Silly Reason for War: Difference between revisions

'''Lister:''' You're not kidding. They were supposed to be [[Shoot the Shaggy Dog|green]].|''[[Red Dwarf]]''}}

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

* In ''[[Slayers]]|Slayers Gorgeous]]'', heroes...er, ''[[Anti-Hero|protagonists]]'' Lina Inverse and Naga the Serpent find themselves caught in a civil war between a local lord and his daughter, who's raised an army and marched on the palace. Her reason for rebellion? She wants a bigger allowance.

== Fanfiction[[Film]] ==

== [[Literature]] ==

** In [[Real Life]]," ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20130917180007/http://www.csd.uwo.ca/~magi/personal/humour/Shaggy_Dog/On%20Holy%20Wars%20and%20a%20Plea%20for%20Peace.html On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace]''" is a famous essay by Danny Cohen on whether data should be transmitted from the most-significant bit to the least-significant bit or vice versa. It draws heavily on ''Gulliver's Travels'' down to the names for the sides: Big-Endian (most significant first) and Little-Endian (least significant first). To this day, those are the "official" names of those groups.

* Inspired by the Swift, ''[[Dr. Seuss|]]'s ''[[The Butter Battle Book]]'' had two peoples fighting over which side of the toast should be buttered. It [[Lensman Arms Race|escalated to]] ridiculous extremes, becoming an obvious parody of the then-current Cold War, and [[No Ending|ends with an ambiguous]] [[Mexican Standoff]]. Seuss himself [[Take a Third Option|liked to butter the crust]].

** A similar but less violent Seuss story is ''[[The Sneetches]]'', in which the presence of a star on their bellies is used as a sign of racial superiority by the titular Sneetches until Sylvester McMonkey McBean shows up with a contraption that applies (or removes) stars, all for a modest payment. In the end, he has all their money, and the hopelessly confused Sneetches get the [[Aesop]].

* Hari Seldon from Isaac Asimov's ''[[Foundation]]'' prequels once mentions a youth subculture conflict on his home planet between people who shave the left side of their head and those who shave the right side of their hair.

* In a ''[[Spellsinger]]'' novel, two tribes of prairie dogs went to war periodically over possession of an ugly statue, which gave the victors exclusive rights to use the nearby hot springs' water. The springs produced enough hot water to meet the needs of both tribes, but their egos were too caught up in the competition to care.

* The ''[[Star Trek]]'' [[Expanded Universe]] novel ''I, Q'' told of a war between the Q and another race of similarly omnipotent beings, the M. These two [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien|impossibly advanced species]] both admitted the real reason for their catyclysmiccataclysmic conflict was "there's just something about you that just really pisses me off." The war itself is kicked off when one of them blurts out, "[[Minor Insult Meltdown|Your mother!]]"; nobody now knows who said it or who it was directed at. Both sides also show near [[Breaking the Fourth Wall|fourth-wall breaking]] [[Genre Savvy|Genre Savviness]]: they're both aware enough to realize that in their reality every race ''always'' manages to get balanced out by some other race which exists to be an opposing force and source of plot. If they made up with their obvious opposite numbers, it would inevitably lead to a serious threat to both of them showing up.

* In ''[[Use of Weapons]]'', part of the ''[[Culture Series]]'' of sci-fi novels by [[Iain Banks]], one of the many, many, many military conflicts the protoganist took part in was an unending and brutal war on an ice planet. Ostensibly, the war was for control of the constantly shifting iceberg masses that made up the only land surface on the planet. But since these icebergs are inevitably destroyed/melt as they move towards the equator, no victory ever means anything for more than a few months, but the war continues on and on, as both sides had grown to hate the other too much to admit the whole thing was pointless...

* In ''[[Discworld/Jingo|Jingo]]'', two smaller nations nominally claimed by the Klatchian empire had only recently eased off on a centuries-old war, having run out of rocks to throw. The reason for the conflict is a one-word difference in their holy book, which one country translates as "man" and the other translates as "god". This trope is applicable because the difference between the two words, in Klatchian script, comes down to how a single dot is positioned over one letter ... and it ''especially'' applies if, as heretical theologians suggest, the dot is actually a bit of fly poo. Apparently if the dot was moved slightly more it would mean "licorice".

* In ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'', higher-dimensional beings like playing Brockian Ultra-Cricket, a game so complicated that a complete compilation of its rules became a ''black hole''. The more popular it gets, the less it is being played beacusebecause almost all the teams (and substantial parts of the population) are now in a state of permanent warfare with each other over the interpretation of these rules. This is, however, all for the best, because in the long run a good solid war is less psychologically damaging than a protracted game of Brockian Ultra-Cricket.

** Also, the Vl'hurgs and the G'Gugvuntt fought a long war because the Vl'hurg leader was supposedly insulted by the G'Gugvuntt leader. After noticing that it was actually Arthur Dent (and a hole in the space-time continuum), they teamed up and flew 'for ''thousands of years''' towards the Milky Way to punish him, only to be swallowed by a little dog when they arrived.

** ''[[The Histories|Herodotus]]'' by Herodotus cites this absurdity as evidence for a slightly different theory about the [[Trojan War]]. Egyptian priests told Herodotus that Helen never made it to Troy, because she and Paris were shipwrecked in Egypt along the way, and the Egyptians decided to hold onto Helen for her husband until he came to get her. The Greeks think the Trojans are just lying when they say that Helen is not in Troy, hence the ten -year war. Herodotus argues that this makes more sense than Homer's version, because the King of Troy "assuredly was not so mad, nor yet the others of his house, that they were desirous to run risk of ruin for themselves and their children and their city, in order that [Paris] might have Helen as his wife".

* Also in ''[[Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay]]'', [[French Jerk|Bretonnian]] [[Aristocrats Are Evil|nobles]] are noted to be notoriously thin-skinned and will war with each other for the silliest of reasons (such as ana flippant insult) if not restrained by their liege lords. This is especially true in regions of Brettonia where there are no orcs or beastmen to fight. In fact, one particular pair of [[Feuding Families]] are still going at it over an alleged ravishing that happened several hundred years ago (if it happened at all) and which both sides claim to be the victimized party in. The feud is so formalized the time and place of any battles are agreed upon in advance, fought according to a timetable, and are apparently a great spectator sport for neighbouring nobility and peasants.

* Any given Beholder in ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'' is engaged in a never-ending race war against any Beholders not of its breed, killing them on sight. In ''Volo's Guide to Monsters'', Volo even claims the best way to fight a beholder is to trick another beholder into fighting it. While there are some varieties that are vastly different in terms of appearance and philosophy, they will fight over any difference at all, even ones that anyone other than a beholder would never notice. Of course, there is the true Beholder, whose form would clearly be the correct form for a beholder to have. Unfortunately, whenever any beholder sees it the thing looks exactly like them.

* ''[[Team Fortress 2]]''.: At first the battle between RED and BLU was an [[Excuse Plot]], and recent revelations have just made things worse: it's a feud between two bickering brothers who were each left half of their father's land in his will. So what's the sensible thing to do? Hire mercenaries to fight each other in hopes of killing the other brother and gaining all the land for themselves.

* ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]''.: The Cola Wars were fought between the followers of [[Bland-Name Product|Dyspepsi-Cola and Cloaca-Cola]]. The war between the Hippies and Frat Boys gets started over the (apparent) murder of an animal mascot.

* ''[[Battlefield Heroes]]''.: The nationals apparently cheated during an Olympic cycling event and then mocked the king's mustache. The royals proceed to launch a full-scale invasion.

* ''[[Mystic Ark]]''.: We never find out [[Noodle Incident|exactly what started]] the longstanding feud between the crews of the Bloodhook and the Gunboss, but when the captains of the two ships are asked just what they were fighting for, neither one can offer any answer other than embarrassed silence.

* ''[[Pokémon Black and White]]''.: The two brothers destroyed Unova in a battle over what was arguably a petty squabble.

* In ''[[What's New with Phil and Dixie]]'', two powerful forces [https://web.archive.org/web/20150428205505/http://www.airshipentertainment.com/growfcomic.php?date=20091115 went to war] over {{spoiler|stripes vs spots}}.

** ''[[TheIn Simpsonsone (animation)|The Simpsons]]''episode did it, not for war but for religion. Flanders explains that the bad blood between their religion (The Western Branch of American Reform Presbylutheranism) and Catholicism goes back to when the former split off from the Catholic Church over the right to attend services with wet hair... which they've since abolished.

* In 2002's ''[[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe]]'', Adam reminds himself that he has to learn diplomacy etiquette because one wrong use of a spoon or fork during dinner with ruler of other country can cause a war.

== [[Real Life]] ==

* In 1325, Italy was still divided into city-states. A regiment of solders from the city-state of Modena invaded Bologna to steal a brown, oak bucket. During the raid, several ''hundred'' Bolognese citizens were killed by the Modenese troops. The ensuing war lasted 12 years. Modena won, and still has the bucket. It's still on display in Modena's cathedral tower, the "Ghirlandina". Here's [http://tiny.cc/ljnlt a photo.]{{Dead link}}

* In 1976, [[Operation: Blank|Operation]] [[Meaningful Name|Paul Bunyan]] was started because two US Army officers were killed. The reason? They were chopping down a tree in the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). Granted, South Korea and North Korea had quite a lot of tension between them, this was supposedly a scheduled trimming.

* The war of Jenkins' earEar: Britain was looking for a reason to go to war with Spain, and someone pointed out the ''eight years earlier'' Spanish coast guards had boarded a English ship, captained by the aforementioned Jenkins, and cut off his ear. Parliament was outraged, war begun, and it destabilised the Hapsburgs to the point that it was the major cause of the far bloody war of the Austrian succession, with in turn kicked of the Seven years’Years’ warWar: Three wars and two million dead over an ear.

* The First Anglo-Dutch War began because the Dutch fleet refused to doff their flag when passing the English Channel in the presence of the English fleet. In reality, as most such things are, it was a matter of [[Honor Before Reason|Honorhonor]] and a country that doesn't take care of it'sits honor is neglecting it'sits [[ProveProof I Am Not Bluffing|first line of defense]] so there is some justification even if it is quite commonly taken to [[Fridge Logic|weird lengths]] as in this case. Another and overlapping reason was rivalry for trade and control of the seas at a time when maritime voyages were bringing high profit, and bringing prosperity to the upper classes of both nations as well as employment to the citizens of the various ports. Furthermore in those times it was considered legitimate to try to control the ocean as if it was cultivated land, and as well, and everyone was frank and enthusiastic about using business as a weapon of power politics or vice-versa at the time (that is still done of course, but it is sometimes felt awkward now). All those factors surrounded the Anglo-Dutch wars. But the spark that set off the fire that was a-building was the Dutch refusing to doff their flag.

* The War of Parsley Point (as columnist Charles Krauthammer named it) is a subversion because the behavior of the governments involved suggests they knew the whole thing was silly in the first place. Morocco set a small detachment to occupy Perejil (Parsley in Spanish) and then waited until it was ejected by the Spaniards. There was no blood shed and only a small amount of military effort. Making it obvious that someone said roughly, "As we pay all those expensive soldiers anyway and as there is no Hollywood Mogul needing spear carriers this year, we might as well use a few in our childish prestige games. We'll arrange it so no one gets hurt of course; what do you think we are, barbarians?"