With Due Respect/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A junior disagrees with a senior.

  • Straight: "With all due respect, sir, we could sail about the mermaids' island and not risk it."
  • Exaggerated: "With all due respect, sir, I haven't heard a stupider idea in my entire life."
  • Justified: The junior's duty is to advise the senior to the best of his ability. (As it often is in Real Life.)
  • Inverted: A senior disagrees with a junior's plan.
    • A junior insists on carrying out a senior's plan despite reservations.
  • Subverted: "With all due respect, that's the best plan I've ever heard of."
  • Double Subverted: "But it could still be better if we -- "
  • Parodied: A junior disagrees with everything the senior says, in the rudest possible terms, and "all due respect" appended to every one.
  • Deconstructed: The "With all due respect" was originally used because it was the only way to get anyone to listen where the character grew up, even if the idea was necessary--despite no longer being necessary, s/he still uses it out of reflex.
  • Reconstructed: The junior uses "With all due respect" to mean exactly what it sounds like--he may disagree with the senior's plan, but he isn't trying to undermine his authority.
  • Zig Zagged: "With all due respect, that's the worst idea I've ever heard, but it could still be better if [incredibly horrible idea]." An even more junior officer chimes in with something similar, this continues until someone stops them all talking.
  • Averted: The character knows the superior is about to be foolish, but says nothing.
    • Or, of course, he always agrees with thim.
  • Enforced: "We need some conflict in The Squad -- and some exposition of why they are doing it. If Number Two disagrees, we get both."
  • Lampshaded: "Why is that I know that 'with all due respect' will be followed by a blistering critique of what I just said?"
  • Invoked: A character notes that statements are given a more careful weighing when prefaced with, "With all due respect," and so uses it for anything important. (This may even serve to reinforce this mindset.)
  • Defied: "I'm not about to give him 'all due respect' when he's not due any!"
  • Discussed: "Why is it that whenever someone says 'with all due respect', they really mean 'kiss my ass'?"
  • Conversed: "Ever noticed how the junior can get away with saying practically anything when he puts 'With all due respect' in front of it?"

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