History Main / AesopTinum

** There was also an episode where future VR near-perfectly resembled reality - which made the unregulated versions the perfect drug to push. We also see that the addicts had crippling home problems which made them ''desperate'' for any way to experience the illusion of a normal life.

%% When listing examples below, remember that THIS TROPE IS A TYPE OF PHLEBOTINUM, and thus a SUBSTANCE or TECHNOLOGY.

%% THIS TROPE IS NOT THE MORAL LESSON. Examples listing only the moral lesson and not the Phlebotinum will be deleted.

!!Examples

* In ''Anime/StrainStrategicArmoredInfantry'', [[spoiler:the Strains are derived from research done on aliens that look exactly like little human girls, and the research is supposed to continue ([[WhatHappenedToTheMouse though they don't really finish that plot thread]]) so they can achieve instantaneous communication and more with the further dissection and possible brain removal of said girls.]] Naturally, [[spoiler:Ralph]] [[DefectorFromDecadence didn't like this]], So he decided it would be best to [[spoiler:punish humanity for this]].
* In ''Manga/{{Inuyasha}}'', both Inuyasha's Tessaiga and Sesshomaru's Tenseiga were crafted specifically for them by their father to be aesoptinum. Tessaiga, the sword of destruction, has the power to kill one hundred demons with one swing, but only if it's wielded by a half-demon for the purpose of protecting humans. Tenseiga, the sword of healing, has the power to revive the dead but cannot harm anyone (except "minions of the underworld" which are basically a type of grim reaper-like creature). The swords are also [[EmpathicWeapon empathic weapons]], and have been known to guide their respective owners from time to time.
* An episode of ''Literature/KyoKaraMaoh'' involves a mountain covered by a ghostly miasma that would infect people and cause them to stop trusting anyone. The only one unaffected is the kid hero Yuuri, who had previously decided to never doubt anyone.

[[folder:Films]]

* In ''Film/{{Serenity}}'', the chemical "Pax" was created by the Alliance to weed out aggression and pacify people. In case that wasn't objectionable enough to the audience, its first wide-spread test failed spectacularly, resulting in [[spoiler: nearly the entire population of a planet developing severe amotivational disorder and simply sitting quietly until they starved to death. The survivors were rendered insane and horrifically violent, becoming the Reavers.]]
* The movie world of ''Film/LogansRun'' is [[{{Utopia}} utopic]] (i.e. no hunger, no want or need to work). The catch? Everything is run by a [[MasterComputer Computer]]; children 0-7 years are raised in tubes; youth 7-14 are set to run wild, and once you become 30 a gem on your palm (or Life Crystal) turns black and you're sent to compete to be "Renewed". Unfortunately, Renewal is something the citizens made up--the computer never actually ''says'' anything about Renewal and [[spoiler:Box is confused by what Logan means by "Sanctuary."]] Everyone participating in the competition dies.

* ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanOnStrangerTides'' has a fountain of youth [[spoiler:that requires a human sacrifice to work.]]

* Truffula Trees, the ones for which ''Literature/TheLorax'' speaks. They're used for making thneeds.
* The central premise of Creator/UrsulaKLeGuin's short story "Literature/TheOnesWhoWalkAwayFromOmelas" was a city whose [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans happiness depended]] upon the [[PoweredByAForsakenChild suffering of one innocent child]].
* A similar idea is posed as a philosophical question by Ivan to Alyosha in ''Literature/TheBrothersKaramazov''.
* Subtly parodied (along with {{phlebotinum}} in general) in the novel ''Literature/GenerationDead'', as the proposals by scientists to "explain" the whole "teenagers suddenly coming back as zombies" phenomenon, which are mentioned in asides throughout the book, tend towards this. Choice examples include proposals that it was caused by "too much fast food", "too many FirstPersonShooter games", and -- thanks to the expansion of the book's accompanying CharacterBlog -- "too many generations eating microwaved food". Naturally, ''none'' of them is true.
* Creator/NormanSpinrad's '60s sci-fi novel ''Literature/BugJackBarron'' has an Evil Rich White Man gaining immortality from [[spoiler:[[PoweredByAForsakenChild the glands of irradiated-to-death children]]]], with the one the audience knows about in the book being [[spoiler: African-American]]. Good book, [[{{Anvilicious}} heavy-handed Aesop]].
* Creator/DamonKnight's short story "Rule Golden" has an alien that spreads a special plague which induces tele-empathy. This means that prison guards become depressed from the sadness of their prisoners, anyone that strikes another person will feel the pain from their blow, and anyone that kills another person will drop dead on the spot (strangely, this even includes such acts from a distance, such as shooting someone, which just kills the shooter rather than everyone else within the same radius). The ostensible reason the alien does this is to make humans become peaceful before they invent interstellar travel, with a side benefit supposedly being the elimination of hierarchic governments (since "government is force"). Notably, the story explores the nasty side effects of every animal with a nervous system becoming a psychic ''bomb'' directly equivalent to how much brain mass they're carting around; every purely carnivorous animal goes extinct, herbivores start stripping regions bare, vermin such as rats and mice undergo a population explosion, and oh yeah -- famines ensue because it takes a few years for farms to switch over to high-protein crops like beans and slaughterhouses to adopt painless killing methods. The entire planet nearly dies before the process is complete and the rest of the aliens feel safe enough show up with shipments of food and painless pest control measures are put to use.
* Similarly, Creator/StanislawLem's short story "[[Literature/TheCyberiad Highest Possible Level of Development]]" had a drug, Altruzine, that caused tele-empathy, but the story is much more tongue-in-cheek. The results are still not altruistic, though: a man with a toothache has his painful tooth ripped out by nearby people who don't want to feel the pain, a newlywed couple is nearly mobbed outside their hotel where they consummate the marriage (and criticized on their poor performance), and depressed people are driven from towns rather than treated.
* The Creator/JohnBrunner novel, ''Literature/TheStoneThatNeverCameDown'', centers around an artificial, self-replicating protein (today, it'd be called a prion) that eliminates selective inattention -- the brain ''has'' to make connections between pieces of information that it previously ignored. In addition to an intelligence boost, this bestows automatic empathy, since those infected can no longer disregard the genuine pain that others feel.

* In Khaled Hosseini's ''Literature/TheKiteRunner'', main character Amir writes a short story about a man who discovered a cup. Not just any cup; one that turns tears into pearls. In order to become rich, the man must make himself sad. The story ends tragically with the man crying over his wife's body (whose throat he has just slit to make himself cry) atop a mountain of pearls. This is all subverted when Amir's best friend asks why the man didn't simply cut up some onions instead.

* Since ImmortalityImmorality and NotAfraidToDie are huge themes of ''Literature/HarryPotter'', various methods of extending your lifespan are Aesoptinium. This includes the Horcrux, a type of SoulJar that you can only create if you're willing to kill someone, and unicorn blood, which can save you even if you'd otherwise die, but since unicorns are so pure, killing one is a MoralEventHorizon and your life will be cursed.

* The spore drive in ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery'' is initially this; it can take you anywhere in the galaxy, but you need to torture an animal to do it,
* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'' also gets in on the act with Trellium-D, used to insulate Enterprise from the harmful effects of the Expanse. Unfortunately it also degrades the neural pathways of Vulcans, causing loss of emotional control. T'Pol starts taking "carefully controlled" doses of Trellium-D in order to loosen up a bit and becomes addicted, permanently damaging her ability to control emotions. She also gets Pa'nar Syndrome, an allegory for AIDS, which also causes a loss of emotional control.
* The crew of the ''Equinox'' in the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' [[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS5E25S6E1Equinox two-part episode of the same name]] are built up as sympathetic and being more down on their luck than ''Voyager''; then they do a FaceHeelTurn. Any audience sympathy they might have had is destroyed by the discovery that their improved warp drive runs on [[PoweredByAForsakenChild the corpses of sentient aliens]].

* One ''Series/TalesFromTheDarkside'' episode has an old man and his daughter finding a fountain of youth. It is guarded by a Native American-esque spirit who says "You must sacrifice one form of immortality (i.e. your child) for another." The old man sacrifices his daughter, then finds he ages like a rock--veeery slowly, but lives like one--taking years to blink.
* One ''Series/GilligansIsland'' episode involves the castaways finding some seeds that when ingested, bestow on the consumer the ability to read other people's minds. Trouble is, everyone then becomes privy to every tiny little critical thought the others have about them, and the group is unable to stop fighting with each other. Gilligan solves the problem by burning the bush that produces the seeds, leading to the moral "Some things are better left unsaid" --even though [[FantasticAesop no one actually said them]].

* ''Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower'': The mithril comes with two warnings which if are not listen, only bad things will follow. Mithril can be used to stop the fading away of the Elves, but king Durin the Third refuses to let the Elves mine for mithril because sometimes you have to allow things follow their natural evolution, stating that the elves' time has come to an end and that this was decreed by far wiser minds. His judgement is harsh but entirely accurate, and the elves themselves eventually will have to see this as well. The second warning is about the greed of the Dwarves and what happens if they dig to deep for mithril. This one is a ForegoneConclusion.

* ''TabletopGame/ShockSocialScienceFiction'' encourages this in its worldbuilding phase.

* The TabletopGame/NewWorldOfDarkness gives us at least two:
** In TabletopGame/WerewolfTheForsaken, spirits are the source of all magical tools, gifts, and powers. However, spirits have their own sometimes-delicate ecosystem, and removing one (to bind it into a tool or simply destroying it because it's dangerous) can have disastrous consequences for other spirits in the area and the things they embody in the real world. Since this is a Green Aesop, sometimes ''failing'' to hunt or destroy certain spirits can have similarly terrible effects.
** In TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening souls are a viable power source, as are demons from "the void". You can probably figure out what the issues with tapping either [[MoralEventHorizon tend to be]]. On the plus side: immortality!
** The more-universal Humanity system makes morality itself a form of Phlebotinum. Each splat has a set of hierarchical sins, with things on the order of 'occasionally thinks unkind thoughts about others' at rank ten and 'genocide purely for the purposes of entertainment' at zero. Committing sins on the list below your current rank pulls you downward, while only abstaining and spending experience points can pull you up, so you tend to 'level out' at one rank above the sins your character abhors enough to avoid even when they're necessary... and, being a CrapsackWorld, staying above the rank of 'murder' is often near-impossible if you want to survive. Higher Humanity improves the natural reaction of things like spirits and muggles to your presence, and lower morality increases the chance of your splat's primary downside occurring.
*** And then the downsides themselves can often lead to further sins, so the first step can lead to a bit of a vicious cycle: the downside for Mages, for instance is literal insanity, and for Werewolves it's turning into a gigantic out-of-control murder-beast whenever something provokes you. For Vampires, their humanity is almost visible, making it difficult to find food at low Humanity and thus more prone to hunger-induced killing of mortals, and Changelings can completely forget which world they are currently in.
*** Further complications arise from each splat having a different list or ranking of sins; Harmony (the Werewolf version) ranks disrespecting a pack elder or great spirit where the human version ranks multiple homicide, and the highest Wisdom (the Mage version) requires never using magic to do something that you could achieve through mundane means, essentially a 'don't use magic' rule since any magic that couldn't be done through mundane means breaks the {{Masquerade}}.

* ''Videogame/CommandAndConquer'' gives us Tiberium, which is ''extremely'' valuable as it leeches minerals and valuables from the soil and brings it to the surface for easy harvesting in the form of green crystals, which grow blue as they grow more saturated and valuable. There's just the [[BlatantLies tiny]] list of problems to go with it; It's radioactive, mutagenic, spreads like AlienKudzu [[spoiler: [[HostileTerraforming - because it is - ]]]] by assimilating everything it touches into more of itself if not handled correctly, and, if blue, has a tendency to set of explosive chain reactions at the slightest provocation. Ironically enough, Tiberium used as a fuel is actually a source of incredibly efficicent ''clean'' energy compared to alternatives like fossil fuels or nuclear power, which leads humanity to become more or less dependent on it even though it's ''completely destroying Earth and all life upon it''. In short, it's the stuff of Al Gore's nightmares.

* One ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'' episode features the titular "Pearl of Wisdom", which will grant whoever holds it at a certain point at sunrise temporary infinite wisdom. ''Every'' person who has ever stolen it and used it in this manner realizes the error of their ways during their "moment of wisdom," and voluntarily returns the pearl to the islanders from whom it was stolen. This is why the islanders are never bent out of shape whenever the pearl ''is'' stolen - they know it will eventually be brought back to them.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/ThreeTwoOnePenguins'' episode "Compassion Crashin'", there is a machine called the X-Five One Behavior Modifier which can change one's attitude with great ease. Fidgel planned to use it to make himself, Jason, Zidgel, Midgel, and Kevin compassionate so that they could listen to Michelle when she was feeling sad. However, thanks to Kevin breaking the modifier, Jason and the penguins became the opposite of compassionate.

* ''Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower'': The mithril comes with two warnings which if are not listen, only bad things will follow. Mithril can be used to stop the fading away of the Elves, but king Durin the Third refuses to let the Elves mine for mithril because sometimes you have to allow things follow their natural evolution, stating that the elves' time has come and that this was decreed by far wiser minds. His judgement is harsh but entirely accurate, and the elves themselves eventually will have to see this as well. The second warning is about the greed of the Dwarves and what happens if they dig to deep for mithril. This one is a ForegoneConclusion.

* ''Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower'': The mithril comes with two lesson which if are not listen, only bad things will follow. The mithril can be used to stop the fading away of the Elves, but king Durin the Third refuses to let the Elves mine for mithril because sometimes you have allow things follow their natural evolution, stating that the elves' time has come and that this was decreed by far wiser minds than his is harsh but entirely accurate, and the elves themselves eventually will have to see this as well. The second lesson is about the greed of the Dwarves and what happens if they dig to deep for mithril. This one is a ForegoneConclusion.

*** Further complications arise from each splat having a different list or ranking of sins; Harmony (the Werewolf version) ranks disrespecting a pack elder or great spirit where the human version ranks multiple homicide, and the highest Wisdom (the Mage version) requires never using magic to do something that you could achieve through mundane means, essentially a 'don't use magic' rule since any magic that couldn't be done through mundane means breaks TheMasquerade.

* ''Videogame/CommandAndConquer'' gives us Tiberium, which is ''extremely'' valuable as it leeches minerals and valuables from the soil and brings it to the surface for easy harvesting in the form of green crystals, which grow blue as they grow more saturated and valuable. There's just the [[BlatantLies tiny]] list of problems to go with it; It's radioactive, mutagenic, spreads like AlienKudzu [[spoiler: [[HostileTerraforming - because it is - ]]]] by assimilating everything it touches into more of itself if not handled correctly, and, if blue, has a tendency to set of explosive chain reactions at the slightest provocation. Humanity becomes more or less dependent on it even though it's ''completely destroying Earth and all life upon it''. In short, it's the stuff of Al Gore's nightmares.

* Argent Energy in ''Videogame/Doom2016''. Samuel Hayden protests the Doom Slayer's casual destruction of it, saying it "solved an energy crisis the world had no answer for." The truth comes in the sequel: [[spoiler: it is essential created from the suffering of mortal souls. This finally disgusts Hayden enough to abandon its pursuit.]]
* Mako in ''Videogame/FinalFantasyVII''. An energy source that is derived by leaching energy from TheLifestream. Usage causes vast expanses of land to be rendered desolate. When humans and animals are overexposed to it, expect a BodyHorror. With the Shinra Electric Power Company's hold on the public media, and everything else, [[ApatheticCitizens no one knows]]. You'd think that they would have noticed that something was wrong the ''first'' time a Mako reactor exploded, but it took an EldritchAbomination alien, an OmnicidalManiac, and a team of {{Well Intentioned Extremist}}s to shake them from their haze. Immediately after Mako fell out of favor, they resorted to oil.

* One ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'' episode features the titular "Pearl of Wisdom", which will grant whoever holds it at a certain point at sunrise temporary infinite wisdom. ''Every'' person who has ever stolen it and used it in this manner realizes the error of their ways during their "moment of wisdom," and voluntarily returns the pearl to the islanders from whom it was stolen. This is why the islanders are never bent out of shape whenever the pearl IS stolen -- they know it will eventually be brought back to them.

* In ''Series/DoctorWho'', if a new substance or technology is discovered, chances are it violates someone's civil rights in ways that will be revealed around mid-episode and require a debate on the ethics of placing the wants of the many over the needs of the few. The most common example is time travel. (Is it okay to change history?) Other examples have included 'the Flesh' in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E5TheRebelFlesh The Rebel Flesh]]"/"[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E6TheAlmostPeople The Almost People]]", a substance that can be used to create avatars that allow people to do dangerous tasks without risking their own lives (which, of course, turn out to be alive and capable of sentience); a diet pill that causes human fat to turn into larval aliens (it's the only way for the aliens to reproduce, but has the potential to kill the dieter) in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E1PartnersInCrime Partners in Crime]]"; and a process that can turn old people into young people (it also makes their DNA unstable, causing possible mutation and requiring the rejuvenated person to drain the life from others) in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E6TheLazarusExperiment The lazarus Experiment]]". Granted, the diet pill is more an issue of informed consent than anything else, since the process isn't dangerous unless the person in charge deliberately puts it into overdrive; the real problem is that she isn't supposed to use Earth for this kind of thing, so she keeps things secret and kills anyone who might reveal the {{Masquerade}}.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* The spore drive on ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery'' was initially this; it could take you anywhere in the galaxy, but you needed to torture an animal to do it,

* The crew of the Equinox in ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' were built up as sympathetic and being more down on their luck than Voyager, then they did a FaceHeelTurn. Any audience sympathy they might have had was destroyed by the discovery that their improved warp drive runs on [[PoweredByAForsakenChild the corpses of sentient aliens]].
* ''Series/BabylonFive'': In "Deathwalker", the Dilgar war criminal Jha'dur develops an anti-aging serum that can be used repeatedly to extend an individual's life indefinitely. The cost? It requires a non-synthesizable ingredient available only in [[PoweredByAForsakenChild other sentients]] (one treatment requires one sentient). Her intention was to disperse the knowledge of the serum to ''start'' genocidal wars as vengeance for her species dying (and to establish that, for all their self-righteous condemnation of the Dilgar, the other races aren't so different). The Vorlons [[YouAreNotReady take it upon themselves]] to destroy the serum, Deathwalker and her ship to prevent that (and destroy any chance of researching the process to give the younger races true immortality and become rivals of the Vorlons).

* On ''Series/DoctorWho'', if a new substance or technology is discovered, chances are it violates someone's civil rights in ways that will be revealed around mid-episode and require a debate on the ethics of placing the wants of the many over the needs of the few. The most common example is time travel. (Is it okay to change history?) Other examples have included "flesh" - a substance that can be used to create avatars that allow people to do dangerous tasks without risking their own lives (which, of course, turned out to be alive and capable of sentience); a diet pill that causes human fat to turn into larval aliens (it's the only way for the aliens to reproduce, but has the potential to kill the dieter); and a process that can turn old people into young people (it also makes their DNA unstable causing possible mutation and requiring the rejuvenated person to drain the life from others). Granted, the diet pill was more an issue of informed consent than anything else, since the process wasn't dangerous unless the person in charge deliberately put it into overdrive; the real problem was that she wasn't supposed to use Earth for this kind of thing, so she kept things secret and killed anyone who might reveal TheMasquerade.

* In ''FanFic/{{Fractured}}'', a ''Franchise/MassEffect''[=/=]''Franchise/StarWars''[[spoiler:[=/=]''[=Borderlands=]'']] [[MassiveMultiplayerCrossover crossover]] and its sequel ''FanFic/{{Origins}}'', it's noted by the heroes that the "Cosmic Cleansing Sphere" triggered through [[spoiler:Lilith crashing a ship into a temple made of Eridium]] kills both [[EldritchAbomination Reapers]] and [[{{Mooks}} followers]] of the InsaneAdmiral Xytler by [[spoiler:turning their hearts into solid matter]].

* In ''Manga/InuYasha'', both Inuyasha's Tessaiga and Sesshomaru's Tenseiga were crafted specifically for them by their father to be aesoptinum. Tessaiga, the sword of destruction, has the power to kill one hundred demons with one swing, but only if it's wielded by a half-demon for the purpose of protecting humans. Tenseiga, the sword of healing, has the power to revive the dead but cannot harm anyone (except "minions of the underworld" which are basically a type of grim reaper-like creature). The swords are also [[EmpathicWeapon empathic weapons]], and have been known to guide their respective owners from time to time.

* In ''Anime/GhostInTheShell: Innocence'', [[spoiler:the gynoids' sentience is due to their containing copies of the ghosts of abducted preteen girls. The ghost-copying procedure (which is ''highly'' illegal in the ''Ghost in the Shell'' universe) eventually kills the girls. Even more disturbingly, they were first brainwashed into near-robots so that the gynoids wouldn't be ''too'' human-like - and that they were intended to be [[{{Sexbot}} Sexbots]]. Despite all this, a surviving girl and her rescuer are actually chastised by the heroine, as she says that [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman the real victims were the robots]] -- the humans were tortured, yes, but they had lives prior to that; the robots were given sentience ''solely so they could suffer!'']]
-->We are saddened by a bird's cry, but not a fish's blood; Blessed are those with voices. [[spoiler:If those dolls had voices, I bet each and every one would scream "I don't want to be a human."]]

* An episode of ''LightNovel/KyoKaraMaoh'' involved a mountain covered by a ghostly miasma that would infect people and cause them to stop trusting anyone. The only one unaffected was the kid hero Yuuri, who had previously decided to never doubt anyone.

* ''Franchise/DragonBall'': In the ''Manga/DragonBall'' manga, Goku's rideable cloud, the Nimbus, can only be ridden on by the pure of heart. Everyone else falls right through, including the perverted Master Roshi who gives Goku the cloud. The only known people who can Nimbus include Goku himself, Chichi, Gohan and Goten. In a (non-canon) crossover, [[Manga/OnePiece Monkey D Luffy]] could ride it too.

* Creator/RobertJSawyer has written several books that feature a technological loss of privacy as leading to a better society. His ''[[Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax Neanderthal Parallax]]'' trilogy features a society in which everyone wears a gadget that records everything they do 24/7, storing it in an archive that can only be accessed by the person in question, or by the authorities if they have sufficient cause. Another book features plans sent by aliens. The plans are for a gadget that lets people read each others minds without limit, and it is strongly implied that this will lead to utopia. His book ''Triggers'' has humanity becoming a {{hive mind}} with the same effect-this is shown explicitly as utopian. One short story also has a future Earth that has become an anarchic utopia by means of similar technology as ''The Neanderthal Parallax'' features, since a government isn't needed anymore with everyone under sousveillance.

* In ''Anime/GhostInTheShell: Innocence'', [[spoiler:the gynoids' sentience is due to their containing copies of the ghosts of abducted preteen girls. The ghost-copying procedure (which is ''highly illegal'' in the ''Ghost in the Shell universe'') eventually kills the girls. Even more disturbingly, they were first brainwashed into near-robots so that the gynoids wouldn't be ''too'' human-like - and that they were intended to be [[{{Sexbot}} Sexbots]]. Despite all this, a surviving girl and her rescuer are actually chastised by the heroine, as she says that [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman the real victims were the robots]] -- the humans were tortured, yes, but they had lives prior to that; the robots were given sentience ''solely so they could suffer!'']]

* In ''Anime/GhostInTheShell: Innocence'', [[spoiler:the gynoids' sentience is due to their containing copies of the ghosts of abducted preteen girls. The ghost-copying procedure eventually kills the girls. Even more disturbingly, they were first brainwashed into near-robots so that the gynoids wouldn't be ''too'' human-like - and that they were intended to be [[{{Sexbot}} Sexbots]]. Despite all this, a surviving girl and her rescuer are actually chastised by the heroine, as she says that [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman the real victims were the robots]] -- the humans were tortured, yes, but they had lives prior to that; the robots were given sentience ''solely so they could suffer!'']]

As is common for moral metaphors, this trope has a tendency to [[FantasticAesop miss its mark]]. But still, [[TropesAreTools when handled well]], Aesoptinum can be an effective plot device.

* Creator/NormanSpinrad's '60s sci-fi novel ''Literature/BugJackBarron'' has an Evil Rich White Man gaining immortality from [[spoiler:[[PoweredByAForsakenChild the glands of irradiated-to-death children]]]], with the one the audience knows about in the book being [[spoiler: African-American]]. Good book, [[AnvilOfTheStory heavy-handed Aesop]].

* In ''FanFic/{{Fractured}}'', a ''Franchise/MassEffect''[=/=]''Franchise/StarWars''[[spoiler:[=/=]''[=Borderlands=]'']] [[MassiveMultiplayerCrossover crossover]] and its sequel ''[[FanFic/{{Origins}}]]'', it's noted by the heroes that the "Cosmic Cleansing Sphere" triggered through [[spoiler:Lilith crashing a ship into a temple made of Eridium]] kills both [[EldritchAbomination Reapers]] and [[{{Mooks}} followers]] of the InsaneAdmiral Xytler by [[spoiler:turning their hearts into solid matter]].

* On ''Series/DoctorWho'', if a new substance or technology is discovered, chances are it violates someone's civil rights in ways that will be revealed around mid-episode and require a debate on the ethics of placing the wants of the many over the needs of the few. The most common example is time travel (is it okay to change history?). Other examples have included "flesh" - a substance that can be used to create avatars that allow people to do dangerous tasks without risking their own lives (which, of course, turned out to be alive and capable of sentience); a diet pill that causes human fat to turn into larval aliens (it's the only way for the aliens to reproduce, but has the potential to kill the dieter); and a process that can turn old people into young people (it also makes their DNA unstable causing possible mutation and requiring the rejuvenated person to drain the life from others). Granted, the diet pill was more an issue of informed consent than anything else, since the process wasn't dangerous unless the person in charge deliberately put it into overdrive; the real problem was that she wasn't supposed to use Earth for this kind of thing, so she kept things secret and killed anyone who might reveal TheMasquerade.

* The crew of the Equinox in ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' were built up as sympathetic and being more down on their luck than Voyager, when they did a FaceHeelTurn. Any audience sympathy they might have had was destroyed by the discovery that their improved warp drive runs on [[PoweredByAForsakenChild the corpses of sentient aliens]].