Pitying Perversion: Difference between revisions

{{quote| ''All sympathy given to victims is treacherous. The love is directed exclusively to a victim whom one consider oneself superior to. [...] It's a human psychological mechanism to be excited at the chance to help someone who is weaker, a victim. But this only works for as long as this hierarchy is firmly in place.''|'''Natascha Kampusch''', in the epilogue of ''3096 Days''}}

Note that the thing Alice pities Bob for doesn't have to be something Bob cares about or even notices. Being left-handed or whatever didn't make Bob feel different until Alice started yapping about it. One of them is likely to come across as [[Blue and Orange Morality]] here, but which one really depends on the situation. Of course, the whole drama may very well [[Never Live It Down|be about a single incident rather than something that is a regular part of Bob's life]]. This is also a tactic that is commonly employed by [[Fan Hater|Fan Haters]]s and [[Complaining About People Not Liking the Show]], a la "It's a shame you suffer from this affliction that's causing you to like/dislike X." Very much [[Truth in Television]].

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* Common in the works of the German cartoonist Ralf König. A good example is a show-within-a-show-within-the-comic. The protagonist is a film critic who runs on Pitying Perversion Type A and shows the audience a movie that runs on Pitying Perversion Type B. The comic start with the film critic ranting about how movies these days are naive and shallow when it comes to homosexuality, making horrible mistakes such as portraying gays as capable of happiness and meaningful lives. Then he shows his own favorite movie. It's about gays getting beaten to death and falling in love with each other as they lie dying in the hospital. After the movie, he feels so sorry for the poor poor little homos that he pretty much has a nervous breakdown.

* In ''[[Preacher (Comic Book)|Preacher]]'', a temporary main character is a tough cop who is secretly a gay masochist - [[Straw Loser|and thus a pathetic person who is unworthy of his badge]]. The whole reveal scene seem to be constructed to underscore how cool and noble his partner is: Cool for his contempt for the outed [[Armored Closet Gay]], noble for doing it in a aloof manner.

* [http://wwwluunna.detrasdelespejoblogspot.escom/wp-content2005/uploads11/2008/12/son-como-nosotros-quinoglobalizacion.jpghtml This comic Strip] from Joaquin Lavado ([[Quino]]) is titled "They are just like us." Here comes a translation:

{{quote| This “globalization” issue let us to realize that the people of other races and cultures fall in love, just like us.<br />

And, like us, make love, and children are born of that love. Children that they love and care about, [[Department of Redundancy Department|just like us]].<br />

And they need music to express themselves, dance and have fun, [[Rule of Three|just like us]].<br />

And they weep his sorrows in tears as ours own tears, and laugh out loud their joys with laughter, [[Running Gag|just like us]].<br />

They even rent the same movies that we see and eat the same fast food with the same soda that we drink here.<br />

What shows us all of this? [[An Aesop|That THEY, only apparently so different, ARE JUST LIKE US!]]<br />

[[Beat]]<br />

It sounds so easy to say: [[Pitying Perversion|"They are just like us!"]] How long time will it take for us to even begin to say [[Not So Different|"We are just like them"]]? }}

* ''[[The Breakfast Club]]'' This is Claire's attitude towards the unpopular kids in school, particularly Bender. Her popularity and friends force her to be mean to those "beneath her," and much of her conflict stems from hating the fact that this is so.

{{quote| {{spoiler|Son: I know, you were disappointed because I couldn't be you.}}<br />

* ''[[Secretary]]'' is one of the very very few romantic comedies with a masochist as the protagonist. It is also the perhaps ''only'' romantic comedy that starts with the protagonist getting signed out from a mental hospital and has a lot of [[Broken Bird|heavy mental problems]] that are not [[Played for Laughs]] at all. Also, when she tries to date around to find a new partner to satisfy her masochism, all guys she encounter are worse than pathetic.

* In [[Mammoth]], believing prostitution to be horrible, Leo keep feeling sorry for Cookie. He does this in a way that's actually shaming her and would damage her emotionally if she [[Internalized Categorism|internalized it]].

* In ''3096 Days'' and ''I Choose Life'', the autobiographies of Natascha Kampusch and Sabine Dardenne, they both spend the last part of their books discussing this trope. Both women were kidnapped as kids, and after they got free they experienced that people tried to reduce them to a victimhood-role that was basically there for these people to feel better about themselves at the victim's expense.

* In the ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'' episode ''Cardassians'', the main characters do a creepy case of [[Pitying Perversion]] by [[Straw Affiliation|deciding Rugal's identity for him against his will]], and then insisting that he's suffering from [[Internalized Categorism]] because the identity they have chosen for him {{spoiler|and eventually condemned him to, by giving him away to the stranger Ben decided deserved him the most - by virtue of being his biological father and the victim of a political conspiracy}} is one he hates.

* Nanne Grönvall's song "Fördomar" (Prejudice) plays this for laughs. The whole song is about the protagonist bragging about how she's a perfect [[Mary Sue]] who [[No Except Yes|do not have]] any prejudice whatsoever. The first verse is simply about how great and open-minded she is in general. The second verse is the Alice of this trope, expecting gratitude from gays for not despising them. The rest of the song goes downhill from there with blatant racism (against blacks AND whites), sexism (against men AND women), ageism (against young people AND old people) and so on.

* This was actually the start of liberalization towards homosexuality in the western world: Instead of criminals, they were now considered only sick. Not that anyone would consider this progressive nowadays, since [[Society Marches On]]. Still, without this first step, homosexuality might still be considered a crime.

{{quote| Again, [[Mis BlamedMisblamed|we can blame]] [[Hollywood Style|the studios all we want]]. [[Lowest Common Denominator|But they've learned from hard experience that for the most part]], [[Pitying Perversion|if they don't play to our prejudices,]] [[Unfortunate Implications|we simply won't go see their movie.]]}}

[[Category:PityingAlliterative PerversionTrope Titles]]