beyond the Impossible|this is one of the most depressing films I ever sat through.]] And I've watched ''Salo'' and ''A Serbian Film''.}}
== [[Literature]] ==
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- I shall honor my mother today, and I shall tell Father he is powerful.
- Today I shall be clean. I shall not touch my teeth, knowing that the oils of my skin shall cause them to disintegrate. I shall instead hone them with a good steel twice after prayers.
- I shall be a faithful child, and [[Science Is Bad|I shall ever make science my enemy.]] [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|Also eels]].
- At day, I shall perform my chores and duties happily, and if I see an eel, I shall kill it before it may speak to me seductively of its lazy life on lazy river bottoms.|At night, I shall dream of more labor, and in my sleep I shall smile with sharpened teeth, knowing that today has not been wasted.}}
** ''Marcelino, pan y vino'' is a book (and movie) that mostly anyone on the Spanish-speaking world has heard about. It's about some orphan kid (Marcelino) who befriends a living statue of Christ. Marcelino starts stealing bread and wine (pan y vino) to feed Jesus. Of course, in the end Marcelino dies so he can go meet his mother. Oh, and dying was supposed to be a reward. No wonder some people grew to be scared of crucifixes.
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* ''[[The Secret]]''. Hoo boy. Good things happen if you really, ''really'' [[Clap Your Hands If You Believe|visualize them enough]]! It's the big secret to every success story in history! Never mind that by that same token, every failure or bad thing that ever happened was because someone basically didn't want to avoid them strongly enough.
== [[Live
* Pick an edition of ''[[Afterschool Special]]''.{{context}}
* Viewers of ''[[7th Heaven]]'' are force-fed Christian morals like a baby. The version of Christianity was the vague, feel-good sort that could be described as 'spiritual masturbation.' You don't mention Jesus as anything more than a really hoopy dude, because people might feel ''bad'' and that would be terrible.
* The ''[[Law and Order: Criminal Intent]]'' episode "Faith" is a look at the darker side of glurge: the [[Victim of the Week]] is a benefactor who planned to stop supporting a girl who suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease and survived abuse to write an inspiring book about her experiences. {{spoiler|He planned to stop because he found out ''she isn't real'', and her "foster parents" are con artists.}} And this is actually inspired by {{spoiler|[[wikipedia:Vicki Johnson|Anthony Godby Johnson]], supposed "author" of ''A Rock and a Hard Place''.}} (The name is under spoiler tags to not ruin the episode for people who know about that but haven't seen the show.)
* ''[[The X Factor]]'': Where do we ''start''...{{context}}
* [[The Oprah Winfrey Show]]...{{context}}▼
▲** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1oV_MzzNSk Here], let Ryan Higa tell you about it.
▲* [[The Oprah Winfrey Show]]...
* While they're certainly not ''all'' guilty of it, more than one film strip, 16mm film, and video on the dangers of drugs has [[Drugs Are Bad|fallen into this]].▼
* Not sure I've I'm putting this in the right category, but there was an ad promoting Proposition 8 (a law which banned gay marriage in California) featuring a cute, little blonde girl playing with [[Barbie]] dolls. While the ad seemed sweet on the surface, advocates for gay rights would see this as a way of using children (who don't really understand what it is they're doing) to promote homophobia.▼
** Which runs in perfect parallel to allegations that gay rights advocates use 'tolerance' and 'acceptance' programs in schools to teach children (who don't really understand it) that homosexuality is not wrong. Some points of view ''cannot'' be reconciled to each other, they are anathema to each other.▼
* The notorious I Am Autism, produced by Autism Speaks and put on the Internet in September 2009. It starts out with [[Evil Sounds Deep|a man's deep voice speaking over footage of autistic children playing at various activities as]] '''[[Evil Sounds Deep|"Autism!]]"''', gloating about how he "work[s] faster than pediatric AIDS, cancer, and diabetes combined" among other things and then it switches over to various saintly neurotypical adults who all talk about how they will bravely fight autism, with one woman saying that "Autism!" "think[s] that because [her] child lives behind a wall, [she is] afraid to knock it down with [her] bare hands." [["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|Yeah, they]] ''[["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|really]]'' [["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|put that up]]. Unsurprisingly, it got a lot of backlash from autistic people, allistic allies, and many disability rights organizations. [[Heel Face Turn|Even many people who had whole-heartedly supported Autism Speaks and their cause turned on them because of the video]]. [[Even Evil Has Standards|Eventually, Autism Speaks took down the video]].▼
** [http://www.aspiesforfreedom.com/showthread.php?tid=23241 If this interview is honest], Autism Speaks seems to have changed its tone. However, the director of the piece, [[Alfonso Cuaron]] (yes, [[Children of Men|THAT]] [[Harry Potter|Alfonso]] [[Y Tu Mama Tambien|Cuaron]]), hasn't apologized or even spoken about it since.▼
== [[Music]] ==
* The song "Christmas Shoes" definitely qualifies. We'll let [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iq10bz3PxyY Patton Oswalt] speak (using lots of cursing, so be warned) for this one. It's so infamous that even Christian Radio stations are opting to stay away from this these days.
** [[Patton Oswalt]] offers an [[Alternative Character Interpretation]] that posits the kid is a [[Street Urchin]] playing on the heartstrings of his marks in order to scam them.
** [[The Nostalgia Chick]] [https://web.archive.org/web/20120224054250/http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thedudette/nostalgia-chick/3250-top-10-disturbing-and-inescapable-christmas-songs says it best]. It IS the #1 ''disturbing'' and inescapable Christmas song, after all.
** Speaking of Christmas, Glurge seems to be the steak and potatoes of all the Christmas movies that -coincidentally?- nobody seems to remember. A stellar example: the all but forgotten Disney movie ''One Magic Christmas''. It is a... ''loose'' reimagining of ''[[It's a Wonderful Life]]'', sort of. And it sits uncomfortably between this trope, [[Tastes Like Diabetes]], [[Inept Aesop]], [[Deus Angst Machina]], and [[Nightmare Fuel]] (the latter especially due to the violent [[Mood Whiplash]]). Bonus points for having many of the same [[Fridge Horror]] as "The Christmas Shoes," as pointed out by Patton Oswalt above: {{spoiler|"[[God Is Evil|What a horrible]] [[Sound Effect Bleep|f*** ing]] [[God Is Evil|God!!!]]"}}. The whole things seems like it was ''designed'' to scar children for life.
*** As a side note, 'The Christmas Shoes' is sold in the shop 'Poundland' in the UK. Poundland. Which means it sells for a pound or less. That's about two dollars in America. Huh, not so uplifting any more, are we?
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* The Deck of Cards: playing cards in church is punishable by death?
* [[Michael Jackson]] was a [[Glurge Addict]], so it's not surprising that some of his work fell into this territory.
** ''Ghosts'' was something of a response to accusations that his affection for children [[Paedo Hunt|hid unsavory motives]]. It uses the framework of a black-and-white horror movie. An evil white mayor (played by Jackson) leads a [[Torches and Pitchforks]] mob on the supernatural Michael just because he was sharing ghost stories with some local boys. What results is a parade of horrors to drive the mayor away, and it [https://web.archive.org/web/20090616081608/http://archive.salon.com/ent/tv/diary/2001/10/31/jacko/index.html has been argued] that Michael is the real villain even though the idea is that he's the hero who teaches us [[An Aesop]] about not picking on others who are different.
** "Earth Song" is a [[Green Aesop]] guilt trip that attacks the listener for not even ''bothering'' to notice the suffering of plants, animals and people. In the video, war victims and natives wailing and gnashing their teeth somehow proves sufficient to magically turn back time and make everything all better. To make matters worse, live performances had Jackson singlehandedly stand up to a tank and reduce the soldier/driver within to tears by ''standing down the gun he aimed at him''. And '''then''' there was Michael's [http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xalpov Brit Awards appearance] in 1996, in which the song became a ten-minute production number that climaxed with Michael clad in white, being treated as a messiah by the suffering masses. About midway through the peformance, Jarvis Cocker (of Pulp) crashed the stage to counteract the sappiness; [[Hilarity Ensues|hilarity ensued]]. That said, this song is ''hugely'' loved by Jackson fans, especially the [[Vocal Minority]]—just look at this [http://www.thehuffingtonpost.com/joe-vogel/michael-jackson-earth-song_b_882740.html excerpt]{{Dead link}} from an e-book about its creation.
* A lot of early-to-mid-20th-century pop can fall into this nowadays, given how completely sentimentality has been redefined since then. "Artificial Flowers" (best-known version by Bobby Darrin) is a great example.
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* [[Played for Laughs]] on ''[[South Park]]''. Which episode? Practically all of them.
* In ''[[King of the Hill]]'', Hank's mom Tilly collects figurines and Hank utterly despises them because of how much she loves them and how they seem to control her life. Then Hank realizes those figurines were the only things that kept her going while she was trapped in her marriage to Hank's [[Jerkass]] father Cotton.
== Multimedia ==
▲* While they're certainly not ''all'' guilty of it, more than one film strip, 16mm film, and video on the dangers of drugs has [[Drugs Are Bad|fallen into this]].
▲* Not sure I've I'm putting this in the right category, but there was an ad promoting Proposition 8 (a law which banned gay marriage in California) featuring a cute, little blonde girl playing with [[Barbie]] dolls. While the ad seemed sweet on the surface, advocates for gay rights would see this as a way of using children (who don't really understand what it is they're doing) to promote homophobia.
▲** Which runs in perfect parallel to allegations that gay rights advocates use 'tolerance' and 'acceptance' programs in schools to teach children (who don't really understand it) that homosexuality is not wrong. Some points of view ''cannot'' be reconciled to each other, they are anathema to each other.
▲* The notorious I Am Autism, produced by Autism Speaks and put on the Internet in September 2009. It starts out with [[Evil Sounds Deep|a man's deep voice speaking over footage of autistic children playing at various activities as]] '''[[Evil Sounds Deep|"Autism!]]"''', gloating about how he "work[s] faster than pediatric AIDS, cancer, and diabetes combined" among other things and then it switches over to various saintly neurotypical adults who all talk about how they will bravely fight autism, with one woman saying that "Autism!" "think[s] that because [her] child lives behind a wall, [she is] afraid to knock it down with [her] bare hands." [["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|Yeah, they]] ''[["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|really]]'' [["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer|put that up]]. Unsurprisingly, it got a lot of backlash from autistic people, allistic allies, and many disability rights organizations. [[Heel Face Turn|Even many people who had whole-heartedly supported Autism Speaks and their cause turned on them because of the video]]. [[Even Evil Has Standards|Eventually, Autism Speaks took down the video]].
▲** [https://web.archive.org/web/20150824062131/http://www.aspiesforfreedom.com/showthread.php?tid=23241 If this interview is honest], Autism Speaks seems to have changed its tone. However, the director of the piece, [[Alfonso Cuaron]] (yes, [[Children of Men|THAT]] [[Harry Potter|Alfonso]] [[Y Tu Mama Tambien|Cuaron]]), hasn't apologized or even spoken about it since.
== [[Real Life]] ==
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:
[[Category:An Aesop]]
[[Category:Esoteric Trope Names]]
[[Category:YMMV Trope]]
▲[[Category:Glurge]]
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