Never My Fault: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

* ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'': From her first episode onward, Asuka always blames Shinji when missions and training go wrong, whether it's ''her'' mistake or completely beyond anyone's control. For variety, she also rips into him for apologizing for something he had no control over.

* Happens all the time in ''[[Ranma ½]]''. When something bad happens, the characters '''demand''' that the fault lies with someone else. Examples of note include Ranma not accepting responsibility for causing Ryoga to turn into a pig even though he pushed him into the spring. Ryoga blamed Ranma for missing the fight there were supposed to have before Ranma moved away, even though Ryoga was the one who missed the fight due to his own faulty sense of direction. Similarly [[Takahashi Couple|every argument Ranma has with Akane]] is somehow always Ranma's fault. This trope is to be expected since the author herself describes the series as a [[Played for Laughs|Gag Manga]].

* In the Doma Arc of ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]'', Rex has a grudge against Joey stemming from the latter winning his Red Eyes B. Dragon card in Duelist Kingdom, ''completely'' forgetting that ''he'' is the one who decided to up the ante and wager it against Joey's Time Wizard.

 

* ''[[Spider-Man]]''

** [[Hero with Bad Publicity|This is the norm in pretty much any adaptation in the entire franchise. Poor Spidey gets blamed by villains and civilians alike for pretty much every sucky thing that happens to them, regardless of whether or not its their own fault or it's a villain's doing in which it's completely beyond Spider-Man's control.]]

* Pre-Flashpoint, Deathstroke's entire motivation for hating the [[Teen Titans (Comic Book)|Teen Titans]] and trying to kill them was that he blamed them for the loss of his family. In reality, Deathstroke himself was the one who drove them away with his life as an amoral mercenary. Averted in one storyline when he eventually realized he was a terrible father. He enacted a scheme to endear his remaining two children to the Teen Titans so they could have the family he couldn't give them.

 

* [[Assumptions]]: Rainbow Dash's huge ego makes it downright impossible apologize to Caramel, [[Nice Guy|who has been nothing but kind to her]], after he find out she nearly killed him with a botched aerial trick. Rainbow chooses to fly away in shame rather than admit she wronged him, but later halfway-apologizes, which Caramel accepts.

* There have been quite a few ''[[Harry Potter]]'' fanfics written from the point of view of the Slytherin students. Very often in these stories, the Slytherins view themselves as the victims of injustice, of rampant "anti-Slytherin prejudice." The fact that people dislike or distrust the Slytherins ''never'' seems to be the Slytherins' fault for being bigots, bullies, or otherwise openly cruel and hostile to other students, [[Fantastic Racism|particularly Muggle-borns]].

{{quote|'''Sonic:''' ''If it weren't for ''you'' and your friend, you wouldn't even '''be''' in this mess!''}}

 

* In ''[[Caddyshack]]''. Rodney Dangerfield drops his anchor into another boat. The other boat sinks, yet all Rodney says is "You scratched my anchor!"

** Of course, it's okay because the other guy is a gigantic dick, and even though Dangerfield is even more of a dick than that to him, he's a charming, amicable schmoozer to literally everyone else.

* Sean from ''[[The Social Network]]'' particularly has this problem. He blamed the Winklevii and/or Manningham for {{spoiler|"planting" the coke and calling the cops for catching him with underaged interns.}} He also doesn't seem to get how record companies would be pissed to see you take money away from them, chalking it up to the companies not having a sense of humor.

 

* ''[[Jurassic Park]]'': In [[Michael Crichton]]'s novel, Hammond <ref>who's more of a [[Jerkass]] than in [[The Film of the Book]]</ref> has a long internal monologue in which he blames everyone except himself for the disaster. Then he [[Karmic Death|gets eaten]].

** Gennaro, too, is a largely irresponsible man who has allowed significant monetary investment in a project he did very little checking on, under a man (Hammond) he knew to be unsavoury, and yet whenever something goes wrong he's the first one to start bitching at someone else. Eventually Grant [[What the Hell, Hero?|calls him on it by slamming him into a wall]] and [["The Reason You Suck" Speech|spitting it all into his face]].

* ''[[In Death]]'': A number of the villains will always blame everyone but themselves when something goes wrong. ''Divided In Death'' had Dr. Mira explicitly telling Eve that Blair Bissel refuses to blame himself and that he ''has'' to blame someone else for everything going wrong for him.

* ''Sisterhood'' series by [[Fern Michaels]]: A number of villains essentially go around with this attitude. Senator Webster in ''Payback'' stands out with refusing to accept the blame for having multiple affairs, and then feebly trying to blame his wife Julia Webster for giving him AIDS. She had to pretty much shove the evidence in his face and spell out that recklessly having sex with women caused him to get AIDS, and he passed it on to her, plain and simple! Owen Orzell AKA Jody Jumper in ''Home Free'' actually averts or defies the trope by coming out and admitting that he is responsible for what he has done and nobody else.

* [[Ring Lardner]]'s novel "You Know Me Al" is a collection of letters from a young pitcher trying to break into the big leagues. Whenever he writes about one of his poor pitching performances, he starts by saying that he always takes responsibility for his failings (usually with a [[Title Drop]]), and then immediately blames everyone else on the team for his loss.

* The bully ringleader in ''[[Let the Right One In]]'', Johnny, feels this way towards the protagonist, Oskar, smashing him in the head with a piece of wood... while he and a lackey were ''throwing him into a frozen lake''. He retaliates by holding Oskar's head ''in the path of an oncoming train''. Oskar in turn retaliates by burning the bullies' school desks. Unfortunately, the scrapbook with Johnny and his [[Teens Are Monsters|older brother Jimmy's]] only photos of their father is in his desk. They respond by nearly drowning him, then preparing to ''cut out his eye''. Never once does Johnny acknowledge his horrible treatment of Oskar which drove him to this.

* In ''[[Who Cut the Cheese?]]'' by Mason Brown, Cover successfully blames Duck for ruining a cheese depot.

 

* A common variant that shows up in most crime dramas involves an escaped convict seeking revenge on the cop who arrested him, the lawyer who helped convict him or the witness who testified against him, as payback for landing him in jail. The criminal never accepts that it's their own fault for breaking the law in the first place. This attitude is sometimes, unfortunately, [[Truth in Television]].

* ''[[Only Fools and Horses]]'': The Trotters have a strong habit of blaming each other when things go pear-shaped. However, the person being blamed always calls the accuser out on it. One example of note, in one of the TV specials, quite similar to the Scrooge McDuck example above: after Cassandra kicks Rodney out for [[Not What It Looks Like|seemingly taking another woman out to the pictures]], Rodney worries that Cassandra's father is going to fire him, as he's left a message saying that there's something important they need to talk about. [[During the War|Uncle Albert tells one of his war stories]] about a stoker who was facing a court-martial and handed in his resignation. [[Karma Houdini|Because he was the only stoker on the ship, they had to refuse his resignation and cancel his court-martial]]. Rodney follows suit, thinking that Cassandra's father will turn down the resignation, since it's so close to Christmas and more orders are coming in. When Rodney meets him, it turns out he just wanted to talk about the extra workload. Then he finds Rodney's resignation and accepts it. Rodney blames Albert.

* ''[[Lois and Clark]]'': Humorously played with in the pilot episode, which sees Lois and Clark captured and tied up by the bad guys after Lois has pressured Clark into breaking into a suspicious warehouse. Lois angrily blames Clark for their current situation. Clark angrily points out that ''he's'' not the one who wanted to break into the warehouse in the first place. After a moment's pause, Lois realizes that he's right - and this triggers an outburst of self-pity about how her recklessness and competitiveness [[Freudian Excuse|all stems from her upbringing]], how her father never paid any attention to her and how she competes with everyone and sleeps with guys from work to compensate for her hidden insecurities, thus leading Clark to save their lives out of frustration with her [[wangst]]ing as much as anything else.

** The hilarious bit comes when Clark just rolls his eyes at this and breaks the chains binding them. Even ''[[Superman]]'' couldn't stand listening to that.

* A subplot in an episode of ''[[The West Wing]]'' revolves around someone suing the President for making a remark about the safety of American cars, following which his wife was killed in an accident when she didn't wear a seatbelt. This inspires Sam to work on proposals for increased safety regulations for the auto industry, only for the President himself to shoot him down, pointing out that as much as he sympathises with the husband's loss and his need to find someone to blame, he can hardly be held responsible if someone chooses to use an off-the-cuff remark he made as an excuse to ignore common sense safety guidelines.

* Lois from ''[[Malcolm in the Middle]]'' is like this often. In one point she gets into an argument with a cop over whether she cut off another car or not and is given video proof that she did, yet still insists that the video is inaccurate. {{spoiler|It was, but she didn't need to know that.}}

{{quote|'''Manny:''' Bernard I'm sorry! It was my fault you toasted my hand!}}

 

* An early Straylight Run demo includes a track called "It's Everyone's Fault But Mine". Which, given its subject matter (the singer's estrangement from his old band, Taking Back Sunday), might be a fairly accurate title.

 

* At one point in ''[[Calvin and Hobbes]]'', Calvin blames Hobbes for breaking the battery case of a beanie, even though Calvin was the one who broke it. Played with in that after Hobbes calls him out on it, saying he had just been sitting there watching Calvin work when it snapped. Calvin then tearfully admits that he knows, and that having Hobbes take the blame will make him feel better.

** On top of that was Calvin's decision to not take part in elections when he's an adult, with the final reasoning of "It's easier to blame things than fix them."

* Lucy from ''[[Peanuts]]'' is quick to blame others for things that were often her fault in the first place, the worst example of this being "It's Your First Kiss Charlie Brown" (see in [[Western Animation]], below).

 

* In one episode of ''[[I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue]]'', Jeremy Hardy makes a joke which could be seen as offensive. Tim Brooke-Taylor immediately follows it with the comment "That was Jeremy Hardy who said that..." Moments later, Tim makes a joke which is groaned by the audience and follows it, again, with "That was Jeremy Hardy who said that..."

** And in another episode, Tim makes a joke which gets a mixed reaction, before saying "Oh, you shouldn't say that. Shush, Jeremy." <ref>Part of the joke is that Jeremy is both younger and more 'alternative' than the regular cast, so he's more expected to make offensive jokes.</ref>

 

* In ''[[Paranoia (game)|Paranoia]]'', the mission debriefing tends to devolve into ''[[Blame Game|everyone]]'' [[Blame Game|doing this at once]].

* ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'' 4e mostly failed (as in, drowned in maelstrom of retroclones and d20 OGL products) because... [http://yarukizerogames.com/2013/04/01/dd-4es-influences-and-problems/ of the gamers who discussed D&D3.x!] If no one pointed out its bugs, and everyone just praised it, the developers and managers (who for their next number had ''voting on WotC site for specific isolated features one by one'') would ''surely'' get their concepts articulate and coherent - [http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Eladrin needless random mashing of terms from previous editions] and widely ridiculed gems like [http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Bloody_Path nonsensical arcade elements] or "[[CamelCase|GloomGloom]]" [[I Don't Like the Sound of That Place|naming scheme]] being, somehow, side effects of making the game non-optimizable (wait, who even said it could - much less should - be a ''good thing''?).

** In the same vein, [[Forgotten Realms]] was effectively erased and replaced with another setting under the same name, with some names borrowed (see the creativity problem above). This didn't roll well with most old fans, and surprise, this set heavily intersects with "the ones who ''have money to buy stuff''". Whose fault that could be?.. Cue the loud astroturfing (which touched even tvtropes) that shifted on Ed Greenwood blame for all and any stupid stunts that were ever done by TSR/Wizards/Hasbro editors to his novels<ref>''Spellfire'' was [[Executive Meddling|"trimmed"]] until the plot was [[Plot Hole|cut into disconnected pieces]]. Later he was told to fix their mess within specified word count - ''and then it was cut again, beyond their own limit''.</ref>, whole series of books<ref>Like [http://forum.candlekeep.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1888&whichpage=7#36407 characters being one-arc, except the few "prominent" ones].</ref> and Realms in general, often despite loud protests of himself and other authors, which all was publically clarified years ago. E.g. "signature characters" frog-marched in limelight to death and beyond - which is supposedly because [[Creator's Pet|Authors Luvs Them]], even though it was common knowledge in the fan circles for years that Ed consistently expresses desire to (and, as much as he can, ''does'') write about relatively "common" folk rather than Elminster; ditto for Ed cosplaying as Elminster at a convention (at TSR request). It's less clear with Salvatore, but the notion that [http://forum.candlekeep.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=12023&whichpage=53#262993 Drizzt became his "albatross"] is generally accepted as feasible, too.

 

 

* Stross from ''[[Dead Space 2]]''. He was unintentionally responsible for the death of his wife, Alexis, and their son. Unable to accept it, the Marker slowly drives Stross more and more insane as time goes on, {{spoiler|eventually becoming [[Face Heel Turn|actively antagonistic]] and trying to kill Isaac and Ellie}}. It's not that Stross wants to hurt them, it's just that Stross wants someone, ''anyone'', to validate what he's seeing and tell him his family's deaths wasn't his fault, which is why he listens to what the symbols from the Marker are telling him.

* ''[[Dynasty Warriors|Dynasty Warriors 4]]''. Dong Zhuo's campaign. If Lu Bu defeats Diao Chan in the final act of the campaign. "Why did you take Diao Chan into battle. You are the one that killed Diao Chan!"

* By the time of the final battle in [[Portal 2]], {{spoiler|Wheatley's incompetent management has left the Enrichment Centre on the brink of self-destruction. Wheatley rants at Chell for running off with Glados after he "reluctantly" assumed power, when in reality he jumped at the opportunity to take over and then tried to kill Chell and Glados. He even goes so far as to claim that there's nothing wrong with the facility, and all the alarms and warnings going off are just a conspiracy by the two of them trying to sabotage him, even as his lair starts to catch fire and the ceiling collapses around him.}}

* In most ''[[Super Mario (franchise)|Super Mario]]'' games that give him a voice, Bowser shifts the blame for his plans failing to his underlings or allies upon defeat. The most ludicrous case is ''[[Mario & Luigi: Dream Team]]'' when {{spoiler|he blames Antasma for his defeat when Bowser himself double-crossed him and threw him under the bus when he felt like [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|he didn't need him anymore]].}}

 

== Web Animation ==

{{quote|'''Caboose''': I did it! I {{spoiler|beat up the girl}}! I--Not my fault! Not my fault! The computer made me touch it!}}

 

* Mandark from ''[[Powerpuff Girls Doujinshi]]'' really can't bring himself to accept {{spoiler|that he killed Dee Dee}}. This being [[Dexter's Laboratory|Mandark]], he blames Dexter.

** Not quite true. {{spoiler|Mandark did blame himself for Dee Dee's death. However, he hates Dexter for [[Death Seeker|not avenging her by finishing him off when he had the chance]].}}

* Paul Christophoro, the instigator of the infamous [[Penny Arcade]] vs. Ocean Marketing fiasco is apparently suing the company that hired him to sell the controllers for [[Internet Counterattack|getting the entire internet after him and ruining his company]]. [[Insane Troll Logic|Apparently being a egomaniacal jerkass is the fault of the company who had nothing to do with anything past making the controllers.]]

 

* ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]''

** "Bart Star": Homer has a [[Flash Back]] to a floor gymnastics routine. Abe yells "You're gonna blow it" at him... and so he does, and Abe then gets mad at him. To add insult to injury, Abe's bitter condemnation to Homer—immediately after yelling this out—are "This is what I get for having faith in you."

** When his head scientist fails to move the moon to the position that the former principal wanted it to go, Benedict blames everything on him, even though he could have chosen a location that had more electricity to power up the beam in the first place. Though in his defense, Third Street Elemtnary was the ''last'' place that people would look for the stolen laser (and the police are apparently incompetent).

 

* [[Truth in Television|If you don't know anyone with a habit of shifting blame, then you probably do it yourself]]. And at the same time, if you accuse ''everyone'' in your life of shifting blame, you probably do it yourself. [[Hypocritical Humor|And if you didn't want to know this unsavoury tidbit about yourself, then it's your own damn fault for reading this page.]]

* According to [[Peloponnesian War|Thucydides]], the Athenian democracy was like this. Generals who survived a failed expedition were often [[You Have Failed Me...|put to death]] by democratic vote, despite the fact that the people had voted for the expedition and it was obviously not the generals' fault.

* Psychologists call this the [[wikipedia:Fundamental attribution error|fundamental attribution error]].

* Entire ''governments'' can play this game with other countries, such as in "Operation Paul Bunyan". Two US soldiers were attacked by around 40 North Korean soldiers. North Korea then claimed that the Americans attacked them.

* The list of people and organizations blamed for [[Hillary Rodham Clinton]] losing the election in 2016 continued to grow for [http://twitchy.com/sd-3133/2017/05/31/denial-is-a-btch-omg-look-who-hillarys-blaming-for-her-loss-now/ more than six months]. It does include most of her supporters, but not herself.

 

[[Category:Morality Tropes]]

[[Category:Hypocrite]]

[[Category:Character Flaw Index]]

[[Category:Blame Tropes]]