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{{trope}}
{{quote|''Don't raise your voice here. This is a sacred place. Now, you may not believe it and I may not believe it, but my God it's a useful hypocrisy.''
|'''Linton Barwick''', on the Mediation Room of the United Nations, ''[[In the Loop]]''}}
Leaders, especially ones for ideologically motivated organizations, are expected to have the ultimate dedication to this cause. Be they a [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]], [[Knight Templar]], or even [[Dark Messiah]], this leader dedicates themselves to a cause and is willing to die for it, and at times suggests that [[Utopia Justifies the Means|the end justifies the means.]]
Then there's the '''Straw Hypocrite'''. This villain (and it usually is a villain) will [[Evil Gloating|exhibit their dastardly plot]] and expose their "good" cause as a smokescreen to some hidden agenda that the villain has. If this happens, then it may be part of revealing the [[Evil Plan]] or the hero discovering it on his own, but often it is to show just how flawed their painted-on ideology is. Any [[Gullible Lemmings]] or [[Black Shirt
Unlike a regular [[Hypocrite]], whose behavior fails to square with his or her publicly expressed (''and'' sincerely held) moral standards due to ordinary human weakness, the Straw Hypocrite does not actually believe in their cause in the slightest and merely uses it as a cover to another end.
The
Depending on one's level of cynicism, of course, this may be regarded as [[Truth in Television]].
Compare [[Straw Traitor]]. May be used as part of a [[Debate and Switch]]. An important leadership position in the [[Path of Inspiration]] or [[Scam Religion]]. Very common with [[Knight Templar]] types, to argue that the high standard they set is impossible (though ordinary [[Hypocrite
{{Noreallife|real people are not crafted for a specific purpose.}}
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==▼
▲== Anime ==
* In in the second [[Naruto]] movie, has the main antagonist Haido. At first glance he seems like a humble man whose main goal is to gather the [[Green Rocks|Gelel stones]] in order to create a utopia devoid of war. But he's really just a power hungry warlord who wants to rule the world and use the stones to wipe out anyone who gets in his way.
* In ''[[Digimon Frontier]]'',
* [[The Emperor|Charles zi Britannia]] of ''[[Code Geass]]'', on the surface, promotes [[Social Darwinism]]. {{spoiler|Later on in the series, it is revealed that all of his actions shroud his true, opposite intentions: to create a world without lies and equality via [[Assimilation Plot]]}}.
** His son Lelouch co-opts the goal of the Japanese resistance of self-liberation against Britannia as a means of revenge against [[Parental Abandonment|his]] [[Evil Overlord|father]] and create a gentler world for his sister, Nunnally. Subverted in that he finds that he really wants to liberate the world from Britannia's tyrannical and expansionist policy.
== Comic Books ==
== Comics ==▼
* Many Catholics in stories by [[Wilhelm Busch]].
* {{spoiler|Vaticus Finch, aka, Jacobus Sicuro}} in [[The Tainted Grimoire]], is this.
{{quote|'''Maria''': How befitting of a ''holy'' man such as yourself. How can we possibly lift up the name of Elianto when his {{spoiler|own Archbishop}} is so morally corrupt.
{{spoiler|'''Vaticus'''}}: No…don't tell me…you actually think I believe in all that rubbish! This position, {{spoiler|Archbishop}}; this was only a stepping stone on my way to the top. Everything I said, every charity I funded; I didn't mean any of it. I didn't care for ''any'' of it. I simply needed the people on my side. }}
== Film ==
* ''
* The leaders of Libria in ''[[Equilibrium]]'' preach that Prozium, an emotion-inhibiting drug, would save humanity from having another World War. ''They'' aren't on it, however. The head of the government is revealed to indulge in art and literature that would get regular citizens executed.
* ''[[Ultraviolet (film)|Ultraviolet]]'' had the [[Evil Overlord|Evil Surgeon General]] who hunted all vampires to near extinction with active genocide, be not just a vampire... but ''the first one!'' He manipulated public fear and hysteria to rise to power. However, he was too effective; with most of the vampires killed off, he needed something to keep people in-line. So he was working on an anti-human virus that would require constant treatment that only he could provide.
* The villains of every ''[[Die Hard]]''. It's part of the series' theme.
== Literature ==
* Lord Voldemort, of ''[[Harry Potter]]'' fame, champions the cause of pure-blooded wizards over [[Fantastic Racism|"Mudbloods" and Muggles]]. By all appearances, though, he's just a sociopath trying to stave off his own death. And he himself is only a half-
** He seems to have been genuinely hateful towards those groups, whether it made sense or not. Voldemort being a half-blood was probably a reference to the [[wikipedia:Adolf Hitler#Ancestry|similar rumours]] about Hitler being part-Jewish.
*** In the fifth book, Delores Umbridge spent much of her time lecturing everyone about how "the Unforgivable Curses are BAD". Toward the climax, however {{spoiler|she threatens to give Harry a dose of the Cruciatus curse to get information}}. When Hermione lampshades the hypocrisy of this statement her basic response is "[[Screw the Rules, I Make Them|I make the rules so I don't have to follow them]]."
* In [[Andrew Vachss]]' ''Dead and Gone'', the lead villain pretends to be a Nazi/White Supremacist in order to enlist the aid of a White Supremacist group to help him carry out his revenge on the [[Anti-Hero]] Burke, who had him sent to prison for being a pedophile. While giving his [[Just Between You and Me|Big Villain Speech]] he reveals that he has been manipulating the skinheads and that he really thinks they are all retards for believing in Nazi ideology. He is, of course [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|unaware that Burke]] is [[Engineered Public Confession|broadcasting this back to his henchmen]].
* Happens in the recent [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]] novel ''Outcast'' (no, not ''Jedi Outcast''). {{spoiler|The leader of the Baran Do [[Stealth Pun|underground movement]]}} turns out to {{spoiler|have a few hidden elevators that can be used to get back up to the surface at any time. But what if there really were a bunch of people who liked living underground? Would Luke and Ben be justified in changing that?}}
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* Played beautifully in ''[[Lucky Starr]] and the Rings of Saturn''. Sirius makes a colony on Titan, claiming it is completely within their rights, despite the fact Earth is within the same system (there is no clear precedent). Unfortunately for them, they had trouble explaining {{spoiler|by what right they removed an Earth colonist from another moon of Saturn, so an interstellar conference ordered them to get out}}.
* ''[[Philip K. Dick|Radio Free Albemuth]]'''s distant, unseen antagonist, [[Our Presidents Are Different|president Ferris F. Fremont]], uses a Joe McCarthy-esque Communist hunt to distract America from the fact that he is - in fact - a secret member of the Russian Communist party, and is selling U.S.-produced food and goods to the USSR dirt cheap.
* In Voltaire's novel ''Candide'', Dr. Pangloss, though not a villain, is a Straw Hypocrite, in that he is the last remaining person to uphold his previous philosophy that everything that happens is for the best, though his espousal of it is now merely superficial. "I am still of my opinion, for I am a philosopher and cannot retract," he says, even though his having been burnt, hanged, and partially dissected has caused him to [[Doublethink]].
* In ''[[Battlestar Galactica
▲== Live Action TV ==
▲* In ''[[Battlestar Galactica Reimagined]]'', a particular scene between Cavil and Tyrol is a [[Heaven]] for subtext when rewatching the series from the beginning.
## Brother Cavil is posing as a human priest in the human fleet (and in the Caprica resistance), but he's actually a [[Artificial Human|Cylon]] abusing his position to orchestrate destructive acts.
## He's talking to Chief Tyrol to give him counseling and talk him down from his fear that he, like his girlfriend, is a Cylon sleeper agent. Cavil assures him he hasn't seen him in any of their super secret meetings... because {{spoiler|Cavil reprogrammed Tyrol to forget his life as one of the five creators of Cavil and the bio-Cylon race.}}
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* [[House (TV series)|House]] versus [[Tyrant Takes the Helm|Vogler]] was lined with this from the start. Vogler wanted to eliminate House's department because it's by far the most expensive one in the hospital, but [[Lampshade Hanging|only treats one patient a week]]. House catches on to this game very quickly, and spends time exposing Volger for someone who may have noble desires but is still just a businessman looking for a new market to venture into.
** House's patients sometimes espouse a cause or adopt an attitude to mask a secret, eg. an AIDS sufferer who embraces a life of hedonism to mask guilt over his part in his mother's death, an environmentalist who hides his waning enthusiasm for the cause, and, in a rare example of noble straw hypocrisy, a patient's late father who allowed his son and his black wife to believe he was a racist in order to hide a horrible secret.
* On ''[[Glee]]'' Quinn is president of the celibacy club and an extreme Christian. She ends up getting pregnant by cheating on her boyfriend with his best friend.
* On ''[[Justified (TV series)|Justified]]'' Boyd is the leader of a White Supremacist group even though he really has nothing against black people. He likes to rob banks and blow things up and his position gives him access to weapons and fanatical accomplices who will not testify against him if caught. After he gets shot and his gang sent to jail, he claims to have found God and starts his own church among the low level criminals and drug addicts of the county. Both the cops and his criminal family believe that he is using this to build another criminal gang. The cops try to figure what his 'master plan' is and his family wants in on the 'action'. In the first season finale we learn that {{spoiler|he really believed what he preached and was simply applying the same methods he used as a criminal to try to do some good in the community}}
* Ethan Zobelle from ''[[Sons of Anarchy]]'' is initially presented as a white supremacist who is trying to run the Sons Of Anarchy out of town. His white supremacist right hand man thinks this is because they are selling guns to latino and black groups. However Zobel has no issue with dealing with said gangs - he is seen buying guns from the Mayans, a latino gang. In fact, Zobel is an FBI informant who is trying to kill the gun trade in the town altogether.
== Music ==
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But I can get you a pocketful of miracles, if you promise to be good, try to be nice
God will take good care of you, just do as I say, don't do as I do }}
== Radio ==
* In the [[Superman]] serial ''The Clan of the Fiery Cross'', the Grand Scorpion is shown, near the end of the serial, to be one of these. In his own words, "Don't tell me you actually believe that 'pure American' hogwash! Riggs, I thought you were smarter than that."
== Tabletop Games ==
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** Why yes, if you have suspected, they ''are'' all completely insane.
** The Directors can be like this but for them it's played straight.
== Theatre ==
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** Isabella is also an example: she is generally viewed disfavourably by the audience, as she values her chastity more than her brother's life and tells him that he deserves to die for his sin. Then once the Duke of Vienna proposes marriage to her, she does not protest in the least (although this can be interpreted different ways by different directors). There are theories that ''Measure'' is an attack specifically on the Catholic Church, which, as you probably know, emphasizes chastity in its clergy.
* In [[Moliere]]'s ''[[Tartuffe]]'', the title character is one of these. He claims to be a devout Christian, but the play is pretty clear that it's all an act. When he reveals his hypocrisy, there is a stage direction that reads: "Speaking as a villain" (Moliere added that particular stage direction so the Jesuits couldn't claim that he was specifically accusing them of hypocrisy, but even so, lots of devout Christians were outraged at the play.)
* Caesar in Shaw's ''[[Androcles
== Video Games ==
* ''[[Mass Effect]]'' has shades of this, both of which come one of the sequel's
** To be fair, it's not that Cerberus is anti-alien, just pro-human. At least, so the Yeoman Kelly says. Whether this is true in practice may vary.
*** Its a mix of both really some members are just pro-human others are anti-alien.
** Then on ''[[Mass Effect 3]]'' {{spoiler|they ally themselves with the Reapers! ...After apparently being subject to Reaper indoctrination. Last this troper checked, being mind controlled didn't qualify as a form of hypocrisy.}}
** The reason they were exposed to Reaper indoctrination in the first place was
* Team Plasma of ''[[Pokémon Black and White]]'' have this. They claim that humans are abusing Pokemon by putting them through battles. They not only have Pokemon of their own that they battle with, they also repeatedly kick a Munna in order to make it produce Dream Mist, all the while yelling about how they'll free Pokemon from the abuses of humans. In fact, the team's leader, Ghestis, {{spoiler|only wants to "liberate" Pokemon from their trainers so that he will ultimately be the only one with any Pokemon.}} The only significant member of Team Plasma who actually seems to genuinely believe in the Team's alleged purpose is N, who {{spoiler|apparently actually '''does''' free his Pokemon between battles, and typically only uses Pokemon found in the wild near each battle location.}}
** There's no confirmation that everyone in Team Plasma fits this category, however - some of those who {{spoiler|don't free their Pokemon like N}} may simply be taking a more pragmatic approach, but there's no denying a fair few definitely count.
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* In ''[[Grand Theft Auto Vice City]]'', Tommy is tasked in one mission to covertly photograph a fundamentalist politician in the act with a porn star, because said politician is trying to have pornography outlawed (or restricted, at least).
** In ''[[Grand Theft Auto IV]]''; Bryce Dawkins, the fiercely anti-gay and "family values" oriented deputy mayor of Liberty City, cheats on his wife with Niko's [[Camp Gay]] war buddy Bernie Crane.
== Western Animation ==
* [[South Park]] ''[[Anvilicious|adores this trope.]]''
** The head of the Church of
** [[Complete Monster|Cartman]] gloms on to [[Political Correctness Gone Mad]] in "The Death Camp Of Tolerance," advocates for stem-cell research in "Put That Fetus To Good Use," and becomes [[The Fundamentalist]] in "Probably." All for his own selfish purposes.
* According to [[Word of God]], an [[Aborted Arc]] in ''[[Moral Orel]]'' would have revealed that the Evangelical Christian Miss Censordoll had used voodoo to make Clay shoot Orel.
** Hell, half the cast of that show.
** [[Did Not Do the Research]]. Most Vodou adherents are also practicing Catholics, seeing the loa and the saints as one in the same, and Bondye and God the Father as the same being. There's a saying in Haiti that the nation is 90% Catholic and 100% Vodou.
*** Actually, Catholicism is only one part of Christianity, and many sects of Christianity believe that only their sect is the "right" sect, and that all other sects will go to Hell for getting it "wrong".
**** And the fact that the whole town is ''very'' anti-catholic in the first place (to a point where using the necronomicon to rise the dead is veiwed better than reading form a Catholic bible)
** Even disregarding the voo doo aspect, Censordoll was already a
* The teachers in [[Danny Phantom]], the only reason they gone with Sam's vegetarian food idea is so they can have all the meaty food for themselves.
** Though it is implied that the teachers didn't even wanted to do Vegan Week in the first place and only did so because Sam just wouldn't leave them alone about it. As Sam herself said, "''I finally wore them down."''
* From ''[[King of the Hill]]'':
** Ted Wassanasong
** In another episode, Ted, in an attempt to improve the social status of Arlen, and his own by association, has the sale and cooking of all trans-fat food banned in the city, claiming it will make the population thinner. Hank and Buck wind up illegally selling the food around town, and Hank is shocked to find Ted is an eager customer. When Hank calls him out on this, noting how the food ban was his idea in the first place, he smugly replies how he, unlike the common masses of Arlen, has the self-control needed to not overindulge and can therefore eat as much as he wants. It later comes to light that all the members of the city counsel side-step the ban they themselves put in place, and Hank is able to repeal it by blackmailing them.
* In ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' the Vespinaccians who's goal is to spread the glory of spinach. But not one of them even like spinach, and their king only did all that just so he doesn't have to eat it. ▼
** Hank himself becomes this in the ''[[King of the Hill]]'' episode "It's Not Easy Being Green". Joining Luann's environmentalist group seems very out of character for him at first, Bobby mentioning that he usually claims extremist tree-huggers were "noodle-brained communists". In truth, Hank's real reason for joining the group is because they're protesting a quarry being drained, something that Hank does ''not'' want the town to do. Seeing as years ago, he Dale, and Bill crashed Boomhower's old Mustang there and never told Boomhower; draining the quarry would expose them as liars. Naturally, his actions now only expose him as a liar ''and'' a hypocrite.
▲* In ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' the Vespinaccians who's goal is to spread the glory of spinach. But not one of them even like spinach, and their king only did all that just so he doesn't have to eat it.
* Hayley Smith of ''[[American Dad]]'' has occasional shades of this, a lot of her liberal views seem to be put on solely to outrage her republican [[Control Freak]] father, often when she is made to go fully through with her communities' views and actions, she immediately attempts to bail out.
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Hypocrite]]
[[Category:The War On Straw]]
[[Category:Villains]]
▲[[Category:Straw Hypocrite]]
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