World's Smallest Violin: Difference between revisions

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{{trope}}
[[File:worlds_sm_violinworlds sm violin.jpg|link=SpongeBob SquarePants|frame|Lucky for Squidward, listening is free.]]
 
Bob has accidentally allowed his subscription to ''[[Simpsons|Better Homes Than Yours]]'' to expire. Now he's going to miss the finals of the Fall '10 wrap-around porch competition. He'll never find out if Mrs. Custerly's balsa-wood extravaganza will win out against that retired marine biologist's oak/rattan experiment. Bob is in deep, deep dejection when he comes across Aerith.
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With an eyebrow cocked at a jaunty angle, Aerith begins sawing two fingers back and forth across each other. "Here's the world's smallest violin," she says. "Let me play you a sad song on it."
 
A predominantly Western gesture, the World's Smallest Violin is given to a person who is exaggerating the sorrow of his/her predicament in order to gain sympathy; the person who does the giving presumably has none. There are other, much more rude, hand gestures available to tell someone they're being an ass, but the violin is more sophisticated. It plays on the idea that [[Wangst|wangstywangst]]y characters expect the Warsaw Symphony to pop up out of nowhere to provide some background for their soliloquies. This gesture is rare both in real-life and in fiction. Usually it will be given by the [[Deadpan Snarker]], possibly villainous.
 
"BAAAWWWWWW" and "somebody call the WAAAAAAH-mbulance" are the internet equivalents.
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