Sink-or-Swim Mentor: Difference between revisions

{{quote|'''Dracula:''' Well, I was remembering that when I was a child my father decided to teach me how to swim by grabbing me and throwing me into the river.}}

* [[Discworld]]'s Granny Weatherwax is often the benevolent version, especially with Tiffany Aching. According to Granny "witching school" (ie the world) gives you the exam ''first'', and then you spend the rest of the time finding out whether you passed. And everything is a test.

* From [[E. E. "Doc" Smith]]'s ''[[Lensman]]'' series, the appropriately named Mentor of Arisia is an example of this trope. Though Mentor does relent and give the protagonist some training in psychic combat, he generally avoids directly aiding his students and criticizes them for asking him for help or advice when they don't really need it. And since he's effectively omniscient, he ''always'' knows whether or not they really need it.

** Mentor's psychic combat training is a perfect example of this trope. He "trains" Kinnison how to defend himself psychically by ''continuously psychically attacking him''. The justification is that every mind is unique, so each person must develop his own method of defense. And the best way to develop callouses is to hit the tender part over and over. Though he does scale his attacks to Kinnison's ability to survive them.

 

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[[Category:Mentors]]

[[Category:Abuse Tropes]]