History Main / OpposeWhatYouSuffered

* As a child, Music/NeilYoung suffered from polio 3 years before the polio vaccine became available. In 2022, [[ScrewTheMoneyIHaveRules he threatened to withdraw his music catalog from Spotify in protest of the spread of COVID-19 misinformation on the platform]], especially by radio host Joe Rogan, an infamous anti-vaxxer.

* Zigzagged two ways from Sunday in ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'': [[Characters/TransformersPrimeMegatron Megatron]] started out as a [[YouAreNumberSix nameless]] transformer slaving away in the mines underneath {{Bad Boss}}es, and eventually found his way to the [[GladiatorGames Gladiatorial pits]], where he earned his freedom through his victories, taking the name '[[InternalHomage Megatronus]]' after the original TragicVillain of the mythos in the process, hoping to strike fear into his gladiatorial opponents. After earning his freedom, Megatronus gathered a following of disenfranchised transformers and campaigned for a reformation of the political system of their home planet, Cybertron, to make it more egalitarian than it was at the time... but when he was finally granted an audience with the NotSoOmniscientCouncilOfBickering that ran the planet, he saw the flaws inherent in the political process and demanded that he be named Prime - supreme ruler. When this was refused and one of his long-time friends was given the opportunity instead, his gathering of loyal followers began a CivilWar against the rulers of the planet to make -- the now-renamed -- Megatron ruler, a CivilWar that would, after millennia of conflict, eventually render the planet uninhabitable and every single remaining transformer TheRemnant, and saw his followers rename themselves the 'Decepticons' as their goals [[SlowlySlippingIntoEvil eventually became]] little more than [[FullCircleRevolution totalitarian control of everything]]. The final zig of this zagging comes at the end of the series, where [[spoiler: Megatron has been possessed by [[GodOfEvil Unicron]], and is ForcedToWatch as Unicron uses his body for the purpose of finally killing off the dormant [[TheMaker Primus]] at the center of the recently-restored Cybertron. Whenever Megatron tries to resist, Unicron enacts ColdBloodedTorture upon his soul - and this leads to Megatron having a HeelRealization. When the possession is lifted, Megatron disbands the Decepticons and leaves for voluntary exile, realizing that his attempts at becoming this trope have ''utterly'' failed and that no matter what he does now, his millennia of warfare mean he will always be remembered as an EvilOverlord]].

* ''WesternAnimation/BoJackHorseman'': [[spoiler:Beatrice had a child out of wedlock, and as a result, she endured a really crappy daily life. As a result, she desperately tries to stop Henrietta from going through the same thing she did in "Time's Arrow" by making her give her baby up for adoption]].

* Zigzagged two ways from Sunday in ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'': [[BigBad Megatron]] started out as a [[YouAreNumberSix nameless]] transformer slaving away in the mines underneath {{Bad Boss}}es, and eventually found his way to the [[GladiatorGames Gladiatorial pits]], where he earned his freedom through his victories, taking the name '[[InternalHomage Megatronus]]' after the original TragicVillain of the mythos in the process, hoping to strike fear into his gladiatorial opponents. After earning his freedom, Megatronus gathered a following of disenfranchised transformers and campaigned for a reformation of the political system of their home planet, Cybertron, to make it more egalitarian than it was at the time... but when he was finally granted an audience with the NotSoOmniscientCouncilOfBickering that ran the planet, he saw the flaws inherent in the political process and demanded that he be named Prime - supreme ruler. When this was refused and one of his long-time friends was given the opportunity instead, his gathering of loyal followers began a CivilWar against the rulers of the planet to make -- the now-renamed -- Megatron ruler, a CivilWar that would, after millennia of conflict, eventually render the planet uninhabitable and every single remaining transformer TheRemnant, and saw his followers rename themselves the 'Decepticons' as their goals [[SlowlySlippingIntoEvil eventually became]] little more than [[FullCircleRevolution totalitarian control of everything]]. The final zig of this zagging comes at the end of the series, where [[spoiler: Megatron has been possessed by [[GodOfEvil Unicron]], and is ForcedToWatch as Unicron uses his body for the purpose of finally killing off the dormant [[TheMaker Primus]] at the center of the recently-restored Cybertron. Whenever Megatron tries to resist, Unicron enacts ColdBloodedTorture upon his soul - and this leads to Megatron having a HeelRealization. When the possession is lifted, Megatron disbands the Decepticons and leaves for voluntary exile, realizing that his attempts at becoming this trope have ''utterly'' failed and that no matter what he does now, his millennia of warfare mean he will always be remembered as an EvilOverlord]].

* ComicBook/{{Magneto}} is one of the most famous characters motivated by this mindset. As a Romani/Jew/other ethnic minority during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, he and his family suffered horribly at the hands of [[ThoseWackyNazis the Nazis]], and he learned firsthand the terrible results of bigotry and hatred. To that end, he opposes that same treatment towards [[FantasticRacism mutants]]. However, Magneto's methods are very much a case of DependingOnTheWriter, as sometimes he is 100% correct or even heroic while at other times he is treated as a WellIntentionedExtremist who BecameTheirOwnAntithesis. It depends on whatever the current status quo is, really.

** Additionally, Laura spent some time as a StreetWalker under a particularly sadistic and cruel pimp. As a result, she's evolved into something of a WifeBasherBasher who goes out of her way to bust up any human and sex traffickers she comes across. On several occasions, she has outright killed people she caught brutalizing prostitutes (and in one case killed a man who murdered a girl she ''[[MistakenForProstitute thought]]'' was a prostitute).

* Invoked and inverted by Erik Killmonger in ''Film/BlackPanther2018'', who has personally experienced racism and discrimination while growing up in the USA and now intends to save other Black people around the world from suffering similar fates [[spoiler:by arming them with advanced vibranium weapons, at the very least ignoring and probably being fully aware that the people he arms will merely [[PersecutionFlip become the new oppressors in turn]]. There's also the fact that by making himself the ruler of a non-democratic African nation, one that he intends to lead to war with the rest of the world, he will be oppressing Black people himself.]] Ultimately averted, as it's clear Killmonger doesn't oppose what he suffered in the slightest, he just wants to be the one dishing it out.

* In ''Film/HellboyIITheGoldenArmy'', pyrokinetic Liz Sherman bursts into flame when a crowd throws a rock at Hellboy, [[spoiler:turning the whole situation into a [[FaceHeelTurn Face-Heel Temptation,]]]] but manages to restrain herself and merely launch into a ReasonYouSuckSpeech. A flashback in ''Film/Hellboy2004'' showed that Elizabeth had had rocks thrown at herself, too when she was still a little girl and her powers were manifesting [[spoiler:uncontrollably, which then resulted in an explosion that killed several bullying kids]].
* In ''Film/IronSky'', James, who is African-American, is pretty much the only decent person in the entire film[[spoiler: (apart from the people of Finland). While this isn't difficult when the antagonists are actual Nazis [[RecycledINSPACE From Space]], James also both fights the Nazis with violence as well as by working to [[{{Deprogram}} deprogram]] those who just don't know things could be different]]. Additionally, the fact that the US President deliberately sent James to the moon in a publicity stunt to get the Black vote shows that discrimination against African-Americans is a thing in the film's setting that requires patching up, or at least papering over, in the President's eyes.

* In the 1986 film version of ''Theatre/LittleShopOfHorrors'', Audrey II can only tempt [[ExtremeDoormat everybody's doormat]] Seymour [[spoiler:into committing murder]] when they watch Audrey being treated the same way.

* ''Literature/NightWorld'': Rashel Jordan eventually fights to protect innocent people, especially kids, from being harmed by dangerous Night People; as a little girl her family was killed by a vampire and she only narrowly escaped herself.

** In the second season ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode [[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS2E9TheMeasureOfAMan "The Measure of a Man"]], the android Data's rights are contested, as a scientist argues he should be treated as a machine, rather than a person[[spoiler:, and this fact is even demonstrated by Data being taken apart and switched off without his consent]]. In the season 6 episode [[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E9TheQualityOfLife "The Quality of Life"]], Data then goes to extreme lengths to protect an emerging machine life-form from being treated in the same manner before they can fully achieve sentience[[spoiler:, even going so far as to risk the life of his own best friend, Geordi La Forge]].

* ''VideoGame/EnsembleStars'': In a downplayed example, Adonis grew up weak and sickly which led to him being taken advantage of by some stronger people. Now that he's grown up into a fit and strong man, he often repeats a declaration to protect the small and weak, because he knows what it's like to be powerless.

* Trevor Belmont, the last remaining member of the Belmont Family in ''WesternAnimation/{{Castlevania}}''. Following centuries of [[HunterOfMonsters hunting monsters to protect the people of Walachia]], the Belmonts were falsely accused of practicing black magic by corrupt members of the [[CorruptChurch clergy]], leading to his ancestral home being burned down and his parents murdered when Trevor was eight years old. Whilst this has left him cynical and jaded towards most of mankind, Trevor also possesses a deep empathy towards those who are unfairly persecuted by the corrupt. Protecting a nomadic group called the [[ProudScholarRace Speakers]] from being scapegoated by a corrupt bishop marks his transition from simply drifting through to actually taking a stand in general.

* ComicBook/{{Magneto}} is one of the most famous characters motivated by this mindset. As a Romani/Jew/other ethnic minority during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, he and his family suffered horribly at the hands of [[ThoseWackyNazis the Nazis]], and he learned firsthand the terrible results of bigotry and hatred. To that end, he opposes that same treatment towards [[FantasticRacism mutants]]. However, Magneto's methods are very much a case of DependingOnTheWriter, as sometimes he is 100% correct or even heroic while at other times he is treated as a WellIntentionedExtremist who BecameTheirOwnAntithesis. It depends on whatever the current status-quo is, really.

** Additionally, Laura spent some time as a StreetWalker under a particularly sadistic and cruel pimp. As a result, she's evolved into something of a WifeBasherBasher who goes out of her way to bust up any human and sex traffickers she comes across. On several occasions she has outright killed people she caught brutalizing prostitutes (and in one case killed a man who murdered a girl she ''[[MistakenForProstitute thought]]'' was a prostitute).

-->'''Izuku:''' I-I know it's hard, t-to... to reach out. W-when you're in pain, when you... h-have a secret, you think 'it's better that nobody knows'. You c-convince yourself you're in c-control, and you're... p-preventing a worst case s-scenario. You build it up s-so big in your head that j-just thinking about it hurts, l-let alone talking about it. B-but... keeping it inside i-is just going to hurt you more. I-I'm not saying you h-have to tell someone, e-even though I think you s-should. B-but... if it's e-ever too much to carry... y-y-you can talk to m-me. I-I promise I'll always listen.

* ''Fanfic/RaiseYourVoiceAgainstLiars'': An unintentional {{Aver|tedTrope}}sion of this gets PlayedForDrama. While the Phantom Thieves recognized that Gabriel was a ControlFreak, they don't attempt to target him and change his heart right away, due to having other targets that need to be dealt with. Once they learn that he's Hawkmoth, they set their sights upon him. When Adrien learns all of this, he complains that none of them cared about ''his'' safety, bitterly remarking that clearly none of them know what it's like to live with somebody like that. This causes a good chunk of the Phantom Thieves to wince, as many of them ''do'' have personal experience with abusive guardiands.

* African-American Bruce [=MacDonald=] in ''Film/ConquestOfThePlanetOfTheApes'' is willing to protect Caesar, likely because he knows all about dehumanisation, oppression and exploitation from his own racial background. He asks Caesar not to act like the humans who enslaved his kind, invoking his slave ancestry while doing so.

* In ''Film/District9'', Wikus initially does not seem to mind harassing and even killing the aliens [[spoiler:while he is still human]]. It is only later[[spoiler:, when he hasn't only started turning into an alien himself, but has also been treated as less than human and even been experimented upon by humans]] that he starts fighting alongside the aliens, though it is not made clear whether he is truly doing this because he, having suffered the same treatment, now sees it as wrong and fights it for that reason[[spoiler:, or because he still believes he needs to protect the aliens so they can turn him human again]].

** In ''Literature/UnseenAcademicals'', Pepe stands up to the bully Andy when no-one else does[[spoiler:, both by providing the protagonists with protection against Andy's favoured GroinAttack and by actually cutting Andy with a knife, a treatment Andy is very keen on inflicting on others]], and in his TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, Pepe states that he is very familiar with bullies, implicitly from having been bullied himself[[spoiler:, potentially about his ambiguous species and sexuality]], and will not allow bullies to get away with it anymore.

* ''Series/TheLateLateShowWithCraigFerguson'': In 2007, unlike other humorists and late night talk show hosts, Creator/CraigFerguson notably refused to ridicule Music/BritneySpears while she was suffering her CreatorBreakdown, as he sincerely sympathized with her struggles, sharing stories about his own struggles with drug and alcohol abuse when he was younger, culminating with a plan to commit suicide on Christmas Day, which he called off at the last minute when he stepped into a pub for some sherry, and decided he needed help. He did the same thing about Creator/CharlieSheen as he suffered his own breakdown in 2011.

* Emily Lindin, a feminist activist who founded anti-sexual bullying website [[https://www.unslutproject.com/ The UnSlut Project]], did so due to slut-shaming she experienced in middle and high school.

* In 2018, Music/PaulMcCartney participated in a March For Our Lives rally in New York City to protest gun violence. When asked why the cause was important to him, he replied, "One of my best friends was killed by gun violence.", referring to his Music/TheBeatles bandmate Music/JohnLennon, who was shot to death by a LoonyFan in NYC in 1980.

** In''Manga/GTOTheEarlyYears'', Eikichi's father was [[DisappearedDad never around]] when he was a kid, so one of his {{Berserk Button}}s is deadbeat fathers, as Makoto finds out to his terror during a PregnancyScare.

''Manga/GreatTeacherOnizuka''. In that series, he ''[[SuplexFinisher suplexes the vice principal]]'' for calling wayward students "trash".
* ''Manga/GTOTheEarlyYears'':
** Eikichi's father was [[DisappearedDad never around]] when he was a kid, so one of his {{Berserk Button}}s is deadbeat fathers, as Makoto finds out to his terror during a PregnancyScare.
** He also has at least one horrible SadistTeacher, which informs his actions in the sequel series

* The African mercenary Albert Laurent decides to help the main characters in ''Film/TheIsland''. Their tattooed numbers[[spoiler:, which identify them as clones - their lives to be thrown away for the benefit of their purchasers - ]] remind him of the reason he was branded himself as a child[[spoiler:, making him switch sides]].

!!Examples

** He also has at least one horrible SadistTeacher, which informs his actions in the sequel series ''Manga/GreatTeacherOnizuka''. In that series, he ''[[SuplexFinisher suplexes the vice principal]]'' for calling wayward students "trash".

* In ''Franchise/DragonAge: ComicBook/BlueWraith'', the title character is a former slave who (since being freed from his master's control in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'') has taken up the cause of SlaveLiberation in the heart of the Tevinter Imperium, particularly targeting magisters with designs of turning their slaves into {{Living Weapon}}s -- like his former owner did to him.

[[folder:Film]]

* In the 2021 film ''Film/{{Old}}'', African-American policeman Mitchel immediately helps Trent and Maddox, no questions asked[[spoiler:, when they reveal to him the resort's management runs cruel and ultimately fatal medical experiments on some of the guests. Considering Mitchel's family's likely history of slavery as well as the more recent [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Syphilis_Study Tuskegee medical experiments on African-Americans]] it's not surprising that everybody on the beach having been exploited and effectively enslaved for medical experimentation touches a nerve and prompts Mitchel to quick action.]]

* In Frank Herbert's ''Literature/{{Dune}}'' series, the Bene Gesserit struggle to improve humanity because they have inherited all the atrocities humanity has both suffered and inflicted through their GeneticMemory (though it would be argued by the Bene Gesserit themselves that this is more of a case of the Bene Gesserit being [[TheAtoner the atoners]] rather than [[OpposeWhatYouSuffered opposing what their genetic ancestors suffered]] since they only inherit the memories of ''survivors'' - which usually means the memories of those who perpetrate atrocities rather than suffer them).

* ''Series/TheLateLateShowWithCraigFerguson'': In 2007, unlike other humorists and late night talk show hosts, Creator/CraigFerguson notably refused to ridicule Music/BritneySpears while she was suffering her CreatorBreakdown, as he sincerely sympathized with her struggles, sharing stories about his own struggles with drug and alcohol abuse when he was younger, culminating with a plan to commit suicide on Christmas Day, which he called off at the last minute when he stepped into a pub for some sherry, and decided he needed help. He did the same thing about Creator/CharlieSheen as he suffered his own breakdown in 2011.

* In ''VisualNovel/IkemenSengoku'', Hideyoshi is especially passionate about Nobunaga's plans to create a more equal world and always does his best to stand up for the lowest members of society because he himself grew up in poverty [[spoiler:and specifically, as a member of the Sanka gypsies, a maligned ethnicity]] and was only saved from that status due to Nobunaga's charity.

** [[spoiler:The villainous]] Yuthura Ban wants to complete her [[spoiler:Sith]] training to gain the power to free slaves explicitly because she used to be a slave herself[[spoiler:, which would also make this a case of EvilVersusEvil - by the time you meet her, she has certainly become a WellIntentionedExtremist at best and is close to even JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope and abandoning her heroic cause entirely.]]

** Pretty much all the civilisations [[spoiler: already wiped out by the Reapers in previous cycles]] who have been working on the Crucible, [[spoiler: a device that is supposed to [[ExactWords end the Reaper threat once and for all]],]] count, because they clearly want to make sure the same thing does not happen to other civilisations [[spoiler: even if it is too late for themselves]]. Also counts as [[FlingALightIntoTheFuture Flinging a Light into the Future]].

[[folder:WesternAnimation]]

* Defied by Archibald Snatcher in ''WesternAnimation/TheBoxtrolls'', who, as a "Red-Hat," is of lower social status than the "White-Hats," but is quite willing to step on those who are even lower on the rungs of the social ladder than himself, i.e. the eponymous vilified boxtrolls. Played straight and even lampshaded by the Red-Hats Mr. Trout and Mr. Pickles, who have a HeelRealization and, even when faced with failing to obtain a better social status by doing so, decide to aid the oppressed [[spoiler: boxtrolls and their human allies Winifred and Eggs]].

* In ''WesternAnimation/CorpseBride'', Emily had her happiness stolen from her [[spoiler:when she was murdered for her dowry by the man she had eloped with]]. At the end, she protects Victoria from a similar fate [[spoiler:even at the cost of her own happiness, and especially because it would now have been Emily who inflicted such a fate on another bride]], because she knows exactly how painful it is.