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{{trope}}
{{quote|
A relatively common device is to have valuable advice come from a completely unexpected source. Like, ''completely'' unexpected. You don't expect your average homeless person to want to talk, much less have a lesson they're prepared to teach you (that somehow specifically addresses your problem.) [[Hooker
Sometimes this is combined with the idea that [[Angel Unaware|angels disguise]] themselves as beggars and homeless people. It even goes back to [[Fairy Tale|fairy tales]] that have fairies disguising themselves as old beggar women, making this one of [[The Oldest Ones in
See also [[Dumbass Has a Point]] and [[Jerkass Has a Point]]. If the source of wisdom isn't just poor, but also oppressed, uneducated, and/or mentally challenged, it may be a [[Whoopi Epiphany Speech]].
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* In the [[Shojo]] [[Western]] ''[[Miriam]]'', Douglas gets relationship advice from two men holed up in the local jail for starting a barfight, and is embarrased by how valuable their words are and how they have a much easier time seeing things from Miriam's point of view.
* Subverted in ''[[Full Metal Panic!]]: The Second Raid'' when a floozy Kaname-look-alike gives Sousuke some very bad advice (mixed in with a few minuscule truths). Furthermore two episodes later Sousuke is spouting the wisdom of ''Gauron''! [[Heroic BSOD]] is not fun.
* Kimbley from [[Fullmetal Alchemist]] gives Roy and crew a nice little lecture during the Ishvalan war on accepting the fact that as a soldier, you are killing people, and there's no way around it, so you'd better remember their faces; they'll never forget yours. Good advice... coming from the [[Ax Crazy]] [[Mad Bomber]].
** {{spoiler|[[Straw Man Has a Point|He does have a point though.]] }}
== [[
* In one ''[[Batman Gotham Adventures]]'' comic, Batman, caring for a lost baby, is educated on how to hold it properly by some thugs whose mugging attempt he had foiled.
* ''[[Batman RIP]]'' had an amnesiac Bruce Wayne receive guidance (and a [[Chekhov
** He also receives helpful advice from a drug-induced hallucination Bat-Mite.
* The only person both smart enough and sufficiently uncorrupt to dispense useful advice in [[Dilbert]] is The World's Smartest Garbage Man.▼
** Not just the world's smartest garbage man, but the world's smartest man. Period. Apparently, those of us who can't figure out why he wants to work as a garbage man just aren't as smart.▼
* [[Deadpool]] once got a pep talk from [[Psycho for Hire|Bullseye!]]
== [[Film]] ==
* In the movie ''[[
* In ''[[Team America
* When Brendan Fraiser gets incarcerated in the remake of ''Bedazzled'', his cellmate gives him some advice which ultimately saves his soul. {{spoiler|Ever-so-slighty justified because said inmate is actually [[Divine Race Lift|God]].}}
* There's also Da Mayor from ''[[Do the Right Thing]]'', who is surprisingly lucid for a wino and does a [[Title Drop]] when dispensing advice to the main character.
* ''Gone Fishin{{'
* After the heroes figure out that selenium is the weakness of the alien menace in the film ''Evolution'' (through, I might add, [[Solve the Soup Cans|a completely arbitrary deductive method]]) they wonder just where they're going to get enough selenium to save the day. It's the comic relief idiots that reveal the answer (selenium is the active ingredient in [[Product Placement|Head & Shoulders shampoo]]). When asked by their disbelieving biology professor how they knew ''that'' when their final coursework essay was entitled, "Cells Are Bad", they point out how silky and dandruff-free their hair is.
* In ''[[
** Parodied when Tony later repeats this quote word for word during a broadcast of ''[[Wheel of Fortune]]'' he's hosting, and the director of the episode (also played by the real Tony
* ''[[Bruce Almighty]]'' features
* ''[[Ferris Bueller's Day Off
== [[Literature]] ==
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* In the book ''The Redemption of Althalus'' by David and Leigh Eddings, Althalus is traveling and gets directions from a homeless man that Althalus assumes to be crazy because he's wandering around muttering to himself. You learn much later in the book that this old man was actually {{spoiler|Deiwos, the Creator God}}, who was there on purpose to point Althalus the right way.
== [[Live
* In the late 50s/early 60s there was a [[So Bad It's Good]] British police show called ''Dial 999'', which was about a Canadian detective learning British policing techniques. In one episode he's educated in Cockney rhyming slang by a surprisingly polite criminal he's just arrested.
* A [[Running Gag]] on ''The Armstrong and Miller Show'' features a Northern window cleaner expounding at some length on, eg. the crisis in the Middle East and presenting a plausible solution - "but what do I know?"
* An episode of ''[[Just Shoot Me]]'' had this in a ''literal'' gutter: Maya spends a night in a sewer with a creepy informant trying to get evidence of illegal phosphate dumping after meeting her former college roommate and being jealous of her becoming a successful investigative journalist while Maya is stuck working in her father's fashion magazine. Eventually, she questions what she's doing and realizes she actually likes her current occupation. The creepy guy then says "Sometimes on our way to our dreams, we get lost and find a new one". Maya is surprised and impressed until the guy somewhat ruins the moment by saying he read the phrase on the wall of a brothel.
** This gets later used as a [[Brick Joke]] when she repeats the phrase to the rest of the crew and Elliot says "I think I wrote that in a wall somewhere".
* Subverted in the ''[[
** [[Double Subversion|Which is still true...]]
* In an episode of [[The Office]], Michael was surprised to receive relationship advice from a stripper, while Benjamin Franklin turned out to be "kind of a sleazebag."
* In an episode of ''[[Doctors]]'', the [[Patient of the Week]]'s problem was pretty much solved by a boiler repair man. The guy mentioned that people tend not to notice uniformed blue-collar workers, so he gets to experience a lot of human nature.
* Subverted in the ''[[Law and Order]]'' episode "The Wages of Sin", where a bum who the cops are currently questioning offers a cryptic-yet-wise statement that foreshadows the hubris the cops and district attorneys, in their quest to bring down a high-ranking mob boss that takes up the next two episodes, will face and which they would do well to pay attention to. However, because he's a bum and because what he's saying has absolutely no connection to what the cops are currently talking to him about (and indeed have not even ''begun'' chasing the mobster, thus having no lesson to learn at this point), they just ignore him and wearily ask him to focus on the point at hand.
== [[Newspaper Comics]] ==
▲* The only person both smart enough and sufficiently uncorrupt to dispense useful advice in [[Dilbert]] is The World's Smartest Garbage Man.
▲** Not just the world's smartest garbage man, but the world's smartest man. Period. Apparently, those of us who can't figure out why he wants to work as a garbage man just aren't as smart.
== [[Video Games]] ==
* A quest in ''[[Fallout: New Vegas]]'' involves finding out who sold a man's wife into slavery. One of the most useful sources in the quest is the local insane man who tells you exactly who did it. Although he thinks the wife who disappeared was kidnapped by Mole people who wanted to steal her hair, he's still of more use in the quest than ''any other person in town.''
** Also, there's Rotgut the ghoul in Freeside, a beggar will give you semi-useful information and gossip every time you give him a cap. He'll even give you info that will lead you to a solution to a sidequest.
== [[Web
* [[The Stoner|Rumisiel]] in ''[[Misfile]]'' is usually surprisingly accurate when he's commenting on human nature, so much so you might be excused wondering if he [[Obfuscating Stupidity|really is that daft]]. [http://www.misfile.com/index.php?page=273 Exhibit A] and [http://www.misfile.com/index.php?page=1003 Exhibit B].
** Then again, not necessarily so suprising, considering he has [[World of Cardboard Speech|"seen the fall of empires and the murder of millions"]], [http://www.misfile.com/index.php?page=986 as suggested here]. Problem is, he's still a lazy bum.
* In ''[[
== [[Web Original]] ==
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* [[The Powerpuff Girls]]: In the episode ''Him Diddle Riddle'' the girls must solve [[Satan|Him's]] riddles to save the [[James Bondage|kidnapped Professor]]. Him's final riddle is [[Nintendo Hard|ridiculously difficult]], but [[Deus Ex Machina|luckily]], The Mayor ([[Cloudcuckoolander|yes]], ''[[The Ditz|THAT]]'' [[The Ditz|Mayor]]) appears and explains the answer with ease. [[Crowning Moment of Funny|Cue the girls exchanging blank glances]].
== Other Media ==
* A truck driver comes to a bridge that's slightly too low to let the truck get under. A man standing nearby behind a fence advises him to let some of the air out of his tires, squeeze under the bridge, and fill the tires up again at a gas station on the other side. The man thanks the man for his advice, but notices a sign on the fence indicating that the facility is an insane asylum. The driver asks the man if he's an inmate, and the man admits it. The driver then asks him how he managed to come up with the idea he suggested. The man replies "I'm crazy, not stupid." "[http://www.snopes.com/medical/asylum/tirenut.asp Tire Nut]"
* Comedian Eddie Griffin had a joke about an old wino who would dispense valuable advice as long as you bought him some alcohol.
* The country song "Moments" by Emerson Drive, where the narrator gets life advice from a homeless man.
* The [http://randomactsofshark.blogspot.com/ The Obamadämmerung] plays with this by turning the concept just as EPIC as it turns the rest of the 2008 election.
{{quote|
* Comedian Kat Williams claims he never expected to learn anything from someone wearing a viking helmet and a giant clock pendant with the wrong time on it until Flava Flav said, "Who cares what they say about me [at the roast]? THEY GOT TO PAY ME, BOY-EE!"
* Rabbi Moshe Leib of Sassov would try to pay to get Jews out of debtors' prisons. One day he could not redeem a certain debtor and gave up, but managed to stop another criminal (who turned out to be a thief) from being flogged. The rabbi commented that he had surely learned his lesson and would not steal again. The thief replied that just because he got caught once didn't mean he might not succeed next time. Realizing this common thief had more persistence for sinning than he did for good, the rabbi went back to try again to get the debtor freed.
{{reflist}}
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[[Category:More Than Meets the Eye]]
[[Category:Characters As Device]]
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[[Category:Magical Minority Person]]
[[Category:Closer to Earth]]
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