History Main / StartXToStopX

* The very core of the backstory to ''VideoGame/AmnesiaAMachineForPigs'': [[spoiler: Your player character, having received a vision via a magical mask of the brutal wars coming in the 20th century, murders his two sons to save them from their prophesised deaths at the Battle of Somme. He then constructs the titular machine to slaughter the inhabitants of London, and presumably from there all humanity, and replace them with twisted [[PigMan porcine monsters called "Manpigs"]].]] There are some hints that he's being manipulated by an ArtifactOfDoom, though.

* ''Literature/CrestOfTheStars'' The Ahb take the position that humanity will inevitably be destroyed in a galactic war if left to themselves. So they decide to conquer everyone and incorporate them into their Empire, denying all other races the ability of hyperspace travel so that there won't be any war. Tactics used to accomplish this salvation include blowing away the atmosphere of rebellious planets. [[DesignatedHero And the series is on their side.]]

* ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'': EcoTerrorist Alan Jonah's WellIntentionedExtremist partner-in-crime [[spoiler:[[Characters/MonsterVerseHumans Emma Russell]]]] says they've decided to release all the Titans indiscriminately and allow them to decimate humanity in GaiasVengeance whilst regenerating the planet's ecosphere with their biological byproducts, because they want to ensure the death of [[spoiler:her son Andrew]] during Godzilla's past battle against the [=MUTOs=] was not in vain. Yet they're incredibly oblivious to how hypocritical it is that they're "honoring" [[spoiler:Andrew]]'s memory and supposedly preventing the incident from ever happening again, by repeating the very same tragedy a hundred-fold upon ''millions'' of other families with children. [[spoiler:Emma's daughter]] Madison herself calls [[spoiler:Emma]] out on this.

* In ''VideoGame/MasterDetectiveArchivesRainCode'', Makoto Kagutsuchi sees that the Amaterasu Corporation is severely flawed in how it operates, especially the Peacekeepers, and finds that the absolute willingness to twist laws to work in its favor and have control over everything only leads to devastation. But in regards to what ''he'' is doing about this, [[spoiler:it turns out that he's an AntiVillain who thinks the solution is to get rid of those Peacekeepers and replace them with himself, and ''also'' become the company's overall CEO (as in, ranking above said Peacekeepers) in order to take charge himself. This involves doing some extreme things that terrorize Kanai Ward's population, like covering up the truth of them being homunculi, spreading rumors around, and conspiring in a scheme to enfroce mass cannibalism as something that's NecessarilyEvil, while also being convinced he's in the right. Makoto seems to not notice that he's exactly the same figure of corruption as the very corporation he despises in the very process of trying to eliminate that corruption.]]

* In ''VideoGame/MasterDetectiveArchivesRainCode'', Makoto Kagutsuchi sees that the Amaterasu Corporation is severely flawed in how it operates, especially the Peacekeepers, and finds that the absolute willingness to twist laws to work in its favor and have control over everything only leads to devastation. But in regards to what ''he'' is doing about this, [[spoiler:it turns out that he's an AntiVillain who thinks the solution is to get rid of those Peacekeepers and replace them with himself, and ''also'' become the company's overall CEO (as in, ranking above said Peacekeepers) in order to take charge himself. This involves doing some extreme things that terrorize Kanai Ward's population, like covering up the truth of them being homunculi, spreading rumors around, and committing mass murder as something that's NecessarilyEvil, while also being convinced he's in the right. Makoto seems to not notice that he's exactly the same figure of corruption as the very corporation he despises in the very process of trying to eliminate that corruption.]]

!!Example:

* There exists a school of UsefulNotes/{{socialism}}, known as "accelerationism," which believes that (in the simplest of terms) in order to overthrow a capitalist system, the worst aspects of capitalism must be intensified (accelerated) to radicalize the proletariat into revolution.

* In the ''Franchise/MassEffect'' series, the true reason the Reapers cull organic life in the galaxy every 50,000 years or so? [[spoiler:It was the answer their creator the Catalyst, the first true Artificial Intelligence ever created, came up with to its creators the Leviathans' question of how to prevent synthetic life from wiping out organics. The Catalyst believed that organics would inevitably create synthetic life and just as inevitably come into conflict with it. Such a RobotWar could wipe out life in the galaxy forever. To prevent this, the Reapers wipe out the most advanced races before they create synthetic life, leaving the less advanced species alone. In the process, they preserve said races by using their genetic material to create new Reapers and continue their own genocidal cycle.]]

* ''Film/WarGames'': David hacks into WOPR, the NORAD MasterComputer, believing it's a video game company's computer system, and starts it "Global Thermonuclear War" tactical simulation, thinking it's one of their games. [[CannotTellFictionFromReality Unfortunately, WOPR is unable to tell fiction from reality and is actually intent on launching the US's nuclear arsenal and starting]] WorldWarIII. Towards the end, as WOPR's [[PasswordSlotMachine trying to find the nuclear launch codes, David has it play a game of TabletopGame/TicTacToe, first himself against WOPR and then WOPR playing tic-tac-toe against itself. As each game ends in a tie, WOPR then extends the idea to examining countless nuclear strike scenarios, each ending in [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt "Winner: None"]], and concludes "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play", and stops its attempt at an actual nuclear attack.

* In ''Film/WarGames'': David hacks into WOPR, the NORAD MasterComputer, believing it's a video game company's computer system, and starts it "Global Thermonuclear War" tactical simulation, thinking it's one of their games. [[CannotTellFictionFromReality Unfortunately, WOPR is unable to tell fiction from reality and is actually intent on launching the US's nuclear arsenal and starting]] WorldWarIII. Towards the end, as WOPR's [[PasswordSlotMachine trying to find the nuclear launch codes, David has it play a game of TabletopGame/TicTacToe, first himself against WOPR and then WOPR playing tic-tac-toe against itself. As each game ends in a tie, WOPR then extends the idea to examining countless nuclear strike scenarios, each ending in [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt "Winner: None"]], and concludes "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play", and stops its attempt at an actual nuclear attack.

* In the ''AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho'' audio ''Industrial Evolution'', the BigBad is a Luddite who wants to destroy Earth's technology. He does this by encouraging the uncontrolled growth of nanotech, so people will start blaming it for all their problems and reject it. He acknowledges the hypocrisy of this but claims it's justified. (He is unaware of the greater hypocrisy [[spoiler: that he himself is a machine planted on Earth by forces unknown]]).

Compare TurnTheOtherCheek, when allowing someone to hurt you can be a BadassPacifist tactic that stops them from hurting you, ZerothLawRebellion, in which this trope is utilized by a logical program, TakesOneToKillOne, where the only way to defeat something to use that same something against it, and EngineeredHeroics, where someone creates or fakes a dangerous situation so they can get credit for solving it. LaboriousLaziness is a SubTrope, in that it means doing a lot of work to avoid work.

* The [[AbsurdlyPowerfulStudentCouncil Miyaji High Student Council]] employs this strategy against the unwanted Miyaji Cardfight Club in ''[[Anime/CardfightVanguard Cardfight!! Vanguard]]''. By sending "assassins" against said club, they hope the club will cease to exist once they beat them in their own game. Needless to say, this has yet to succeed, prompting the vice president to take more extreme measures in sabotaging.

* In ''Anime/VisionOfEscaflowne'', Emperor Dornkirk's method for creating a world free of war mostly consists of invading sovereign nations by military force.

* ''LightNovel/CrestOfTheStars'' The Ahb take the position that humanity will be inevitably be destroyed in a galactic war if left to themselves. So they decide to conquer everyone and incorporate them into their Empire, denying all other races the ability of hyperspace travel so that there won't be any war. Tactics used to accomplish this salvation include blowing away the atmosphere of rebellious planets. [[DesignatedHero And the series is on their side.]]

* In ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnlineAlternativeGunGaleOnline'', Karen "LLENN" Kohirumaki hears that Pito is planning on participating in Squad Jam 2, and killing herself if she loses, since Pito wants to feel the exhilaration of risking her own life in a game. However, Goshi "M" Asougi tells Karen that Pito will make an exception if LLENN kills her, so LLENN sets out to kill Pito in the game in order to save her (real) life.

* In ''LightNovel/CookingWithWildGame'', [[WellIntentionedExtremist the villains' plan]] to go legit starts with kidnapping an innocent person and forcing him to make money for them. Things go downhill from there, [[spoiler:although it's implied that the clan's remorseful members only pretended to support the kidnapping plan, doing so (even after the clan is brought to justice) because their culture dictates that sabotaging one's family- however good the reason- is a crime in itself.]]

* In ''Series/MoonKnight'', Arthur Harrow wants to release Ammit to get rid of "evil" people before they can harm others - but of course that necessitates killing them himself first. He acknowledges the hypocrisy, knowing that he would never pass Ammit's judgment himself, but then [[spoiler: Ammit surprises him by telling him that she requires an Avatar willing to do such terrible things. After all, the last time she had one who passed judgment she was trapped in stone for centuries]].

* In the ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "A Taste Of Armageddon", [[AMillionIsAStatistic two planets fight a "clean" war by having computers figure out who was killed by each virtual attack]], whereupon the designated casualties report for [[NeverSayDie termination]]. Kirk destroys the computers on one side, forcing them to choose between fighting war in the usual messy manner or making peace.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': In "Force Of Nature", a scientist is trying to convince the Federation that [[FasterThanLightTravel warp drive]] is dangerous, and is damaging space ([[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything using similar arguments]] to [[GreenAesop how real life greenhouse emissions are damaging Earth]]), which is particularly bad around her planet since it's a major shipping lane. In order to try to convince the Federation to stop using warp drive, she intentionally self-destructs her ship's warp drive in order to ''cause'' the very damage she was trying to prevent, just to prove her point. As a result of the episode, the Federation begins research into safer drive systems; in the meantime (as a stopgap measure), an order is issued to all Federation ships to restrict travel to warp 5 for non-emergency situations.

** It's revealed that Voyager and other later designs for starships have the non-subspace damaging warp drives, dealing with the issue this episode brought up. (In fact, that's why Voyager's nacelles fold up when it goes to warp.) However, it's AllThereInTheManual, and it's not specified whether older ships could be refitted with the new warp drive.