Talk:Stupid Evil

So, while working on the page, I came across this example, which I had cleaned up and edited into its present form (consult the history on how exactly I changed it):

• A big problem in Johnny Mnemonic. The thought of an evil Mega Corp profiting from distributing a cure for a deadly virus affecting half the world's population lacks the real oomph villains need, so they try to suppress it instead. Said cure is cheap and requires only one dose, but the palliative treatment used to help disease-sufferers before the cure was invented is expensive and requires repeated doses, the corporations could potentially make a greater profit by not distributing the cure. Even so, they still want to go to the very specific trouble of cutting off and cryogenically preserving Johnny's head (the only remaining source of the data for the cure), even though they could just shoot him or completely destroy his head, and the cure would be permanently suppressed.
  • The bad guys are not immune to infection -- should any of them personally end up hit by the virus, they would need the cure.

By this logic, though, preserving Johnny's head to keep the cure from being accessible to anyone but the corp itself seems like a more sound approach - not the MOST practical, but enough to indicate they've at least partly thought this through.

Would this be a grounds for example removal or a note of aversion? Personally, I lean towards the former.

I wouldn't say I'm an expert on this, but isn't a retort usually just be doing a "deeper" bullet point instead of editing it out/etc?

Removal of a persons perspective seems a bit wrong, move it to YMMV idk.

I'd like another admin's (who does the troping side more than my technical arse) perspective on this.

Mm, fair, I could easily revert it back, I'm just used to cutting mid-page chatter and Justifying Edits out by pure habit - though just as often I make it a point to try and integrate points into the article in a way that reads smoother. I'll revert that bullet to its previous point for the time being while this is discussed.

There, restored to previous version while we hash this out.

@GethN7@SelfCloak@Looney Toons@Robkelk

I'd try to integrate the retort into the original like "Then again, the bad guys aren't immune, so they could still stand to have access to the actual cure."

My thoughts...

Re-writing examples needs to be done carefully so that we don't give away spoilers - very few reveals count as It Was His Sled. Thus, we need to be careful how much we say about what's in Johnny's head and who it benefits to keep around.

Cutting mid-page chatter and Justifying Edits is a good thing, IMHO. Deleting examples altogether isn't.

And we need to be careful how many bullet-levels deep we go. Two levels usually isn't Natter in the main page, five levels usually is, three levels... can be.

If I had spotted this first, I would have left in the bit about the economic fallacy of everybody being able to afford the palliative care, but otherwise would have gone with a re-write similar to what Umbire the Phantom did write.

Duly noted. I'll wait for some more input before I pursue rewriting that example again.

no worries, we appreciate your contributions :)

I think I've come in too late to really contribute to this issue; glad to see that it appears to be resolved.