Never My Fault: Difference between revisions

== Anime and Manga ==

** To add to the above example {{spoiler|Hatsuharu calls her out for almost killing Isuzu twice because she hates women for no good reason. Akito counters with telling him that it was really his fault that she was put in danger at all because he dated Isuzu anyway knowing that Akito hated her. Suprisingly, Hatsuharu agrees that he is partially to blame for Isuzu's suffering. Justified, since it's difficult for members of the Zodiac to think badly of Akito due to her supernatural influence over them as their "God".}}

** A particularly vicious example can also be found when Akito attacks Hatori with what looks like a vase, blinding him in one eye, and immediately starts asking the maimed doctor "Hatori, what's wrong?" before accusing Kana, Hatori's innocent would-be fiancee, of being responsible for Hatori's pain. Kana ends up agreeing, and the whole situation goes downhill from there.

* Partial example from ''[[Code Geass]]'': Ohgi holds resentment towards Zero for his abandonment during the Black Rebellion and subsequent one-year disappearance, yet never takes his relationship with Villetta, the person linked to at least some degree with the two, or [[Love Makes You Dumb|his resulting carelessness]], into account.

** Even worse, when the boys try and go into the other of the two hot springs because the girls are in the first one, it turns out that the girls have switched. And the boys get blamed ''again''.

** Other times however, she isn't aware of things that happen as she's [[Locked Out of the Loop]] due to special circumstances, such as when she nearly destroyed the world due to a fit of jealousy when Kyon seems to be getting a little too friendly with Mikuru. And later on, [[And I Must Scream|repeating the same two weeks of summer over 15,000 times]] because she wanted to do more activities with her friends.

* [[Paranoia Agent]] is entirely about this.

== Comicbooks ==

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

** Peter Parker's boss J. Jonah Jameson is guilty of this from time to time as well. His irresponsible journalism often puts people's lives at risk, but he always blames Spider-Man for causing the problems.

** Also in ''[[Ultimate Spider-Man]]'', after Peter gets his powers, he finally stands up to [[Jerk Jock]] Flash Thompson. They get in a fight, which Peter calmly tries to talk Flash out of, while the creep keeps throwing punches at him. Finally Peter catches Flash's hand and breaks it by accident. Flash goes crying to his mommy and daddy who sue Aunt May and Uncle Ben for the medical bills.

** Another example in ''Ultimate Spider-Man'' would be Norman Osborn, who basically blames everyone but himself for his own crimes and the horrible things he's done both to his own body and to his son. In particular, he seems convinced that Nick Fury is behind everything bad that ever happens to him, motivated out of jealousy.

* Despite [[Magneto]]'s desire to help his fellow mutants and deliver them from persecution his actions have probably done more to hurt his cause (and harmed more mutants) than he has helped. Naturally, this is always humanity's fault.

* Countless European [[Disney Ducks Comic Universe|Scrooge McDuck]] stories have Scrooge engaging in this. A common story template goes like this: Scrooge starts worrying that he's losing money (or in most cases not making as many billions as he used to). Scrooge whines about it to [[Donald Duck]] who either gives him a well meaning suggestion or simply makes a random remark that gives Scrooge an idea. Scrooge immediately implements said idea spending a ton of money. Said idea fails due to a reason that could have been anticipated with a market test or ''simple common sense''. Scrooge laments the loss of the money... and immediately blames Donald, with the story ending with Scrooge chasing him with the intent of causing bodily harm.<br /><br />Here's a concrete example of the above: in one story, Scrooge notices that his business is slowing down... because Scrooge already produces ''everything'' and there are no markets to expand into. Scrooge goes to Donald's house ''in the middle of the night'' to whine about it prompting him to snidely remark "You'd even sell ''dreams'' if you could, wouldn't you?". This gives Scrooge the idea to do just that. He enlists Gyro Gearloose to create a dream selling business via a machine that accesses your greatest desires and turns them into a dream stored in a tape that you can "replay" while you sleep. The business is a success... then Scrooge finds out that ''all his other businesses'' are going under thanks to people gradually replacing their non essential possessions with dreams (why have anything else when you can relive your innermost desires every night?). Guess who Scrooge blames?<br /><br />In another comic, Scrooge [[Crying Wolf|stages several robberies]] just to keep employees on their toes. Naturally, nobody believes him when he is genuinely robbed, but instead of acknowledging that he is at fault, he gets angry at Donald for not helping him.

* [[Infinite Crisis|Superboy Prime]] kills a multitude of people, but refuses to take responsibility. Coming from a world where he was the only superhero, and being parented by a [[Golden Age]] Superman, he thinks the DC universe is full of degenerates. In his mind, it's '''their''' fault that he's driven to kill. No one agrees with him.

* In the gaming comic ''[[Knights of the Dinner Table]],'' anything bad that happens to Bob, Dave, and Brian is ''always'' somebody else's fault. No exceptions.

== Fan Fiction ==

* 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]].

** The real kicker is that [[Misaimed Fandom|the writers of these stories (and their supporters)]] [[Draco in Leather Pants|actually seem to believe that the Slytherins are right]]. No matter how horribly the Slytherins behave, the writers always seem to attribute any display of animosity toward them to "anti-Slytherin prejudice."

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

* Epitomized by the comic duo [[Laurel and Hardy]]. Whenever things went wrong, Hardy would blame Laurel (regardless of what part of the blame he truly carried) with a reproachful "here's another nice mess you've gotten me into".<br /><br />This schtick is borrowed by ''[[Illuminatus]]!'' where various different figures appear dressed as Laurel and Hardy, e.g. The Flood, everyone except Noah and Co have been drowned for their sins by a vengeful God. Jehovah (as Ollie) turns to Lucifer (as Stan) and says, "Now look what you made me do!" Lucifer cries. Hiroshima, a mushroom cloud rises above the city. Tens of thousands have been killed in a split second. President Truman (as Ollie) turns to Albert Einstein (as Stan) and says, "Now look what you made me do!" Einstein cries. etc.

* Likewise, Moe of ''[[The Three Stooges]]'' was quick to pin blame and administer physical punishment against Larry and Curly (or Shemp), even when whatever hilarious accident that had happened to Moe was his own fault.

** Harry blaming Peter for his father's death, even after finding out that his father was the Green Goblin. And in the third movie {{spoiler|he at first refuses to help Peter save MJ at the end, blaming Peter for disfiguring his face. It was Harry's own stupid fault for throwing a grenade at Peter in the first place!}}

** Also Dr Octopus in both the novelization and the videogame of the second movie blames Spider-Man for his wife's death, when it was the Doctor's own experiment that led to Rosie's death. The videogame adaptation has him snap out of his evil personality and admit that it was his own vanity that killed her. Ironically, his film incarnation avoids this completely by having Doctor Octopus completely uninterested in Spider-Man up until he's paid to kidnap him.

(The sign falls down and shatters, and he glares at the elves.)<br />

'''Jack Frost''': Look what you've done! }}

* In the first ''[[Ghostbusters]]'' film, [[Obstructive Bureaucrat|Walter Peck]] gets the Ghostbusters arrested for causing an explosion he himself had caused, in spite of their explicit warnings. Egon's response? "''[[Your Mom|Your mother]]!''"

* The documentary ''[[Super Size Me]]'' is often criticized for fueling the "[[McDonald's]] made me fat" mindset that was big for a few years. The idea was using fast food, particularly [[McDonald's]], as a scapegoat for American obesity rates and paying no regard to things like genetics or responsibility for one's own body.

* 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.

** 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 ''[[The Magicians]],'' Emily Greenstreet disfigures herself while trying to alter her face with magic; when her boyfriend (who she'd dumped for one of the professors, by the way) tries to help, he loses control of a spell due to being too upset to concentrate and dies in the [[Magic Misfire]]. When Quentin meets Emily late in the novel, she blames [[Magic Is Evil|magic]] for the disaster, claims magic is the source of all the sorrows in her life and Quentin's life, and accuses all of her fellow magicians of being nuclear bombs waiting to go off. For added [[Hypocrite|hypocrisy]], her day job requires magic performed by said nuclear bombs to disguise the fact that she does absolutely nothing.

* ''[[The Railway Series]]'': Because the Rev Awdry didn't want to make railwaymen look foolish, the locomotive characters are usually blamed for whatever goes wrong on the railway. Unfortunately, by doing this, the railwaymen look not only foolish, but [[Ultimate Job Security|get off scot-free with endangering lives.]] There is the below mentioned example of Thomas being blamed for the cleaner fiddling with his controls as well as in ''Main Line Engines'' where The Fat Controller blames Gordon for the mix up, even though it was the fireman's fault for starting the train before everything was ready. Also in ''The Twin Engines'' he rips into the twins for accidents that aren't even their fault. ''Percy and the Trousers''- The porters were just as much to blame for not keeping an eye on the track. ''Paint Pots & Queens'' - The painter loses his footing, spilling his paint, and he blames Henry. ''Percy's Predicament''- The trucks cause Percy to crash, his driver and Fireman can't stop him in time and the Fat Controller still blames Percy.

* ''[[The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde]]'': Even when writing his final letter, Jekyll refers to Hyde ([[Freudian Slip|mostly]]) in the third person, insisting Hyde's actions were not ''his'' actions. "[E]ven now I can scarce grant that I committed [them]."

* [[Oblomov]] is completely unable to change his life by himself; when he gets unhappy he decides to blame Sachar instead. Now Sachar is a [[Jerkass]] and whatnot, but still [[Mis Blamed]].

* A running gag on ''[[Top Gear]]'' is that Jeremy Clarkson denies all responsibility for things that go wrong, blaming the others or claiming it was unintentional (e.g. "I may have accidentally put a cow on the roof of my car.")

* 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.

* In ''[[Friends]]'', Rachel tries to make Ross take full responsibility for their break-up, even though, as Ross puts it, "It took two people to break up this relationship."

** In response to that, Rachel said, "Yeah, you and that girl from the copy place." She was basically claiming that Ross's cheating on her (which Ross vociferously insisted wasn't really cheating because they were "on a break") was the ''sole'' reason for their breakup, even though there were numerous problems in their relationship well before that. Or that she had the guy Ross was jealous of come over to comfort her not an hour after their big fight (and he answers the phone when Ross calls to try and patch things up).

* On ''[[Gossip Girl]]'' Chuck has yet to take responsibility for his and Blair's relationship failing, and has even claimed that it was "fate" that broke them up. The reason for their break-up? Chuck traded Blair to his uncle for a hotel. The reason why their attempted reunion failed? Chuck had sex with Blair's main enemy Jenny on the same night he and Blair were supposed to reunite.

* Lord Zedd pulls this off as early as his first appearance in ''[[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]]''. When Goldar apologizes for his loss (as the Rangers finally defeated the Piranhtishead Monster), Zedd snaps and blames Goldar, Squatt, and Baboo (the latter two had nothing to do with the episode) for the loss. He even blames Rita when their honeymoon goes sour when the Rangers are victorious.

* [[Guilt Complex|Believe it or not]], [[Doctor Who|The Doctor]] started off this way. He was the first to point fingers when things went kablooey, both when it was his fault and when no one was to blame. Notable examples include shouting at and insulting [[Kick the Dog|his own granddaughter]] when Barbara and Ian stumbled into the TARDIS and accusing the aforementioned ''humans'' of ''sabotaging the TARDIS''. Yeah, he was kind of a [[Jerkass]].

== Radio ==

** 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>

== Theater ==

== Video Games ==

* ''[[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!"

* ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' -- both humourously and seriously.

** Also, every time the Prosecutors lose, [[Butt Monkey|they cut Gumshoe's salary.]]

* Part of Seigfried's backstory in ''[[Soul Series|Soul Calibur]]'': He and his gang attacked a band of knights, returning from a campaign, with the intention of robbing them. Seigfried beheaded the Knight's commander and held his severed head up to gloat. It turned out to be his own father. His mind became so warped that he psychologically convinced himself that someone else killed him. Some of his endings in the games show him taking responsibility for this.

* Done twice in Episode 3 of ''[[Phantasy Star|Phantasy Star Universe]].'' First {{spoiler|the Parum refugees}} hate the GUARDIANS because of {{spoiler|the [[Colony Drop|GUARDIANS Colony crash-landing on Parum,]] which killed thousands and left the survivors homeless with hardly any means to survive.}} Then {{spoiler|the New Rogues leader, Tylor}} refuses to work with the GUARDIANS because {{spoiler|they did nothing while the SEED-Virus was unleashed on Beasts. Turning them into SEED-forms which lead them [[Shoot the Dog|to be purified.]]}} Both events were beyond the control of the GUARDIANS.

* ''[[God of War]]'' - That's right, Kratos, it is all Ares's fault that you personally killed your family in a blood-crazed frenzy that incidentally wouldn't have happened if you hadn't sold your soul to him and then butchered a bunch of defenseless priests for worshiping a different god. And sure, the gods betrayed ''you'' when you started destroying Rhodes with your divine powers immediately after Athena asked you to stop pointlessly invading places and told you that Olympus was losing patience with your insanity.

** To be fair, Ares did trick Kratos into killing his family and the gods did betray Kratos by intentionally misleading him about his reward for killing Ares.

** [[Hypocrite|Not that they ever take responsibility for not stopping]] {{spoiler|Luke from unwittingly destroying Akzeriuth}}, even though, unlike Luke, they were more aware of the situation and in a better position to stop it.

*** The team actually realizes this after they've had time to cool down and think things over. That's why they decide to give him a second chance. (Actually, by the time he rejoins, the only person who's blaming him for "the incident" is Luke himself.)

* Maribel from ''[[Dragon Quest VII]]'' is known to berate the hero for getting her stuck in trouble with him, even though she forced her way along in the first place!

* James Tobin is just made up of this trope ''[[In the 1st Degree]]''. He is charged with murder and grand theft. If you ask the right questions, then Tobin and his lawyer Charleston will try to make a story in which Tobin admits a number of things Yvonne, Simon, and Ruby said and tries to spin it so it was all the murder victim Zack's idea, and Tobin was just the poor guy who was dragged into it against his will. Even at that point, he still obeys this trope. Fortunately, you, as the prosecutor Granger, get to pick apart the details of his new story and have him lose his cool at a couple points. If you do it right, you then get to watch Tobin have a total meltdown right there in the courtroom and reveal a little too much information. If that happens, then you have won the game.

== Web Comics ==

** 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]].}}

** Silas Merlot is sentenced to work on Castle Heterodyne, a punishment reserved for particularly nasty criminals, after an incredibly lengthy situation involving indirectly killing someone important to Baron Wulfenbach's plans for running his empire, and later deliberately killing many, many people to hide the evidence of what they worked on. Since Agatha (who Merlot has despised as long as he's known her) was either at the center of, or even the specific subject of, every stage of the situation, Merlot decides that it's all her fault for being born in the first place.

** Gil Wulfenbach has a bit of trouble with this too; his part in the above situation was to defend himself. Unfortunately, "defending himself" meant swatting a bomb away, and more unfortunately, "away" meant "back at the guy who threw it, who was the one who was important to the Baron's plans". For the rest of the scene everyone shouts at Gil for killing Dr. Beetle, and Gil eventually gives up on impotently crying that Dr. Beetle threw a bomb at him.

** [[Start of Darkness]] posits that this is Redcloak's major flaw. If he admits that allying with Xykon — let alone making him a [[Our Liches Are Different|lich]] — was a mistake, then the deaths of all the goblins who aided him in executing "the Plan" will be on his shoulders. During [["The Reason You Suck" Speech]] that Xykon delivers to Redcloak, Xykon bluntly states that Redcloak will never betray him because Xykon is Redcloak's excuse for his inexcusable deeds.

* Lark in [[Mike Bookseller]] will blame anyone or anything to get out of trouble: "Lark, that's a cardboard display of [http://www.krrobar.com/mikebookseller/comics/67.html Henry Winkler]".

* 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.]]

== Western Animation ==

** "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."

*** Which is even sadder because Homer [[Hidden Depths|was doing really well]] up until that point.

** In general, Harry tends to do this quite a lot, which is likely a trait he picked up from his father Norman, who's catchphrase is "Don't apologise. I never do.".

*** And this nearly gets Norman killed in the very first episode where he refuses to apologize to the Vulture for stealing his life's work-while he's being flown above the city and being threatened with a long drop to the pavement. It may be possible to be a [[Magnificent Bastard]] and still be [[Too Dumb to Live]], but you have to have to admire his dedication to that principle.

* ''[[Danny Phantom]]'' - Valerie in the [[Chained Heat]] episode, though at least Danny has the nerve to call her out on it:

{{quote| '''Valerie''': This is all your fault!<br />

'''Danny''': Right, 'cause ''clearly'' [[The Hunter|the maniac]] who cuffed us and dragged us in here didn't have anything to do with it! }}

{{quote| "[[My God, What Have I Done?|What have I]]--what have '''they''' done to you?!"}}

* Done seriously in ''[[Transformers Animated]]'': Sentinel Prime hates Optimus Prime because {{spoiler|Optimus was unable to save Elita-1 from the [[Giant Spider|giant spiders]] on an alien planet, even though it was ''Sentinel's idea'' to go to the planet and search for the energon that made the spiders huge in the first place.}} What a [[Jerkass]].

** Also done by Zapp Brannigan, usually blaming his [[Egregious]] mistakes on Kif, his beleaguered lieutenant.

{{quote| '''Zapp Brannigan''': Prepare to take the blame in 3, 2, 1...<br />

'''XR''': ''(to Mira)'' You idiot! That monster was her boyfriend! }}

** Similarly, ''[[Toy Story]] 3'' has Jessie admit to Woody that the toys were wrong not to believe him. When she says that she was wrong specifically, Mr. Potato Head adds, "Jessie's right, Woody. She ''was'' wrong!"

** Though Meg [[Mis Blamed|was already blaming Chris]], Peter, mistaking the blame to be directed for having to relocate towards him, also blames Chris... even though it was Peter's fault in the first place for [[The Millstone|revealing Chris' identity to the crook who wanted him dead]].

** After hitting Brian with his car:

** Stewie frequently meddles into Brian's attempts at finding women and gives him bad advice. When it inevitably fails and Brian confronts him, Stewie will always accuse ''him'' of trying to blame his incompetance on others.

*** Not that Brian isn't capable of doing this on his own, such as cheating on Rita, his (older) fiancee, with a hot young thing, then saying he just needed one last fling before settling down with her. She doesn't buy it.

* On ''[[South Park]]'', [[Butt Monkey|Butters]] is used to being a scapegoat.

{{quote| '''Butters''': It's great, you get to throw rocks at cars and if the driver gets angry, you blame me."}}

'''The Atom''': Because otherwise it would be my fault. That can't be right. I'm a professor. }}

* Lucy in ''[[Peanuts]]''. In the animated special ''It's Your First Kiss, Charlie Brown'', she pulls the football from Charlie Brown in an actual football game with a game-deciding last-second field goal on the line, and then later (with Peppermint Patty) blames him for missing. (It should be noted that Charlie Brown himself [[It's All My Fault|feels let down]] by this miss, even though it clearly wasn't his fault).

** Frollo, a pious, merciless man, develops an obsession with the gypsy Esmeralda, rationalizing his lust by claiming ''she'' seduced him. All she did was flirt with him a little during her dance.

{{quote| '''Frollo''': It's not my fault! / I'm not to blame! / It is the gypsy girl, the witch who sent this flame!}}

* ''[[Fanboy and Chum Chum]]'': Boog and Lenny blame Fanboy and Chum Chum in "Monster in the Mist" for pretending they were the eponymous monster, when in fact it was Boog and Lenny's impaired vision that made them see it. Lenny could be forgiven, though, since his eyesight was handicapped by them.

* Done by [[Goofy]] of all characters in ''[[A Goofy Movie]]''. When their car starts rolling down the mountain he blames Max for both the car running away, (Goofy should have put the brakes on) and the door being locked. Max retorts that the locked door was on Goofy's side. Goofy then blames Max for distracting him and tells Max he should have put the brakes on himself, then he accidentally breaks it. Max use that to show that Goofy "ruin everything". Then Goofy blames Max for "ruining the vacation". Then Max told him he never even wanted to come and should have just let him stay home. The argument ends with Goofy saying all he wanted was to spend time with him and doesn't want them to become any more distant.

* Governor Ratcliffe from ''[[Pocahontas]]'' who blames the Native Americans for not finding any gold and John Smith for [[Taking the Bullet]].

* In ''[[Moral Orel]]'', Clay Puppington practically lives by shifting blame. In one episode, he teaches Orel the same (thankfully, Orel didn't keep that lesson for long). Orel counsels Principal Fakey to do the same, regarding Fakey's infidelity. This extends to claiming he's been faithful and accusing his wife of cheating on him and giving him gonorrhea, while he's having sex with the woman who gave the disease, as she tells him it's not that bad. He then states there's no decency in the world and goes home from school to throw her out. With his pants around his ankles the whole way.