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{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|''"This is my side, that's your side! This is my side, you stay on your side! My side, your side, my side, your side, ''my'' side... ''your'' side!"''
|'''Stark''', ''[[Farscape]]''}}
If two characters that don't like each other, or who happen to be angry with each other at the moment, live in one house or apartment, one of them will be eventually seen painting a white line in the middle of the residence, explaining: "This is my side; this is yours. Don't go on my part!" Naturally, it's [[Serious Business]].
Related to [[This Is My Chair]], which is usually a throwaway gag. See also [[Property Line]], which is the same plot on a larger scale.
[[Truth in Television]], as those who have ever had an argument with a sibling or roommate can attest to.
{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==▼
* ''[[
▲== Anime and Manga ==
▲* ''[[Mai-HiME]]'', less because of any dislike between the characters than because Akira has a secret to keep from Takumi. Thus, Akira uses a curtain to separate the room, rather than a line.
* Suiseiseki in ''[[Rozen Maiden]]'', who initially dislikes Jun, draws an obviously biased one in his room.
* ''[[
** It's also a [[Shout
* In the
* In ''[[
* ''[[
* Happened once in "[[Pokémon]]" where [[Fiery Redhead|Jessie and Misty]] fell onto a small rock ledge on a cliff together. Misty draws a line on the rock to give each of them a side while they wait for rescue. Her side is much larger than Jessie's.
== [[Comic Books]] ==▼
== Comedy ==▼
* On [[Bill Cosby]]'s record ''To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With'', the title track is a twenty-minute long narrative describing what happened when a young Cosby decided to pull this trope on his baby brother with the bed they shared.▼
▲== Comic Books ==
* A [[What If]] based off of ''[[Planet Hulk]]'' had a one-man version; Hulk lands on the planet the Illuminati meant to send him to, and he and Bruce Banner get into a back-and-forth war of screwing each other over. Eventually Hulk wakes up and sees that Bruce pulled this trope.
* Asuka uses her infamous "Wall of Jericho" line on two separate occasions in ''[[Shinji and
▲== Fan Fiction ==
{{quote|'''Asuka''' (to
▲* Asuka uses her infamous "Wall of Jericho" line on two separate occasions in ''[[Shinji and Warhammer 40 K (Fanfic)|Shinji and Warhammer 40 K]]''... once to Shinji, and once to Rei.
▲'''Asuka''' (to Rei): "This is the unbreakable wall of Jericho! You -will not- cross it!"<br />
'''
'''Rei:''' "That too, is broken."
'''Asuka:''' "...this here is my Absolute Territory ''(as in [[Deflector Shield|AT-field]])''! You -will not- cross it!"
▲'''Rei:''' "That too, is broken."<br />
▲'''Asuka:''' "...this here is my Absolute Territory ''(as in [[Deflector Shield|AT-field]])''! You -will not- cross it!"<br />
'''Rei:''' ''(nods)'' }}
* ''[[The War of the Roses]]''.
* On ''[[Madagascar]]'', Alex draws a line on the beach to divide the island between Marty, who likes being out in the wild, and the others, who want to go back to New York. Marty calls his side the "fun side", to which Alex responds, "You're in the [[Place Worse Than Death|Jersey]] side of this cesspool!"
* ''[[The Odd Couple]]'':
{{quote|
* Donkey did this with ''[[Shrek]]'''s Swamp.
* A rare serious example occurs in [[Rupert Grint]]'s ''[[
== [[Literature]] ==
* ''[[Discworld]]''
** In the novel ''[[
** The novel ''[[
* The [[Gordon Korman]] young adult novel ''The Toilet Paper Tigers''. The bratty older brother has laid tape down the middle of the room, and penalizes any (real or imagined) affront with moving the tape to shrink the younger brother's side.
* In ''The War with Mr. Wizzle'' by the same author: After [[Bruno and Boots]] have a fight, Bruno divvies up the room and refuses to talk to Boots. (He does permit him to use the bathroom, though.)
Line 62 ⟶ 51:
* The page image comes from the children's book ''[[The Berenstain Bears]] Get in a Fight''. Because they both woke up in a foul mood and are having a bitter argument, Brother and Sister divide their treehouse in half.
* There's a children's ''[[Star Trek]]'' book where Worf and his roommate at the Academy do this.
* In ''[[My
== Internet Puppet Shows ==▼
* During her time on [[The Funday Pawpet Show]], Liesl would often use this phrase to try to get Poink to stay on the other side of the stage. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGHOUCj5HxI In this clip from the 2008 Christmas in July episode] Yappy puts up the tried and true white line down the center of the stage.▼
=== Magazines ===▼
* A ''Nickelodeon Magazine'' issue had listed several annoying songs to sing in the car. One of them was to the tune of ''Oh My Darling, Clementine'', and was all about this trope.▼
that is yours and this is mine.'' }}▼
== [[Live
* The [[Trope Maker]] may well be the ''[[I Love Lucy]]'' episode "Men Are Messy", in which
** Another episode found the Mertzs and Ricardos running a diner together. When an argument erupted between which couple would greet guests and which couple would work in the kitchen, a line divided the diner in half, and across the middle counter stool.
*** It got even more interesting when their sole customer decided to sit on the seat in the middle, and both couples outdo themselves trying to serve him.
* Variant: in ''[[WKRP in Cincinnati]]'', Les Nessman, believing that he deserved an office of his own, used masking tape to mark off an area on the floor of the newsroom around his desk which he claimed to be his "office", and demanded that people "knock on the door" and request entry before crossing the taped line to approach his desk.
* ''[[The Brady Bunch]]:'' In at ''least'' one episode, a line was painted or taped, and possibly in several episodes.
* In ''[[Married...
* In ''[[Happy Days]],'' Ralph and Potsie acted on the bad advice secretly written by Richie in an advice column about dividing their apartment. This creates a war of sides where each has the entirety of a necessary part of the apartment (Ralph=kitchen, Potsie=bathroom). Eventually, the resulting fight gets so bad that when Richie tries to resolve the situation, he has to make them all stand on the line itself as neutral territory like tightrope walkers, only to have Fonz come and note to the bizarre sight, "And you're doing without a net."
* In ''[[
* ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'': House and Cuddy do this when Cuddy is forced to temporarily share House's office. This includes dividing the desk into two sides.
* In the ''Milky Jo'' episode of ''[[The Mighty Boosh]]'' Howard and Vince end up washed up on a desert island and divide it up this way.
* An episode of ''[[The Munsters]]'' had Grampa and Herman split the house down the middle after an argument about who actually owned the place heats up. This includes a painted white line (with some effort being put toward an actual stone wall), and the vindictive act of cutting in half any item halfway across both lines. The whole thing is put to rest when Lilly uses some awkward food placement at the dinner table to get them to rethink the logistics of the layout.
* Done in an episode of ''Sesame Tree'', the Northern Irish version of ''[[Sesame Street]]''. The two characters realise that dividing the room is silly, and they should learn how to share it. [[The Troubles|Clearly no analogy intended there.]]
* In one episode of ''[[Drop the Dead Donkey]]'', Henry and Sally have to share a desk and get into an argument about each keeping to their own side. As the episode goes on the argument takes an increasingly militaristic tone with disputes about how one of them has made excursions into the agreed-upon neutral zone in the middle of the desk. In the end, Helen removes their desk entirely and puts two kiddie tables in its place.
* ''[[The X
* In the ''[[Steptoe and Son]]'' episode "Divided we Stand", Harold and Albert divide the house in two. Even the TV gets divided between them.
* A four-way version happened on ''[[The Monkees]]'' when the four boys were fighting over a girl. The show played with it, noting that each would have access to only one particular vital part of the apartment. Davy's side had the front door, implying he was the only one with the ability to come and go; however, he "would gladly trade Mike for the bathroom right away". Moments later, the whole arrangement is quickly forgotten when a show comes on TV that they want to see and everyone rushes to Peter's side (which contains the television set).
* The ''[[
* Happened in one episode of ''[[
* ''[[My Talk Show]]'': Guest William Shatner takes over one section of the house/set and declares it Canadian territory.
* ''[[The Benny Hill Show]]'': In a sketch, Russian and American sides of an unnamed European Country are decided after years of
* ''[[Drake and Josh]]'' have done this at least once.
* In an episode of ''[[
* Alexia does this in the ''[[Pixelface]]'' episode "High Spirits" when the others get angry at her for taking their stuff with permission. She divides the console in half, with her on one side and everyone else on the other.
== [[Newspaper Comics]] ==▼
▲== Magazines ==
▲* A ''Nickelodeon Magazine'' issue had listed several annoying songs to sing in the car. One of them was to the tune of ''Oh My Darling, Clementine'', and was all about this trope.
▲{{quote| ''In the back seat, down the middle,<br />
▲is a line no one can see.<br />
▲It divides this side from that side<br />
▲and this side belongs to me.<br />
▲Don't you cross it, don't you cross it,<br />
▲the imaginary line.<br />
▲Say on your side, stay off my side,<br />
▲that is yours and this is mine.'' }}
▲== Newspaper Comics ==
* Parodied in one ''[[Bloom County]]'' comic strip, when some of the characters start arbitrarily painting lines across the local meadow, cutting off one person each time: "This is ''our'' 'state'! Stay out of our 'county'/'town'/'house'!" Then only two of them are left and they're standing on a hilltop - with no room left for further lines. "You're violating my personal space." Cue the shoving match.
* One ''[[Calvin and Hobbes]]'' arc has Calvin deciding to become a tiger, then finding out that tigers are territorial. He uses a boulder to define the boundary between his and Hobbes' territory, then brags about how much better his side is. Hobbes then rolls the boulder over toward Calvin and declares that "your side is smaller."
Line 113 ⟶ 96:
* Parodied in a ''[[Garfield]]'' strip where he instead just paints a circle around Jon's feet. "If you need me, I'll be in my kitchen."
▲* During her time on [[The Funday Pawpet Show]], Liesl would often use this phrase to try to get Poink to stay on the other side of the stage. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGHOUCj5HxI In this clip from the 2008 Christmas in July episode] Yappy puts up the tried and true white line down the center of the stage.
== [[Recorded and Stand Up Comedy]] ==
== Theatre ==▼
▲* On [[Bill Cosby]]'s record ''To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With'', the title track is a twenty-minute long narrative describing what happened when a young Cosby decided to pull this trope on his baby brother with the bed they shared.
* There is a song about this in ''[[Kiss of the Spider Woman]]''.▼
▲== [[Theatre]] ==
▲* There is a song about this in ''[[Kiss of the Spider Woman]]''.
== [[Video Games]] ==
* Was supposed to be referenced in ''[[Portal (
* ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'': Early on, when Vanille and Sazh stop for the night, she grabs a stick and draws a circle around her blanket, and orders him not to cross the line, to much eye-rolling on his part. It then cuts to her distinctly on the wrong side of the line, huddled against his back and sniffling.
==
* Also happened in an early ''[[Penny Arcade]]'' [http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/1999/12/15/ strip]:
{{quote|
'''Gabe:''' So is God. }}
* Occurred once in ''[[Irregular Webcomic]]'' ... in an infinite featureless void.
* [[Skin Horse|Nick Zerhakker's]] [[Character Blog]]: Unity, dimly recognising that she and the sentient helicopter are not getting along, [http://zerhakker.livejournal.com/17859.html spray-paints a line across the centre of the chopper cabin] and says they can both stay on their own sides. She refuses to see a flaw in this.
== [[Web Original]] ==
* Episode 11 of ''[[
{{quote|
* Used in Djy's video adaption of ''[[Half Life: Full Life Consequences
==
▲* Episode 11 of ''[[Freemans Mind]]'' references this. After he hops over a laser tripwire, a Vortigaunt spawns on the other side of it. After killing it, he shouts:
▲{{quote| ''Gordon''': "Stay on your side of the line! My roommate in college used to do the same thing. Your side is the one where everyone is dead and there are no exits. My side is the one filled with hope, love and submachine guns."}}
▲* Used in Djy's video adaption of ''[[Half Life Full Life Consequences (Fanfic)|Half Life Full Life Consequences]]''. [[Portal (Video Game)|GLaDOS]] uses this on John Freeman, but he gets bored after 3 seconds and shoots her with a RPG.
* ''[[Clerks the Animated Series]]'' has a pseudo-[[Flash Back]] to just such a situation during its second-episode [[Clip Show]], parodying it when the ''third'' roommate indignantly reminds Dante and Randal that he lives there, too.
* ''[[The Simpsons]]''
** Subverted when Homer begins to draw a line across the house "Ã la ''I Love Lucy''" after a fight with Marge, but instead draws himself into a tiny corner of the bedroom. A straight use of the trope is also mentioned in passing by Principal Skinner, when he says that his mother put cardboard over her half of the TV screen.
** In another episode Lisa and Bart are fighting over being able to sit on a certain part of the carpet.
{{quote|
'''Lisa:''' I don't see your name on it.
'''Bart:''' It's right there! (The camera pans down to Bart's name sprawled on the carpet).
'''Marge:''' Bart, don't write on the carpet! }}
* In one story on ''[[The Smurfs]]'', the village is divided over linguistic issues (they can't agree on the use of "smurf") and one enterprising Smurf paints a line along the middle. Unfortunately, it runs right through one poor Smurf's home, creating confusion as to which side he belongs to. The whole story must've been an allegory on the French / Dutch language struggle in Belgium (where the Smurfs' creator is from).
* Parodied in ''[[Clone High]]'': Joan and Cleo are forced to share a room, so Joan paints a line dividing it in
* In ''Arthur'', a babysitter did this to try to stop Arthur and D.W. from fighting. It didn't work, as the two soon begin fighting over a jacket draped over the tape line.
* ''[[Darkwing Duck (
* The first episode of ''[[
* In an episode of ''[[The Emperor's New School
* ''[[South Park]]''
** In one episode, the townsfolk enter a huge argument with themselves over the Iraq war. They eventually decide to split the town into what Skeeter calls the "Pro-War side" and the "Unpatriotic side" (to which Randy responds they should call the Anti-War side the "Rational side" and the Pro-War side the "Redneck side"). Very quickly they realise the flaw in their plan as the town only has one school, post office, grocery store, etc. Eventually, they make a realisation that they're behaving foolishly:
{{quote|
'''Randy:''' He's right. Boy, do I feel like a fool.
(both sides instantly revert to their usual behaviour and begin a mass brawl) }}
** An earlier episode uses a more sinister variation of the trope. Two visitors from out of town come across South Park, but find it devoid of adults {{spoiler|because the kids had the vast majority falsely arrested for "molestering" them and the remaining adults moved away for fear of being arrested}}. Run by kids, the town has fractured into two units; the area now known as Treasure Cove is apparently led by Stan and occupies the poor side of town, whereas Cartman has seized control of the wealthy side of town and renamed it Smiley Town. Aside from the fact Cartman as dictator is scary enough (add to that the fact only one phone has survived in the entirety of South Park, effectively cutting off communication with the outside world), both sides have an agreement where they essentially play [[Capture the Flag]] with a book from the opposing side- whichever side doesn't have a book by [[Race Against the Clock|8:00pm]] must sacrifice one of its number to "The Provider" (in reality, the town's statue of John Elway with a faulty electrical cord nearby rendering it a [[Death Trap]]). It's only through the outsiders' interference that the kids are prevented from killing everyone in town and the adults are allowed to return.
* In ''Tigger and Pooh and a Musical Too'', a movie from ''[[Winnie the Pooh|My Friends Tigger & Pooh]]'', Tigger and Rabbit did this with ''the entire Hundred Acre Wood'', drawing up a big white line across the entire Wood and declaring themselves mayors of their respective sides.
* Happened in an episode of ''[[
* ''[[The Penguins of Madagascar]]'', "All King, No Kingdom": King Julien divides the lemur habitat in half, one side for Maurice and Mort, the other for himself. Naturally, Julien's "half" occupies most of the habitat. Maurice and Mort then throw a party and invite all the animals in the zoo, except for Julien, who starts going crazy with loneliness.
* On ''[[Jimmy Two-Shoes]]'', when Lucius and Jimmy are trapped on a [[Far Side Island]], Lucius does this, trapping Jimmy on a very small "half". Being [[The Pollyanna|Jimmy]], he's flattered that Lucius gives him half.
* In ''[[Angelina Ballerina]]: The Next Steps'', Angelina and Marco did this with a poster after they were assigned to work together. Marco didn't want frills and a tutu on his poster, while Angelina couldn't abide by the idea of having soccer balls in the poster. It didn't work work out, and they went through a couple of other hangups, before finally hitting on a working idea.
* On ''[[
* On ''[[
* In ''[[The Smurfs]]'' episode "Romeo and Smurfette," Papa Smurf has Brainy divide the village like this when Gargamel starts a dangerous Smurfette/Handy vs. Smurfette/Hefty [[Ship
* In the animated ''[[Back to The Future]]'', the kids' room is divided by a red line with "KEEP OUT!" written on each side. Note that unlike most other examples, this is the default state, rather than a one-time thing.
* Seen during the pageant in the ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
* Happened in a ''[[Time Squad]]'' episode when Tuddrussel and Larry were extra angry at each other: they divide the satellite in two , declare their own side off limits to the other and decide to take a trip to the gun range and kitchen respectively...then they realize that the former is on ''Larry's'' side in the latter on ''Tuddrussel's'' side. Not wanting to switch, they up trying the other's hobby out of boredom, then make up with an added appreciation for each other...[[Snap Back|until the end of the episode]].
* In ''[[The Tick (animation)]]'', [[Blob Monster|Thrakkorzog]], [[Evil Overlord|ruler]] of dimensio-err... ''Apartment'' 14-B, has this relationship with his (perfectly normal human) room-mate.
{{quote|
* ''[[Taz
== [[Real Life]] ==
* Legendary bar [http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3635/3396376241_b8d24629a4.jpg?v=0 Cafe Lautrec] in Adams Morgan, Washington DC closed after its two owners, who came from competing tribes in Eritrea, went to war against one another, ''War of the Roses''-style. [http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/17612/drinking-games They divided everything in the bar down the middle,] staffing alternate shifts, keeping separate books, and brown-bagging liquor, even going so far as to visit the bar on alternate nights to tell customers not to patronize the place, submitting bomb-threats and ABC violations against their own establishment when the other owner was on-duty.
* East and West Germany, with the most visible part being the Berlin Wall. This was taken to such an extreme that when the Berlin U-Bahn was divided, a couple of ghost stations existed where the trains passed through on the wrong side of the wall.
* Nation-states can arise from this trope writ large. Especially if a country is internally divided later on. Especially when one considers how language, culture, and all the meaningful aspects of individuals and collectives fade one into the other without as clear-cut barriers as those imposed by the current multi-governmental system, and within a single government many idiolects, microcultures and such co-exist without barriers.
* This trope was played ''extremely'' straight by Mitford sisters Unity and Jessica. Unity was an ardent Nazi; her sister Jessica, three years younger, was a similarly-ardent communist. They shared a room. In [[The Great Depression|the '30s]]. They very quickly took a piece of chalk to the floor, dividing the room in two. On Unity's side were innumerable swastikas and pictures of [[Adolf Hitler]]. On Jessica's were similarly innumerable hammers and sickles and pictures of [[Vladimir Lenin]]. [[The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry]], indeed.
* Tell the truth. How many of you did this with your sibling(s) in the back seat of the family car, or have kids that do this now?
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Sibling Tropes]]
[[Category:Drama Tropes]]
[[Category:Comedy Tropes]]
▲[[Category:This Is My Side]]
|