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Persecution Flip: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
When most writers want to write about discrimination and oppression, they stick to real-world
▲When most writers want to write about discrimination and oppression, they stick to real-world examples -- after all, there are plenty of those. Some writers, however, wonder: "What if it were the other way round?" What if Africans had enslaved Europeans? What if India had colonized England? What if [[Lady Land|women had all the power and men had to stay in the kitchen]]? And so on and so forth. There may be a semi-plausible [[Alternate History]] explanation for the switch, but just as often it simply is that way.
Often this is not just an interesting what-if, but a way of making a point, saying to the privileged group "well, how would ''you'' like it if...?" This tends to be [[Anvilicious]], though [[Some Anvils Need to Be Dropped|not always in a bad way]]. The message may also be that power corrupts, and no matter who's on top, things will always suck for the group on the bottom. On the other hand, in certain cases the barbarism of the now-powerful group can be played up too much and the whole thing can [[Unfortunate Implications|seem as though it came out of some dislike or distrust of the group in question]]. Or, alternatively, the work may be disparaging towards the now-oppressed group (which is usually an [[Acceptable Target]] due to being in power in the real world), and suggest that they deserve to be treated badly.
Compare [[Just the Introduction
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* In [[Yuu Watase]]'s short manga story "Perfect Lovers," a heterosexual couple is transported into an alternate dimension where homosexuality is normal and heterosexual relationships are illegal.
* In the manga ''[[Ooku]]'', after [[Gendercide|a disease kills off a large percentage of the male population]], feudal Japan becomes a female-dominated society, with women as leaders and warriors and men viewed as sex objects too delicate to fight (or farm, or fish, or...).
* In ''[[
** Furthermore, since men greatly outnumber women, women have free pick of mates and are regarded as more valuable. Their higher social status is somewhat theoretical though, since the series plays this out with some [[Unfortunate Implications]].
* ''Prison School'', Hachimitsu Academy was once an all-girl school before allowing in boys. Since the [[Absurdly Powerful Student Council| Underground Student Council]] still enforced the rules, the only boys who are enrolled were subjected to harsh punishments in the prison wing of the school.
== Comic Books ==
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== Film ==
* The film ''[[White Man's Burden (
* ''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06DKCdJWK2c Babakiueria (Barbeque Area)]'' is an Australian film that does this with imperial Aborigines taking over and oppressing white Australians.
* ''Planet of the Apes'' involves apes keeping humans in cages and using them for experiments.
* In the film ''Almost Normal'', the gay protagonist enters a world where homosexuality is the norm - and straight people are the ones viewed as being "deviant".
** [[Fridge Logic|Wouldn't that entire society soon become extinct?]]
* ''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ROXTFfkcfo Love is All You Need?]'': Straight people are discriminated against.
== Literature ==
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** "The English Mutiny" by Ian R. MacLeod (India colonizes England)
** "Islands in the Sea" by [[Harry Turtledove]] (Islam becomes the major world religion; Christianity is practiced only in a few small areas)
* [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s controversial ''[[
* One [[Sheri S. Tepper]] novel, ''[[Six Moon Dance]]'', is about a repressive matriarchal society. Tepper has a very feminist message in a lot of her work, so this is sort of like "examining demographics that would lead to men being oppressed in the same way as women".
* Steven Barnes' ''Lion's Blood'' series is set in an alternate history where African civilization and Islam became the dominant forces in world culture. The main story is set in an alternate American south, centering on a young (black) nobleman and his (Irish) freedman.
* [[
* ''[[Gulliver's Travels
* In Katherine Kerr's ''Polar City'' books, blancs (i.e., whites) are a lightly oppressed minority.
* In a [[Fantasy Counterpart Culture]] version, ''[[Flora Segunda]]'' has the largely European-flavored (though apparently California-dwelling) Califans conquered and ruled by the pseudo-Aztec Huitzils.
* In Waberi's "In the United States of Africa", Africa is the largest superpower while the Western world as we know it is plagued by the very maladies that current Africa faces, from the perspective of an adopted white French girl.
* In [[Kirill Moshkov]]'s ''Special Expert'', Legioner Tauk is sent to a [[Lost Colony]], whose population is predominantly black, with the whites being treated as second-class citizens. Since Tauk is himself white, he has to pass himself off as a servant, while another agent, a black woman, can freely pass herself off as a member of the societal elite. She does explain to a local man that back on Earth, it is their people that used to be subservient to the whites. The man has a hard time believing it.
* William Tenn's story "Eastward Ho!" is set in a post-nuclear-war future where Native Americans are in power, and the oppressed whites keep fleeing further and further east. Eventually they plan to sail to the land of
* The hero of [[
* Many of the stories in the [[Chicks In Chainmail]] quintet, edited by [[Esther Friesner]], deal with the male-female issues by gender flipping, or other plot device, some well-done, and some belaboring the point.
* ''[[Black Like Me]]'' is an account of journalist John Howard Griffin's dyeing his skin black and living in an area he had visited as a white man and describing the differences.
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** The pilot episode has Quinn listening to a radio broadcast about Americans illegally crossing into Mexico in search of jobs. This is the same world where [[Color Coded for Your Convenience|traffic lights]] are inverted (green means stop, red means go).
** A mild case in the first episode involving the Kromaggs, when the heroes slide into a world where US was largely colonized by France, and Arturo is being made fun of for being English.
** In one episode, There is a world where Kromaggs are timid docile creatures who wouldn't hurt anyone. Humans oppress them and put them in labor camps.
* The ''[[Twilight Zone]]'' episode "The Eye Of The Beholder", in which beauty is a pig nose and cleft palate while movie-star looks are a deformity.
* In a ''[[Star Trek]]:[[The Next Generation]]'' episode, an androgynous race views any gender identity as an illness to be cured.
** In another episode, a race of humanoids is ruled by women, while men are their servants and sexual playthings.
** On still another episode, a child-alien persecutes the adults on the ship for imposing rules on children.
** In another episode, Worf travels to an alternate universe where the Bajorans are enemies of the Federation and they overpowered the Cardassians.
* The production team for ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' had a script for a story in which Dr. McCoy and Lt. Uhura crashlanded on a world with a culture similar to the Antebellum South, except the racial roles were reversed, with black aristocrats owning white slaves. [[Executive Meddling|NBC wouldn't let them make the episode.]]
* In one episode of ''[[
* Sexism and Gender Stereotypes are played with in the weird little German-UK SF series from the 1970's - Star Maidens. In which, two men escape from the planet Medusa which is ruled by women and where men are badly mistreated and head for Earth because one of the men has heard it's ruled by men. They are pursued by a couple of their female mistresses. Let's just say it wasn't subtle and leave it at that.
== Music ==
* The Vienna Teng song "No Gringo" (poor Americans illegally cross the border to Mexico looking for work).
== Theatre ==
* ''
** Actually, the play makes reference to the use of surrogate mothers, sperm donors etc..
* [[Older Than Feudalism]]: There was a Greek play, whose title escapes me at the moment, in which the roles of master and slaves are reversed, and it turns out the slaves make the situation even worse, spending more time beating their former masters than getting anything done.
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== Real Life ==
* [http://notalwaysright.com/white-in-new-jersey-what-a-concept/1785 This Not Always Right post has a customer attempting this.] It comes off as head-scratchingly ridiculous.
* This sort of thing has happened when different groups get the upper hand in a closely-divided country. Some prime examples are:
** Protestants and Catholics taking turns persecuting each other during the European Wars of Religion (including the [[Thirty Years' War]]) whenever the ruler changed (either through succession, conversion, [[Klingon Succession]], or conquest). England's history is a prime example: Henry VIII was famous for persecuting Protestants mercilessly until that whole divorce thing, at which point he started persecuting Catholics; when his Catholic daughter Mary became Queen, she persecuted Protestants; and when Mary was succeeded by Elizabeth, she started persecuting Catholics again.
** The same was more or less true when the Middle East was under Byzantine rule. Oriental and Eastern [[Orthodox Christianity|Orthodox]] Christians took the place of Protestants and Catholics, with the favor of the local governor being the variable.
** In the interminable wars between the Byzantine and Sassanid Persian Empires in the 6th and 7th centuries, [[Jerusalem]] would inevitably change hands. Since the Byzantines were Christian and distrusted the Jews, every time they took over the city, Jerusalem would be purged of its Jewish population. Whenever the
* A study done decades ago in a real class promoted and demoted blue and brown eyed pupils to show the effects and issues of racism and other -isms. The children, regardless of being told about the study, stated that they came to feel superior or inferior, and had trouble re-adjusting even years later.
* A study done with college students had some be jailers, and some jailed. The jailers were somewhat oppressive, but only somewhat. After a time, they switched. The once-jailed-now-jailers were much more oppressive.
* [[Bob Marley]] was classified as white due to having a British dad. As result, he was a target of racism in his native Jamaica.
* Folks with Albinism, absence of skin pigmentation, often is faced with this, even if they have sibling with normal pigmentation. It's sadly common for Albinos to fall prey to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_people_with_albinism violence attacks] in many African nations, to the point many governments, like in Tanzania, had to take legal action.
== Others ==
* The Disability Rights Commission, once a British-Based Disability rights organization now part of Equality and Human Rights Commission, released a two-part short films known as "[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZfOVNwjFU0 The] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9a2ZqLhuAw Talk]". it shows a man finding himself in a location where the disabled are the majority and he's looked down upon for being able-bodied.
* Amy Chua in ''World on Fire'' details the phenomenon where one ethnic group will get a lock on the economy (for whatever reason). As a result others will blame them for any troubles they have and take "revenge" (meaning a wild spout of mayhem on anyone vaguely related to them). According to the book this can alternate between slow grinding and bloody rioting. And no real life examples should be given other to say just read the book.
{{reflist}}
[[Category:In Another Mans Shoes]]▼
[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]
[[Category:Race Tropes]]
[[Category:Persecution Flip]]
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