History YMMV / NotAlwaysRight

** [[https://notalwaysright.com/one-day-will-be-her-last-call/189686/ This woman]] is treated as TooDumbToLive for using a cell phone at a gas station. Problem is, the idea that cell phones are capable of creating sparks that could cause fires at gas stations has been [[https://tacit.livejournal.com/181834.html repeatedly]] [[https://www.wired.com/2003/03/cell-phone-fires-a-lot-of-static/ dismissed]] [[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fuelish-pleasures/ as pseudoscience]], spread not because employees believed it but to prevent distraction-related fuel spills and accidental pump-and-runs. The customer ''is'' being a jerk by disregarding the multiple signs and the attendant's warning, and even moreso for being apparently indifferent to the idea that her actions could have repercussions (getting in trouble with their boss) for the employee, but she's not actually putting her own or anyone else's life at risk.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Has its [[AlternativeCharacterInterpretation/NotAlwaysRight own page]].

*** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/an-ugly-side-of-society-has-been-unmasked/198813/ this story]] set during the COVID-19 pandemic, both local city's ordinance and corporate rule of the coffee shop's the story is set, require people to wear masks to be allowed inside stores. A rude regular customer of the coffee shop (the submitter is an employee of said coffee shop) makes a scandal because he wants to enter without mask. He ends up picking a used disposable mask which was lying in the coffee shop's trash can and wears it to enter the building. Since then, he goes back to the coffee shop almost each day, still wearing the same filthy mask.

** While it did create extra work and he should've been more thoughtful when he was making the purchase, many commenters pointed out that the customer in [[https://notalwaysright.com/the-couponator-7-the-forgotten-coupon/117520/ this story]] had a right to be annoyed at the OP. Having made the purchase and having the receipt in his hands, he was well within his rights to return the items so that he could buy them again with a coupon he forgot to use. [[DownplayedTrope The OP does]] say it's against "company policy," but how so is omitted; and if it truly was, there should've at least been more explanation as to why he couldn't refund the items. If, say, the customer just wanted to return the items, there likely wouldn't be any issue.

** The switch also resulted in the breaking of not only links within the site to other stories (such as a part X story containing links to previous parts), but also image posts (consequently rendered blank) - neither of which have been fully remedied as of April 2019, nearly two years after the change. Fortunately, the more popular ones have been saved in [[https://notalwaysright.com/the-75-highest-rated-not-always-right-stories-of-all-time-6/84124/ here]], although the links to many of them are broken. Site management seems to be making no effort to either correct the issue or remove the affected posts.

*** Others have agreed with this criticism, but for a different reason - many readers have preferred orders in which they read the sister sites, and some of these liked to save [=NAHopeless=] for last as a reminder that humanity isn't always terrible.

** The launch of "Not Always Healthy" in particular has gotten a lot of this. In most stories on the other sites you have a Jerkass or an idiot, sure... but seeing these same type of people in medical situations verges disturbingly close to LethallyStupid, with a lot of posters who were treated wrong by their medical staff having afflictions that could cripple or even kill them coldly dismissed as something minor or overreacted to.

** The same technique - using different names/terms to convey the same information - is also often used to tell the story without revealing any identifying information, such as using 'Kinderly' to represent a name that's one letter off from a common one, or referring to a man whose name has a silent first letter as 'Django'.

** A commenter example: Stephen is a commenter who is famous on the site for making puns. His comments tend to be the top rated comment in the section, and the replies often spiral into a HurricaneOfPuns.

** In general, anything with the [[https://notalwaysright.com/tag/revolting "Revolting"]] tag [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin is a ripe source of this.]] Specific examples:

* WhatDoYouMeanItsForKids: [[https://notalwaysright.com/never-had-a-mom-like-me/116621/ The submitter's mom]] gets upset because they went to see ''WesternAnimation/{{Aladdin}}'' with a friend, but only because she wanted to see it as well. She ends up taking the kid back to the theater just so she can see it.

** The unicycling Easter bunny mentioned under Big Lipped Alligator Moment counts.

* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic: [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic/NotAlwaysRight Has its own page.]]

* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic:
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/retract-the-tract/82467 This atheist couple]] are clearly meant to be the "good" customers in contrast to the stingy religious customers, but considering that they only mention they're atheists to compare themselves to religious people and their idea of "everything worthwhile about religion" is "nothing", they come across as incredibly smug and self-righteous {{Hollywood atheist}}s. Additionally, a commenter points out that the couple had no way of knowing the OP wasn't themself religious, in which case the "note" would've come across as incredibly insulting towards their beliefs.
** The [[https://notalwaysright.com/time-short-scammer/110395 customer in this story]] is clearly trying to scam this ice cream store, bringing in $100 bills for $2 purchases early in the morning, going out to their car to hide small amounts of the change, and then coming back in to demand they get the $5-$10 they were short. Ordinarily, the scammer would get the brunt of the derision from the comments section, except that the manager (the poster of the story) falls for the scam ''twice'' before cottoning on, despite how many red flags there were (and even if it wasn't a scam, it's a bad practice to accept hundreds for small purchases because it depletes your entire supply of change for the day). Some people also pointed out that the $100 bills could have very easily been fake (which is common in scams like this), meaning the poster could have been tricked into giving out hundreds of dollars instead of just the $15 that the scammer got out of them.
** The submitter of [[https://notalwaysright.com/the-motherboard-of-all-misunderstandings/160006/ this story]], a computer repair worker, is upset that the customer didn't inform them of an app that tinted their screen yellow, causing them to wrongly diagnose the new motherboard as faulty. Fair enough, but the submitter A) states that the computer didn't "malfunction" until two seconds ''after'' Windows had loaded (which proved that the tinting was related to the software, not the hardware), B) admits to not asking about a tinting app before the installation, and C) still tries to spin it as solely the customer's fault. [[WhatWereYouThinking The comments rip them to pieces]].
** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/i-am-pissing-sarcasm/177666/ this story]], one of the submitter's assigned tasks is "to stand and direct people to various venue events, concessions, or the restrooms". A customer asks them if they work there, if they have restrooms, and where the restrooms are (note that the OP is standing directly underneath the sign for the restrooms). The poster (internally) follows every single sentence from the customer with a snide comment and gives the customer a sarcastic wrong answer (which the poor customer believes) to the question of where the restrooms are. As the comments section points out, missing a sign in a crowded, noisy movie theater lobby isn't actually all that surprising, and directing customers to the restrooms is something that the OP stated was an explicit part of their job.
** The hotel desk clerk in [[https://web.archive.org/web/20210715070403/https://notalwaysright.com/all-idiots-look-alike/238719/ this story (now archived)]] starts out by bragging that they're a "smarta** with no filter". Their boss is Korean, and they frequently have customers who mistake her for being Chinese. OP is unbearably chagrined that in 2021 anyone can't tell the difference between the East Asian races, seemingly stemming from a guilty conscience because they used to think all Hispanic people were Mexican. So when someone says that they spoke to the 'Chinese woman', OP says that nobody like that works there and refuses to help them, acting like they're fighting the good fight by dunking on bigots. Before the story was pulled, commenters almost unanimously thought they were just being an asshole.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/to-term-a-contradiction/78226/ This submitter]] talks about having to deal with a teenage customer who admits to being a fan of both ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' and ''[[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Twilight]]'', the latter of which the submitter and their co-worker had just been criticizing. While the submitter presents themselves as being beleaguered by an annoying fan, the commenters have instead sided with the teenager, pointing out that the submitter comes off as a snob who looks down on anyone who doesn't share their opinion. Not helping matters is that the submitter attributes the teen's use of BuffySpeak to ''Meyer's'' influence, despite the fact that ''Buffy'' is ''literally the TropeNamer'' due to being frequently credited as being the originator of that sort of speech.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/caesars-death-was-less-painful-than-this/245601/ This restaurant's]] Chicken Caesar Salad is stated to be pretty different from the classic salad, though most customers enjoy it nonetheless. A customer orders it and then makes a big fuss once she gets her salad and notices that it doesn't contain the correct ingredients. While she could have been more attentive (especially because she stated that she didn't read the menu, which the author says lists all of the ingredients for the salad), many comments point out that the restaurant is partially at fault for this, as using the name of a famous recipe with specific ingredients to refer to a different dish is asking for trouble.
--->'''Comment from user Bibliovore:''' Any restaurant can put whatever they want on their menu and call it whatever they wish [edit: beyond trademarks], but if you take a known thing and you change the thing substantially but don't change the name, you _will_ get complaints. That's kind of the price of doing that.
** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/el-idiota-de-mayo/246120/ this story]] (cross-posted from Reddit), the poster and another customer laugh at a customer who doesn't know when Cinco de Mayo is. Several comments point out that Cinco de Mayo is not a major holiday in many areas [[note]]no location tag, but parts of the US that don't have large Hispanic populations don't make a big deal of it[[/note]], and some of the hype in the US is because it's seen as a "drinking holiday" -- if the first customer didn't drink, why would he keep track of the day?[[note]]Part of the scorn may be due to the fact that the name itself refers to the date -- Cinco de Mayo literally translates to "the fifth of May" -- but that only works if the person actually knows Spanish.[[/note]]
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/warming-blue-collars/113774/ One white-collar submitter]] writes a story about meeting someone from a blue-collar job whose line of duty left him covered in dirt, making him feel too embarrassed to shake the submitter's hand, only for the submitter to not only initiate a hand shake, but to pull him in for a hug, ending the story by encouraging the readers to treat blue-collar workers with respect. On the surface, this seems totally fine and even outright [[SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments heartwarming]]. However, the problem with the story is that it reeks with self-righteousness, as many in the comments pointed out how the submitter was clearly only posting the story to see the congratulations they'd get from the site's userbase, with their dialogue reading like a pretentious AuthorTract for the submitter to pat themselves on the back over. Because of this and the story's overall white knight tone, the entire story comes off as incredibly condescending towards blue-collar workers. Ironically, there wound up being nary a positive comment to be seen as a result.
--->'''Comment from user Ian R.:''' Treating blue-collar workers with respect is great and you should do that. Using a blue-collar worker as an opportunity to show off how "humble" you are is the opposite of that.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/bad-customers-all-tend-to-blend-together/296539/ This former barista]] recounts a customer they call stupid for not knowing the two blends being used that day when just asking for a regular coffee, referencing him as the most recent of the many "clueless idiots" they have served. The comments are quick to call out the OP for acting like a snob.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/it-hurts-to-be-behind-the-times/312891 The OP of this story]] suggested a customer's six-year-old car was too old and it should be replaced… because it needs new windshield wipers. The comments pointed out that a) replacing a car over windshield wipers is incredibly wasteful b) six years is not even close to old age for a car.

** [[https://notalwaysright.com/one-day-will-be-her-last-call/189686/ This woman]] is treated as TooDumbToLive for using a cell phone at a gas station. Problem is, the idea that cell phones are capable of creating sparks that could cause fires at gas stations has been [[https://tacit.livejournal.com/181834.html repeatedly]] [[https://www.wired.com/2003/03/cell-phone-fires-a-lot-of-static/ dismissed]] [[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fuelish-pleasures/ as pseudoscience]], spread not because employees believed it but to prevent distraction-related fuel spills and accidental pump-and-runs.

** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/el-idiota-de-mayo/246120/ this story]] (cross-posted from Reddit), the poster and another customer laugh at a customer who doesn't know when Cinco de Mayo is. Several comments point out that Cinco de Mayo is not a major holiday in many areas [[note]]no location tag, but parts of the US that don't have large Hispanic populations don't make a big deal of it[[/note]], and some of the hype in the US is because it's seen as a "drinking holiday" -- if the first customer didn't drink, why would he keep track of the day?[[note]]Part of the scorn may be due to the fact that the name itself refers to the date -- Cinco de Mayo literally translates to "the fifth of May" -- but that's only indicative if the person actually knows Spanish.[[/note]]

** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/el-idiota-de-mayo/246120/ this story]] (cross-posted from Reddit), the poster and another customer laugh at a customer who doesn't know when Cinco de Mayo is. Several comments point out that Cinco de Mayo is not a major holiday in many areas [[note]]no location tag, but parts of the US that don't have large Hispanic populations don't make a big deal of it[[/note]], and some of the hype in the US is because it's seen as a "drinking holiday" -- if the first customer didn't drink, why would he keep track of the day?

** [[https://notalwaysright.com/to-term-a-contradiction/78226/ This submitter]] talks about having to deal with a teenage customer who admits to being a fan of both ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' and ''[[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Twilight]]'', the latter of which the submitter and their co-worker had just been criticizing. While the submitter presents themselves as being beleaguered by an annoying fan, the commenters have instead sided with the teenager, pointing out that the submitter comes off as a snob who looks down on anyone who doesn't share their opinion. Not helping matters is that the submitter attributes the teen's use of BuffySpeak to Meyer's influence, seemingly forgetting that ''Buffy'' is often credited as being the originator of that sort of speech.

* ArchiveBinge: Combined with a mild case of BileFascination, this site can occupy you for ''days''. But if you want to pick up where you left off in the archive, read it by month. The /page [=URLs=] aren't stable because the site presents newest posts first. And then there's the spin-off sites...[[labelnote:To be specific...]]Each page of the website holds 5 stories. [=NAR=] alone, as of early June 2020, has 5,295 pages, making it about 26,475 stories of varying length. The entire website? ''13,053 pages'', or over ''65 thousand'' stories.[[/labelnote]]

** [[https://notalwaysright.com/shift-fire-tonight/97473/ This customer]] whips out a ''miniature flamethrower'' in their wallet and acts like nothing happened. After he leaves, the submitter isn't sure it really happened.

** In any story where a person goes out of their way to be a good person, commenters will suggest that they should be part of the "NAR Avengers initiative". This one, too, has now received [[MemeAcknowledgment acknowledgment from the editors]], in the title of [[https://notalwaysright.com/the-latest-nar-avenger-olive-man/279451/ this story]], the saga of "[[SomethingPerson Olive Man]]".

** [[https://notalwaysright.com/life-is-stranger-than-the-fiction-section/77163 One story on the site]] mentions a pair that were once thrown out for vandalism in a library, because they refused to pay late fees. How were they vandalizing it? They were ''pissing and shitting all over books, and had been at it long enough for each of them to destroy an entire section while the police were on their way.''
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/avoiding-spring-bathroom-break/80070 Another story]] has a customer who cheeses a "cheap beer until you go to the bathroom" deal by wearing an adult diaper. When questioned how they're on pitcher #2 without going to the toilet, they lower their pants, revealing an adult diaper that is soggy and yellow like popcorn butter.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/no-point-gagging-over-spoiled-milk/81446 This story]] has a customer trying to get a refund for a jug of spoiled milk without the receipt. To "convince" the cashier that it's bad, she ''dumps the rancid milk all over the counter''.
** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/an-ugly-side-of-society-has-been-unmasked/198813/ this story]] set during the COVID-19 pandemic, both local city's ordinance and corporate rule of the coffee shop's the story is set, require people to wear masks to be allowed inside stores. A rude regular customer of the coffee shop (the submitter is an employee of said coffee shop) makes a scandal because he wants to enter without mask. He ends up picking a used disposable mask which was lying in the coffee shop's trash can and wears it to enter the building. Since then, he goes back to the coffee shop almost each day, still wearing the same filthy mask.
** [[https://notalwaysright.com/coming-this-fathers-day-the-splattering/213683/ This story]] involves a woman absolutely destroying a restaurant's toilet with feces and vomit. It's so bad that it's preceded with "[[ContentWarning CONTENT WARNING]]: GROSS", so you know it's beyond the site's usual levels of disgusting.

* AcceptableTargets:
** This site thrives on stories about entitled customers (Right) and unhelpful workers (Working). Depending on the site, it can extend to badly behaving people in love, family, friendships, education, healthcare, and the law.
** Stories about the ''[[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Twilight]]'' franchise and its more clueless fans abound. Most of them are named "[[TakeThat The Twilight of Our Literacy]], Part X".
** Bigots, bad bosses, and animal abusers earn the highest amounts of vitriol in the comments section.

** In [[https://notalwaysright.com/fickle-over-a-nickel-part-2/79723 this story]], a customer in a Maryland dollar store gets wound up over being presented with a Canadian nickel instead of an American one for her change. Although and the customer screaming at the cashier over this small issue didn't help matters, the cashier's claims that foreign currency "is still worth five cents" and that "any store will accept it" aren't true.