Broken Base / Other Media

If it has a fandom, it likely has had a Broken Base at one point or another.

Other media with their own pages:

• Disney Theme Parks
• Harry Potter
• Star Wars

---

Fan Works

• Ask Princess Molestia:
  • Is Molestia a Flat Character with no real character development nor real character flaws? Or is her relationship with Gamer Luna and Twilight Sparkle profound and well developed? When it comes to Molestia's Hidden Depths, fans think they're either touching and insightful, or cliché with no real effect on the character.
  • The entire blog was the subject of numerous arguements on Tumblr as of 2013. Some see it as a funny comedy blog involving Celestia as a pervert who playfully fondles with other adult ponies while others see it as a disgusting endorsement of rape, sexual harassment and sexual assault with its humour and saucy depiction that trivializes types of sexual assault and the attitude that comes with it. And there are those, who found the blog to be average with subpar characterization and humour but with fantastic artwork.
• The Conversion Bureau:
  • This fanfic subgenre has basically broken the My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fanbase into two camps, and they generally tend to loathe one another. One either loves the fic's universe and wishes to partake in its Wish-Fulfillment, or they absolutely despise it for its disturbing messages and end up writing their own version that's either a deconstruction, parody, or curb-stomp War Fic (that's in favor of the humans, of course).
  • The Conversion Bureau: The Chatoverse has a stark divide between readers. There are those love her stories and the universes they depict, and there are those who despise them and see them as a nightmare of bad writing, disturbingly misanthropic implications and sharing little with the show itself, save for names.
• Infinity Train: Blossomverse:
  • How much should the various works in the extended 'verse focus on the Pokémon side of the crossover versus the Infinity Train? The correct balance of the crossover, which characters should be focused on more, and how to approach the topic has been a topic of debate among fans and co-writers of the series since the beginning, especially as both sides tend to see the other as contributing to the problems they have with the series overall.
    • The Pokemon preferring side of the fanbase tends to see the Infinity Train half as completely incomprehensible, partially as a result of the tendency towards using train cars to have pseudo-crossovers with other properties. They also tend to see the Infinity Train half as holding all of the worst of the 'verse's vices, being the center point or cause of most of the blame throwing, character assassination, and angst. The Infinity Train also tending to require Pokemon characters to be out of character, generally in the form of being unusually spiteful, apathetic, or stupid to work does not help matters. This side of the fanbase tends to want or prefer focus on the Pokemon characters exclusively, believing that stories focusing a trainless Chloe, or about everyone else while the train is in the background, are simply better and more entertaining and with less angst and wangst, and tend to see any part of the chapter set in the Infinity Train as a waste of space to skim over. More than a few of these fans have even come to hate the original Infinity Train itself due to association with the fic, to a point that more than a few of them felt some level of bitter catharsis when the series was de-listed due to its perceived overfocus and tendency to herald unwanted and often repeated plot points.
    • Those who prefer the Infinity Train side of the story will frequently bring up how while the Train side has its own share of drama, the Pokemon World is just as bad, if not even worse, given the constant Blame Game, character assassination, angst, and characters acting out of character just to fulfill the plot. The fact that the Pokemon themselves and their respective concepts, like battles, journeys, gyms and so on, are either heavily downplayed or ignored completely in favor of the aforementioned points doesn't help, making the Pokemon World segments both In Name Only and a chore to sit through.
  • Another topic of the verse that splits the fanbase is the Massive Multiplayer Crossover nature of the Infinity Train side. Is it a good way to spice things up a little, even allowing for comparisons and interactions that wouldn't be possible if it was only Pokémon and Infinity Train? Or does it make the stories needlessly complicated, and reduces the Infinity Train setting to nothing more than a backdrop to allow whatever crossover the authors want to do at the moment?
• The Most Evil Trainer, a Pokémon Self-Insert, had a quite a conflict among readers over the fact that the main character is actively trying to find a way to leave the Pokemon world and go back to his own world, suffering quite a bit of angst over it. In most Self-Insert stories, the fact that the main character will never see their family and friends again is casually brushed aside in favor of adventure and wish fulfilment, so the story's Deconstruction of that mindset sparked enough of a Flame War for all discussion on it to be permanently banned.
• Neither a Bird nor a Plane, it's Deku! has an in-universe example in Lex Luthor. On one hand, he was a terrifying supervillain, the epitome of Corrupt Corporate Executive, and tried to take over the world multiple times. But he seemed to pull a Heel–Face Turn later in life and became an incredibly successful U.S. president who ended World War III, slashed poverty across the globe, and made countless technological advancements. Scholars aren't sure if his turn to goodness was valid or if he should be forgiven for his previous actions.
• In Total Drama fanfic Total Drama: Cody's Redemption: The story as a whole to the Total Drama community as a whole. It has an outspoken and loyal fanbase, but quite a large number of critics have cited it as an example of bad storytelling.

Film

• The Back to the Future fandom has the disagreement over the two sequels. Nearly everyone seems to agree that one of them was good and the other didn't quite measure up, but they can't seem to agree which is which. Back to the Future Part II partisans favor it for what they regard as a uniquely creative plot that spans three separate time periods, viewing Part III as an unremarkable retread of The Western. Part III partisans favor it for what they regard as a more mature storyline in which Marty and Doc both go through some meaningful character growth, viewing Part II as a load of pointless wackiness. There are many fans who love all three films, but even those that love all of them will almost never say the sequels were better.
• Ghostbusters (2016):
  • The film is very divisive among fans of the original film. As with all reboots, some people thought making it was unnecessary while others were onboard with it. Complicating the issue even further was making the protagonists female— some saw this as a pathetic attempt at being PC, while others thought it was good that women were getting representation.
  • Some people saw Patty's sass and lack of a PhD as racist, while others thought that her knowledge of New York history cancelled out any offensive value that those traits might have brought.
• Love, Simon: While the majority of people agree that Abby had a right to be upset with Simon, as he could've told her about Martin's blackmail after he came out to her, thus ending his lies and her being used and forced to endure Martin's presence, fans are more divided on whether Nick's anger is justified. Does he have a right to be mad at his childhood friend for keeping him away from his crush for a few weeks due to blackmail or is he just being petty for abandoning Simon when he needs him? Most people agree, however, that Leah was unnecessarily harsh for abandoning Simon for not liking her back and genuinely believing she liked Nick.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • The biggest argument among fans is whether the X-Men should join the MCU, a debate that has been around since the franchise's inception and has heated up in light of the Disney-Fox merger. Those supporting their inclusion argue that the X-Men would fit well in the MCU's fantastical tone and would get a nice chance from their more grounded and gritty Fox movies. On the other hand, some have pointed out that the mutants-as-oppressed-minority metaphor wouldn't work in the MCU when there are other superpowered heroes present who don't experience the same prejudice as the mutants. Then there are concerns that the X-Men will be tonally watered down to fit within the much more family-friendly MCU, with proponents of this argument pointing to the Deadpool movie as proof of this allegedly already happening.
  • Doctor Strange: The casting of Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One has been divisive. While many are glad to have a powerful character be portrayed by a female actor, especially one as accomplished as Swinton, others are upset that she is white while the original Ancient One was Tibetan, mostly because the MCU (at the time) had no Asian superheroes. Co-writer C. Robert Cargill's comments on it being done to prevent the movie from being Banned in China due to the Chinese government not really liking Tibet (which the studio itself later denied) added more fuel to the fire. Cargill also didn't help things by accusing all the people upset over it of being "social justice warriors", though he later backpedaled on it and said everyone absolutely has the right to have issues with it.
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming:
    • The fact that Tony Stark is the one making Spider-Man's suit upgrades — an element which was already a bit divisive following Civil War — has caused a bit of a stir among the fans. Some don't like it, as they feel it cheapens Peter's status as an independent Teen Genius who was never anyone's sidekick in the comics, and that Iron Man became a spotlight stealer at Peter's expense. Others defend the idea as being consistent with the idea that Peter is operating on limited resources (as seen in Civil War with his initial costume), and note that Peter originally came up with most of the suit's functions and innovations himself (such as the webbing and the adjusting eye lenses), whereas Stark just made them smaller and with more efficient material, and it's also refreshing in emphasizing a new tactical side to Spider-Man's crimefighting rather than the brawling and swinging approach shown in previous films.
    • Iron Man being involved in the film at all. Some love the fact that he has a supporting role to help showcase the connectivity between the Marvel Cinematic Universe and show that the characters are indeed interacting between films, again after Phase 2 was criticized for featuring very little of this. Also, it's the first time that a Spider-Man film features a second superhero. Others are more split, feeling that Marvel is shoehorning Iron Man in too much to bank on his Wolverine Publicity and that Spider-Man should be allowed to stand on his own in his first solo film in the MCU, and doing otherwise takes that away from him.
    • A contingent of the film's critics feel that the refusal to at least briefly mention Uncle Ben and the lesson and overall motivation Peter got from his death removes substance from Peter's character; at worst, the film giving him Destructive Saviour tendencies in his eagerness to prove himself to Tony Stark and the Avengers may feel out of character from his appearance in Civil War, given what (we assumed) happened offscreen. While Stark urges him to be a better hero in response, the connection of the power/responsibility theme to Peter's greatest failure, causing Uncle Ben's death, is missed. Others are just glad to have an arc for the character that doesn't fall back on that part of the backstory, making the film feel fresher compared to the previous Amazing reboot.
    • The famous scene where Peter gets trapped under rubble, a scene clearly inspired by If This Be My Destiny, one of the most famous storylines in Spider-Man history. The division is between people who think it's an amazing scene, probably the best in the entire film, and those who think it completely felt flat on its face. Fans commend it for the reference to the comics and for Holland's acting, who sold Peter's state of mind in that scene: a 15 year old who thinks is going to die and panics accordingly. Detractors, however, think that the scene wasn't thematically earned, and failed to capture what made the scene great in the comics (this last part ties in directly with the previous entry about the absence of the power/responsibility theme—Peter originally lifted the rubble to reach Aunt May's lifesaving medication, thinking that he couldn't fail her like he did Uncle Ben—since they think the whole "If you're nothing without the suit, then you shouldn't have it" line doesn't fit the concept of Spider-Man, whether from the comics or from Homecoming itself, and thus is not deemed a good thematic substitute).
  • After the passing of Chadwick Boseman, Marvel made the decision to kill off T'Challa and not recast for the role. Some fans believe that it's only right to do so, as Boseman's performance would be a massive Tough Act to Follow and that replacing him would be an insult to the man’s legacy. Others argue that not recasting T'Challa is an insult to the man's legacy and that killing off the character permanently would severely cripple the Black Panther franchise down the road. Further inflaming debate, Marvel made Shuri the new face of the Black Panther franchise and chose the opposite approach with Thaddeus Ross' character following the death of William Hurt, which lead to accusations of double standard casting.
• Star Trek:
  • Star Trek: The Motion Picture: A crashing bore that nearly buried the Trek franchise for good, or a worthy Trek Spiritual Successor to 2001: A Space Odyssey? For better and/or worse, it's probably the Trek film that comes closest to being an episode of the Original Series in movie format. Compare Star Trek III The Search Fo Spock, which tends to get much more muted reactions from just about everybody. Maybe the only Trek movie to get this treatment (at least until the J. J. Abrams films) especially after the Re-Cut DVD version, which many felt improved the movie.
  • Star Trek Into Darkness:
    • Was Khan's casting worth it to see Benedict Cumberbatch's acting talent, or was it pointless whitewashing of a famous person of color role that wasted the opportunity for a Sikh actor to have gotten a really big break playing a classic villain?^note Despite the original actor still not being the same race as Khan's entire name would suggest. Are the detractors justified in their accusations of racism, or misguided and counterproductive political correctness or are people just overreacting? After 9/11, would it be wise to cast an actor of color to play a terrorist who crashes a flying vehicle into a populated city? Though the later point adds to the discussion about whether Khan should have been used at all.
    • Is the film essentially a remake of previous Star Trek films or merely an homage?
    • Was Kirk's Disney Death believable (setting aside how unlikely it is they would kill off a main character in the first place) or was it not?
  • Star Trek Beyond: Sulu being revealed to be gay. While many fans are naturally ecstatic at the franchise getting its first explicitly gay character after numerous false starts over its run, others (including Sulu's original actor George Takei himself) deride it as a gimmick based on Takei's sexuality and an affront to Gene Roddenberry's original concept for the character,^note Takei and Roddenberry had discussed the possibility of having gay characters on the original series, but Roddenberry explained that all the characters had to be heterosexual due to social mores of the time and because the series was already constantly on the brink of cancellation due to its portrayal of sex and race relations. It was an explanation Takei accepted and he didn't seek to change Sulu's sexuality. and say if the crew really wanted to include a gay character, it should have been someone new. Some also believe that revealing that Sulu had been gay the whole time implies that he was in the closet for the entirety of the original series. Simon Pegg tried using Word of God to say that Cho's Sulu's sexual orientation is different from Takei's Sulu,^note The timing probably works: Sulu was most likely conceived and born after the timeline split; see current research on biological determination of sexual orientation. but this has its own problems. Then there's people who just think it was a mistake to make a big thing of it (for the record, the movie itself doesn't: Sulu's husband is visible for twenty seconds total and could easily be mistaken for a platonic family member taking only the film itself as evidence). That is problematic as well in that it looks like the studio did it in a way that wouldn't offend anyone that might find it offensive, barely different than what Roddenberry was allowed. They could have shown what was shown in this film back in the 60s TV show.
• Thomas and the Magic Railroad:
  • One side of Thomas fans think that this film is a fantastic big-screen debut to the titular #1 little blue locomotive, while another side of Thomas fans think that it's decent at best and flawed at worst, and another side of Thomas fans believe that it was a bad movie that started the downfall of the Thomas franchise in general and took away the charm and realism the books and the original series had.
  • Which villain do you like better? P.T. Boomer or Diesel 10?
  • Would the film have been better had it stuck to Britt Allcroft's original vision instead of being cut down at the last minute? Some fans argue that Allcroft's original vision should've been kept intact and that it would've made for a much more cohesive story than the messy final film. In contrast, others argue that it wouldn't have made a difference, since the film's premise is too flawed and broken for it to work regardless of what was and wasn't cut, with some arguing that the cuts made were mostly for the better since it has led to a better balance between Thomas and the humans and is more focused than what Britt's original vision was. This debate would only intensify after a workprint got leaked and fans got a better idea of Britt's original vision for the film, with both sides feeling vindicated for differing reasons.
• A Wedding (1978): Depending on who you ask, A Wedding is either a solid Robert Altman outing or one of his worst films. Some people consider it to be a satirical masterpiece with a great Ensemble Cast, while others view it as an unfunny film which has too many characters to do any of them justice.
• Pixar: There is a significant debate online about whether Pixar movies can be classified as Disney or not. Some argue that since Pixar is a subsidiary of Disney, and that all Pixar movies were distributed by Disney and have the Disney label on them, they are Disney. Others argue that Pixar is separate from Disney, and insist on not classifying Pixar as Disney.
  • Turning Red: The film's art style. While largely well-received for its frenetic and energetic style that made it stand out artistically from other Pixar movies, it has its detractors who find the Animesque art style ugly (some making unfavorable comparisons to Steven Universe, despite the movie's art style being far more heavily influenced by anime and manga) or just too big and jarring of a departure from Pixar's usual style.
• The entire concept of colorizing black-and-white films was a massive and heated debate back during the practice's heyday in the late '80s and '90s spearheaded by Ted Turner. Detractors saw it as tantamount to vandalizing a painting and destroying the artistic vision of the film. Their mood was not helped by the fact that early computer colorization techniques were often crude, ending up looking like crayon over a photocopy, and inconsistent, with color choices left up to the colorists with little to no research material available on what the correct colors for a scene were actually supposed to be. Supporters argued that it made older movies accessible to people who might be turned off by black-and-white and added new nuances to the movies^note their argument was somewhat bolstered by the fact that TV stations and networks favored color programming over black-and-white, and that Turner and other colorization houses were also preserving the original films, often in danger of being permanently lost due to film-stock decay by making new negatives as they were prepping for the process. Turner himself would go from the "support" camp to the "detractor" camp by the end of the fad^note only partly due to the controversy, but also because colorization turned out to be an absurdly expensive process, and as a public mea culpa founded Turner Classic Movies, dedicated to showing classic cinema uncut and unaltered.

General Fiction

• Fans of all things zombie have a broken base over whether or not Romero-style zombies can successfully overtake the real world. One group of fans says yes, and it would happen fast. Another group says it can happen but nowhere near as fast as it's depicted in movies/literature, etc. The last group says a zombie plague won't end the world because everyone and their momma knows what a zombie is and how to dispose of it. And that the government won't just collapse within a matter of months like it's usually depicted. At the most the zombie plague would just be a recurring health problem like cancer and AIDS.
  • A sub-group of the latter group agrees with this but thinks the casualties would be more devastating then the last group thinks.
  • Cracked discussed why the Zombie Apocalypse will fail and how it could succeed
  • There is another Zombie-related issue breaking up the fans as well, namely on the usefulness of the .22 caliber round against a zombie. Ever since Max Brooks came out with The Zombie Survival Guide, there has been an ongoing argument on the rounds effectiveness of destroying the brain of a zombie. Proponents argue it would bounce around inside of the skull and it's more common than dirt. Detractors say there is no guarantee that it will even penetrate the skull or do that brain-destroying damage (for what it's worth, reality and the laws of physics can vouch that .22 rounds don't repeatedly pinball around inside the skulls of the living). Some have gone so far to say that the .22 is the only bullet that would be effective at stopping a zombie and all other rounds are less useful or just plain useless.
• The constantly changing image of dinosaurs often sparks debates. Old-school dinosaur geeks that grew up in the Jurassic Park-era display a fierce harshness towards the scientifically now-accepted fact that, for example, raptors and would have been feathered or at least fuzzy, and criticize works that depict dinosaurs as realistic animals instead of reptilian movie-monsters. Meanwhile hard-core paleontology fans, knowing that the fossil evidence clearly supports their side, simply dismiss these people (often rudely). Even among them, though, there is a serious break when it comes to how close works about dinosaurs (and other prehistoric creatures) should stay to the known facts. Is it okay for non-scientific movies to still depict raptors with scales, or unacceptable? Should artists only draw what we can reliably infer from the fossils, or is wild speculation okay as long as it doesn't contradict the evidence? Arguments frequently occur because many paleontologists and general paleo-nerds treat their obsession as very Serious Business, and don't want mass-media misrepresenting their work.
  • Referenced in-universe in the book version of Jurassic Park. When they cloned the dinosaurs, they found that they moved far more quickly than the plodding, lumbering animals in the popular imagination and worried that people would not accept them. There was some talk of creating genetically modified "slow" dinosaurs (which would also, incidentally, have been easier to control) before Hammond nixed it.
• Concerning horror stories:
  • Horror fans seems to be split over the quality of audacious foreign horror films when compared to American horror films. They're either refreshing and daring, or gory pretentious crap.
  • Among horror fans there's a sub-debate on what should be considered a horror film as oppose to a thriller and vice versa. Some feel that thrillers are neutered horror films made for people who can't hack "Real" horror.
  • Another divide is over the style and approach of making horror Films/Books, etc... Some prefer the subtlety of Nothing Is Scarier, Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane, and Doing In the Wizard approach (Exemplified by the people who thought The Descent was good "Until the crawlers showed up"), Some preferring the Through the Eyes of Madness approach, some prefer the Gorn approach. Or perhaps some prefer the Attack of the Killer Whatever and or Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever. Some people think having supernatural entities is what makes a real horror film while others think it's a cheap gimmick. Some even take the diplomatic approach and prefer all, or several, of the above.
  • Within the film medium there's the whole debate over when is dark, bleak, and depressing, too dark, bleak and depressing? And the use of the Downer Ending... Some are of the opinion that people are completely missing the point and that horror is SUPPOSED to be dark, bleak, and depressing. Others take the view that using such a limiting definition and emotional palate only serves to make everything ultimately seem exactly the same. Acceptable Breaks from Reality and Anthropic Principle play a HUGE part in these debates. The disagreements over bleak and dark tone seem to be mostly a matter of personal taste more than anything.
  • A common problem in horror movies tends to be the fact some fans see the genre as nothing but Too Bleak, Stopped Caring. For example: The cast of potential victims is presented as a bunch of obnoxious jerks, and/or complete idiots, to the point where it's hard to feel bad for them when they finally start dying, (although for many that's part of the appeal). On the other hand, if the horror movie has a sympathetic cast (who are often a family as well, for added pathos) as a victim it could have another negative effect ranging from Shoot the Dog to Moral Event Horizon (as far as the writers, creators etc being accused of crossing it themselves... unfairly or not) to Crosses the Line Twice. Which could also turn off certain groups of horror fans as well, which possibly explain the constant obnoxious jerk characters as a substitute, and villains constantly being prone to being Draco in Leather Pants. Creators of horror films (especially mainstream American horror films) like to be broadly appealing; you can't have a popular horror film where expies of The Waltons and the Cosbys are brutally murdered by the villain. While it might be too horrifying to subject, say, a charming, wholesome, likeable family to the events of a horror film, making potential victims unlikable and rooting for the monster are both missing the point of horror. Why should you be scared of something you're actually hoping to happen? This is sort of a inherent divisiveness within the genre. Horror fans want to be scared, but doesn't want it to come by way of hurting innocent likeable characters. Which is terribly ironic considering certain horror fans complain about the genre lacking likeable characters.
  • And whether or not to use humor and comedy. Does it add to the movie and mood or destroy it?
  • For the literature medium there are those who prefer the short and simple stories to the 900 page doorstops. Mostly because they think horror stories are much more effective as short stories, as bigger books tends to drag.
  • There's also a debate over perceived attitudes towards the genre. For instance, on message boards, there will be a fan who'll say something along the lines of, "Yaaay they're making Terror on Cliched Street, part 20!", and another disgruntled one who'll say something like "*ugh* Hollywood has run out of ideas". The latter will think the former is everything that is wrong with horror today, while the former thinks that the latter group are a bunch of pretentious Jerkasses who think foreign horror is the best thing since indoor plumbing, and is taking the genre too seriously. The latter often counter-argues by saying they're the ones that are giving horror fans a "bad name" (and by extension the whole genre).
  • Some people think that sci-fi (similar to how some people view supernatural entities) is necessary to make a "real" horror film. On the other hand, some think adding too much sci-fi and technobabble ruins the genre, likely a microcosm of the Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane approach where they use science or sci-fi to explain away the paranormal/supernatural (which some see as a cop out). Same thing can be said for adding in action.
  • Is it a bad idea to try and explain everything in a horror story/plot, and is it best to leave it mysterious and vague? Or is that a Writer Cop Out?
  • Anytime a Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane horror movie turns out to be Real After All. Case in point, The Last Exorcism.
  • There's also accusations of people Running the Asylum for the worse by keeping all of the arguably negative stuff around because they think it's the norm for the genre, creating a horror version of Sci Fi Ghetto.
• Speaking of horror genre, there seems to be a divide on how to make zombie films/books/shows, and what makes a good zombie story as oppose to a generic zombie story. Should they be humorous zombie killing action pieces? Or dramatic, thought provoking, Socio-Political commentary and or deep character studies? Or alternatively dark, bleak, survival horror, disaster stories ala Black Summer, World War Z etc? Or some compromise hybrid of all or some the above?
  • As mentioned in the Film/28DaysLater example, what does or does not constitute a proper cinema zombie is up for big debate. Can zombies be fast or does that fly in the face of what a zombie should be? Are they mindless walking corpses with no goal other than to eat the living, or should they have a deeper level that allows them to form basic plans and organize? Are they caused by magic? Toxic waste? A virus? Numerous fans will insist that changing a single element destroys the zombie title.
• Combat robots, as seen in stuff like BattleBots and Robot Wars, have a split between fans of robots designed around damage and destruction and fans of robots designed around technique and manipulation. The former favor full-body spinners, flywheel users, spinning drums, and hammer-bots whereas the latter prefer lifters, trappers, push-bots, and wedges, with launchers somewhere in between (but generally well-liked by both parties, as these bots require finesse and create spectacle when they work as intended). The former group of fans want to see robots getting torn apart and ripped to shreds, and the latter group of fans like seeing skilled piloting used to control the tide of battle. Both groups tend to see the other as rather boring to watch, and hence there is little peace between them. It doesn't help matters that the winners of these competitions tend to form cycles between damage-based robots and technique-based robots.
• A Fanwork Ban can sometimes start one of these, between fans who support the author's decision and fans who lambast the author and/or defy the ban.
• Among fans of crossdressing male characters (as well as real-life male crossdressers), there's a bit of debate over whether it's acceptable to call them "traps", stemming from an ages old meme about reacting to such a person with the memetic "It's a trap!" line. Proponents think it's fine and people who complain are overreacting based on an irrelevant issue, opponents feel that it carries negative implications; specifically, the idea that a crossdressing man is deceitful, to say nothing about the term also being used to refer to transwomen which some feel that calling crossdressers "traps" already skirts too close to. Nearly any discussion of this topic between people with differing opinions will quickly degrade into mudslinging.
• Fans of cartoons often argue hotly over whether they should follow Status Quo Is God, and especially its subtrope Not Allowed to Grow Up. Some say that changing the status quo prevents the shows from going stale and makes for interesting new plots, while others think that changing the show would make it suck.
• Regarding fanfiction:
  • Shipping will often cause debate, with some saying it is cute/romantic and, in the case of Slash Fic, good for LGBTQ+ representation, and others feeling that it goes against the spirit of the source material (particularly if the source material follows the No Hugging, No Kissing rule). The controversy goes even deeper if the characters being shipped are enemies, related, kids, already have a canon love interest, have very different personalities, or barely know each other. Also, there is debate over whether changing something to make a ship less creepy (e.g. making characters Unrelated in the Adaptation so it's not incest, or aging characters up so they're no longer kids) actually makes the ship permissible or not.
  • Are Dark Fics good and an excuse to explore topics the source material shies away from, or are they needlessly edgy and depressing?
  • Is it ever acceptable to have an Author Avatar so long as they're well written, not over-idealized, and (usually) don't get shipped with anyone, or are all author avatars inherently cringeworthy?
  • Is it a good idea to write a Fix Fic, or is it just a sign that the author is needlessly petty over an issue in the source material they don't like?

Hardware and Programming

• User-friendly Linux distributions such as Ubuntu vs. "power" distros such as Gentoo or Slackware.
  • Ubuntu itself causes a bit of a broken base for the Debian crowd: should Debian be credited more or would that tarnish Debian's reputation as rock solid? And then there's Canonical's recent UI antics, like rearranging buttons on the title bar or nuking the system tray notification area(the fact that they give the latter drifting from Microsoft's original vision as one of their reasons doesn't help). And then there's the the debate over whether GNU's insistence on "GNU/Linux" is mere egotism or justified.
• The Great Editor War, a long and epic battle between the users of Emacs and Vi. The battle between these two programming editors has gone on longer than the Mac vs. PC debate. The rivalry has long been joked about: even the normally bitter Richard Stallman has poked fun at the debate, declaring himself head of the "Church of Emacs" declaring war on the "Cult of Vi."
• Android has this in many different ways:
  • Rooted^note Granting superuser/admin privileges to the user, a concept familiar to *nix users or non-rooted? Proponents of rooting feel that it opens up many new options for tailoring one's Android experience, while opponents are concerned that rooted phones are more vulnerable to security exploits than non-rooted ones.
  • Official Android versions or custom ones?
• iOS (including iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch):
  • Jailbreaking is a point of contention among users. Some enjoy the extended capabilities of a jailbroken phone, while others feel that it's a bricked phone or an exploited phone waiting to happen.
  • iOS 7 and up vs. earlier versions. There are those who won't upgrade from iOS 6 or earlier, primarily because of the visual style of later versions, while others either enjoy the aesthetic or feel that it's too small of an issue to be concerned about.
  • A huge one exists over later Apple models not having the 3.5-mm audio jack beginning with the iPhone 7. Some users are angry enough about it that they bailed out of Apple's ecosystem, others think that detractors are overreacting and that the problem can be easily solved with a 3.5mm-to-Lightning adapter or a 3.5mm-to-USB C adapter for later models (which itself has the rebuttal that it prevents listening to audio and charging at the same time).
• Windows 8. Whereas certain previous versions of Windows got perfectly justified hate for performance and compatibility problems, 8 has none of those. However opinions on the radically updated UI are either "Greatest Windows Ever" or "The New Vista". No in between.
  • Windows 10 is either "Windows 8 but with less suck and free^note for the first year of 10's release" or "that upgrade that Microsoft kept shoving down my throat so now I hate it so much".
• The goto statement in programming languages. Does using it automatically make you a lazy/stingy/paranoid person with no regards for clean code? Or are the ones who avoid it "quiche eaters" who are just wannabes who can never be a real programmer and are idiotically forfeiting their job security to other "quiche eaters"?
• Style guides for programming can be a highly contentious issue for a number of reasons.
  • How many spaces should each indentation take up? Most people generally argue for either two spaces or four, but other choices are not unheard of.
  • Should indentation use tabs or spaces? The former allows everyone to use their preferred indentation size, therefore negating the above debate, but the latter guarantees that alignment stays consistent across all machines.
  • For languages that use curly brackets, where do you place the brackets? This one gets particularly messy since many of the formally-codified styles have different standards for different types of blocks (e.g. functions versus loops).

Literature

• Animorphs:
  • Some fans liked the secret-guerilla-war aspect of the series, and thought the final story arc ruined the series. Others, conversely, see the final arc as ten shades of epic, and see it as the best-written and greatest part of the series.
  • Some fans liked the open-ended conclusion, as it brought the series full circle and tied in well to the War Is Hell message of the series. Others thought it was just an easy (and lazy) way for Applegate to get out of writing a more conclusive ending. And some people just wished she'd used an existing character like Crayak for the ending instead of The One, which was introduced in the last chapter of the last book.
  • The Experiment gets a lot of flak for being a poorly-plotted anti-meat screed (which even Applegate herself thought was obnoxious), but it also has its fans for the genuinely funny comedy throughout.
  • The second Megamorphs book. Fans either love it for the fanservicey premise (The Animorphs go back in time to fight dinosaurs!) and its fun action-movie pacing, or they absolutely hate it for its questionable logic, inconsistencies with the rest of the series, and a particularly character-derailing ending.
  • Whether the Animorphs' actions, especially Jake's killing of 17,000 defenseless Yeerks, count as war crimes.^note For the record, none of the alien factions are signatories to the Geneva Conventions, and neither are the Animorphs. And the concept of war crimes was developed in a context not considering alien invasion as a possibility. Not helping this is the fact that the phrase "war crimes" has been frequently overused and misused when talking about fictional works.
• 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die: Being updated yearly since 2003 has led to the inclusion of recent movies which many readers believe haven't been out long enough to be included in the book. They often get removed the very next year for lacking lasting impact, too.
• Alex Rider: The fanbase was split over whether or not the climax of Ark Angel, where Alex goes into space, was too fantastic to be believable or not. Author Anthony Horowitz admitted a few years after the book's publication that even he wasn't sure which side of the divide he was on, as he was worried it might not be credible (and the series is well-known for Showing Its Work), but he decided to go with it because the alternative Earth-based conclusions to the plot weren't interesting enough.
• In the adult kids-book parody Brenda's Beaver Needs a Barber, a woman named Brenda has a pet beaver that everyone thinks looks gross until it gets a haircut. This is fine on its own, but the humour comes from the wording making the beaver sound like a woman's nether regions. Some people think this has an unfortunate message that a woman needs to shave or wax her privates in order to be beautiful, while others just think it's a silly joke and shouldn't be looked into too deeply.
• Chicken Little, among parents: Which version is better to read to kids— the original version in which everyone except Chicken Little himself gets eaten by Foxy-Loxy or one of several revised versions where they survive? Fans of the former see the happier versions as "coddling" kids, while fans of the latter think that having the main characters die is too horrible for a kids' story.
• A Court of Thorns and Roses:
  • In the third act of A Court of Thorns and Roses, Feyre must either answer a riddle or partake in three grueling tasks to break Amarantha's curse. She must go through the tasks because she can't figure out the riddle until she dramatically comes up with the answer at the last moment. Several readers have noted the riddle is pretty easy to figure out (especially given the context of Feyre fighting for her lover, that fact the whole thing started because Tamlin refused Amarantha's advances, that her sister was murdered by her lover, and the fact it's a romance novel), so it deflates much of the tension because Feyre is being so dense. Other readers argue that it may not have been obvious to Feyre specifically, given she hasn't received much love and affection over her life.
  • Mor being revealed as bisexual with a preference for women opens several cans of worms. Some readers like that the series has a prominent and heroic bisexual character (who isn't defined solely by her sexuality, either). However, other readers felt the way it was handled is a bit clumsy, if not outright problematic: Mor had previously only been depicted having relationships with men and is merely mentioned as having had a female lover many years ago, which made her bisexuality seem like a tacked-on Informed Attribute to some. Some readers also took issue with the fact that Mor says she mostly sleeps around with men to get Azriel to take a hint then looks downright miserable after the fact (which led to some debate amongst fans as to whether she was really bisexual or actually a lesbian, opening up yet more cans of worms); some readers also feel it plays into the stereotype that bisexual people are always promiscuous. Then there's the scene where Mor comes out to Feyre. There are some who find the scene to be well-done and adding great insight to Mor's character. For others it's dampened by Feyre's previous behavior, as until then Feyre was rooting for Mor/Azriel to the point where Rhys flat out tells Feyre that it's none of her business; some readers find it a little hard not to see it as Feyre forcing Mor to come out because Feyre's ship wasn't happening.
  • The situation between Azriel and Mor is a common point of debate. Azriel has been in love with Mor for centuries and isn’t subtle about his feelings, but while she teases and jokingly flirts with him, she never properly reciprocates and frequently goes off with other men. She later reveals to Feyre she prefers being with women but hadn’t felt comfortable telling Azriel this. Some readers find Mor unsympathetic for this, arguing that while her not wanting to share her sexual orientation with him was understandable she could've still been clearer that it was never going to happen between them, with these readers feeling that she was almost leading Azriel on for hundreds of years. Other readers think that Azriel should've just backed off and moved on, reasoning that in all the time they knew each other Mor never showed signs of being seriously interested in him so you'd think he'd take the hint. And some think they both handled the situation poorly.
  • The sex scenes, which increase in both frequency and worded detail with every installment. Some readers find the scenes well-written and don't think they detract from the overall story. Others find the scenes intrusive and the writing laughable. The sexual content has also generated controversy given that the books tend to be marketed towards teenagers. Some readers are critical of the fact such explicit content appears in Young Adult novels, while others feel that teens aren't intended to be the target audience and think it's the marketers' fault for misrepresenting the books.
  • The frequent usage of sexual assault and sexual violence as a backstory. On the one hand, there are fans who believe Maas has handled the subject maturely and avoided the pitfall of "men can't be sexually assaulted." However, others have noticed that the it still happens far more often to the female characters than the male characters and that Maas isn't really saying anything deeper than "thing bad," barely exploring the trauma or healing process. These readers feel Maas is only using the subject as a crutch for gaining easy sympathy for characters and/or a shortcut for Hate Sink characters.
  • The Inner Circle's attempt at an intervention for Nesta. Some think they did the right thing after being pushed to their limit by Nesta's irresponsible behavior. Others think they were bang out of order and cruel to her. A third group agrees that they had to do something to change Nesta's self-destructive behavior but that they could've gone about it in a more sensitive way.
  • There are some who claim the series is a Feminist Fantasy with a kickass lead who is on equal footing with her male partner. But others are quick to point out that the series' feminist credentials are undermined due to the fact everything Feyre has is because a man gave it to her (including her powers as High Fae, her title and her newfound literacy). As the series continues it's even difficult to say she's on equal footing with Rhys as she's rarely seen doing any political work, becomes a passive trophy wife as soon as she gets pregnant (despite this having been a major issue with Tamlin) and Rhysand still having power over her such as conspiring to hide the serious health issues surrounding her pregnancy from her. Some of the supporting female characters have been praised as strong and powerful, though some feel that Amren and Mor's power is largely an Informed Attribute and that despite being part of Rhysand's court they tend to get sidelined by male characters like Azriel and Cassian.
  • The series' depictions of mental health and trauma recovery. There are some who praise Feyre's recovery arc after A Court of Thorns and Roses and appreciate Rhysand's as well (especially for subverting the notion that men can't be sexually assaulted). However, some have also argued that Feyre's trauma is still heavily romanticized as she had resolved herself to suffer in silence before being taken to the Night Court, with a lot of her episodes tending to happen behind closed doors where no one can see and where Feyre can't lash out at anyone so no one else is caught in the crossfire. Compounding it further is that Rhys ends up being the one to provide the tools she needs to recover, and it's one of the reasons she falls for him, playing straight into the problematic notion of 'needing' a boyfriend to save you from your mental illness. Detractors would also argue that afterward Feyre's trauma is cured just like that, as opposed to her learning to live with it and work her way through the good and bad days. This is made even worse with characters like Tamlin, Lucien, and Nesta whose trauma is treated with mockery and dismissed as something they need to "get over." This has lead some readers to feel as though a character's trauma and struggles are only valid if their names are Feyre and Rhysand.
  • Nesta and Cassian's romance is divisive, especially after the fifth book where their relationship is dealt with directly and forms a major subplot culminating in them becoming an Official Couple. Some like the idea of them as a couple, finding their differing personalities to be complimentary in an Uptight Loves Wild kind of way and enjoy their Belligerent Sexual Tension slowly developing into love. Others aren't so keen; they find that their bickering comes off as too hostile to be genuinely sexy or endearing and that neither of them seem to respect or even like each other beyond sex. Some felt that Cassian was good for Nesta in a Tough Love sense and like that she worked to improve herself to be truly worthy of his love; others feel Cassian comes off as unsupportive of Nesta while she's in the depths of a mental breakdown (especially compared to Rhysand when Feyre was going through something similar) which includes telling her she's unlovable, and thus find the idea of them genuinely falling for each other contrived. On a related note, some like the highly sexual nature of their relationship, while others thought it went overboard in this area.
  • There's a divide in the fandom over whether the redesigned covers are better or worse than the originals. Up until 2020, the English-language versions of the books came with covers depicting illustrations of Feyre, standing in front of either a plain coloured background or a simple environment relating to the story (woods, mountains etc.). The books then received new covers, which feature stylised illustrations of animals or items relevant to the plot with simple, brightly-coloured backgrounds. Some fans prefer the new covers, feeling that they better reflect the novels' content and tone (in particular looking more "adult", given that an early issue with the series is that it was mismarketed to young teens) and that the originals looked cheesy and dated. Other fans dislike the newer covers, finding them to be garish and generic, and that the illustrations have little to do with the plot and/or are very obscure references, as opposed to something more significant; some fans were also displeased that the cover change occurred while the series was still ongoing, meaning their copies of the books won't match now. It's to the point that second-hand copies with the original discontinued covers are being sold and bought for over US$100. And a third subset of fans don't much care for either design.
• Crescent City: Over whether or not Bryce is supposed to be a woman of color and/or of mixed ethnicity (beyond her being half-human, half-fae). Some people point to the fact she's described as having "gold-dusted" skin and a few readers have even criticized fanart depicting her as white as "whitewashing", but others point out that Sarah J. Maas has previously used "golden" to describe tanned white characters (including Bryce's half-brother Ruhn in the same series) so it's hardly definitive proof. Bryce is said to get her red hair and amber eyes from her father, but there's no mention of his skin tone or ethnicity (muddying things a little is that her father isn't human); her human mother is stated to have dark hair and dark eyes with no comment on her skin color or ethnicity either, so overall it's rather vague. Some readers feel that if Bryce really is intended to be a woman of color or biracial, then the text really needs to be clearer on that matter (especially considering Maas' previous track record regarding POC characters has been controversial to say the least).
• The Dresden Files: The treatment of Karrin Murphy after Jim Butcher's six year hiatus between Skin Game and Peace Talks followed by her abrupt, untimely death in Battle Ground has split the fandom into those who will continue reading the series despite her exit and those who declared Fanon Discontinuity and have shelved the series for good as a result. The debate isn't that it's impossible for her to return—it is technically possible, but it is very unlikely that it will happen until the very last books in the series—it's that Butcher built up the friendship and romance between Harry and Murphy for sixteen books and then returned from the hiatus seeming entirely disinterested in it. Any romantic scenes they share are extremely brief or off-screen. Murphy is sidelined due to her injuries in Skin Game and barely appears. Then Lara Raith is reintroduced into the story and given far more ties to Harry than before, including a contrived political marriage to him, and Butters is also pushed into Harry's human support role shortly before Murphy dies. The shift in tone and treatment of Murphy is in sharp contrast to Books 1-15 where she is vital to the story and vital to Harry for both action and emotional/personal/mental health. It also doesn't help that Harry's other love, Susan Rodriguez, was killed in Changes, so doing the same to Murphy has also caused some fans to throw in the towel, as it feels like the same old trick a mere five books apart. Only this time, it's with a cornerstone character who is responsible for assisting in several of Harry's victories as well as helping him become a happier, more well-rounded person.
• Harry Potter:
  • J. K. Rowling declaring Dumbledore to be gay shortly after the release of the final book is something that everyone in the fanbase has an opinion on, and to this day is a hot topic among the base. The two main camps are those who feel that the character's orientation is fairly well-supported in the text, with the Word of God being merely a confirmation of something that a close reading could have already revealed, versus those who feel that it's either a cheap way for Rowling to drum up conversation about a closed book or to quiet complaints about a lack of gay representation in the series or both.
  • At the end of the book, we learn that everyone got married and had babies. This ending has some detractors, who feel like the flash-forward was jarring, having everyone procreate (or having so many Dead Guy Juniors) was unrealistic and sappy, some of the pairings (particularly Ron and Hermione) were bad couples, or that more information was needed (for example, what are these kids like in terms of personality?). Others enjoyed the ending for giving a hopeful Earn Your Happy Ending conclusion to Harry and thought it wrapped things up well.
• Digital eBooks vs. physical books. Some readers prefer the convenience of eBooks since it's easier to take them on the go and read them at any time, while also not taking up physical space like physical books do and allowing stories to be published that would otherwise not see a physical release. Traditional readers, however, prefer the feel of reading pages of a physical book over swiping a screen and argue that eBooks are not as engaging as real books, not to mention other benefits like the resell factor, the lack of eye-strain, the feeling of ownership, and the lack of annoyances like battery life and online DRM. For what it's worth, scientific studies appear to back physical books as well. While this is far from the only digital versus physical media conflict, it is most fierce with books (and other forms of print media) since reading physically and digitally are almost different experiences with their own pros and cons.

Pinball

As niche as pinball is, it has its share of disagreements and dispute that will likely never be resolved peacefully.

• The quality of Stern's machines as compared to Williams and Bally. There are those who insist that the Williams and Bally games of the 90s were pinball perfected and that Stern's machines are devoid of heart and of low manufacturing quality. There are those who say that Stern is just as good as the best pinball companies of the past. And there are a few, most notably Ed Robertson of Barenaked Ladies, who say Stern stands heads and shoulders above the best Williams and Bally had to offer. This mostly falls in line with when someone got into pinball, namely what machines they started playing in (though there are definitely exceptions, such as Robertson). The rise of more competitors, like Jersey Jack Pinball, Heighway Pinball, and Spooky Pinball has dissolved this conflict into something tangled and unrecognizable, as no one seems clear on where these new manufacturers stand as far as Stern vs. Bally-Williams is concerned.
• Bram Stoker's Dracula is a polarizing machine due to its focus on competitive multiplayer and its rewarding of expert-level play, with not much else. It creates a greater divisive response than any other machine when brought into a competition, even among top-level players.
• Dot-matrix displays vs. monitors. As of the mid-2010s, pinball is in a transitional phase due to the cheapening costs of monitors. There are some who say that a monitor can do everything a DMD can do but better, and it attracts passers-by better when the machine is out in public. And there are some who say that they're unimpressed with what has been done with monitors so far and prefer the retro look a dot-matrix display has. Dutch Pinball seems to sit squarely in the middle: The Big Lebowski, their debut game, has a monitor, but with visuals displayed in dots like a dot-matrix display. Spooky Pinball seems to have also taken up this middle area.
• Incandescent lights vs. LEDs. Some people prefer the warm yellowish glow of incandescent lights and how they fade in and out, whereas others prefer the brighter LEDs and how they're cheaper, longer-lasting, consume less power, and come in every imaginable color (and some can even change color). This dispute has only intensified not only because LEDs have become an industry standard (even the Medieval Madness remake uses LEDs, whereas the original used incandescents), but because the United States, where most pinball machines are created and manufactured, is required to halt incandescent production by 2020.
• Modding vs. non-modding. Some people prefer their pinball machines to look like how they were when they were made, and some want to add more stuff onto them. This is mostly a non-issue among what people should do with their machines, but it pops up mainly in regards to modded machines being re-sold: Some people get very upset if a machine they intended to buy turns out to be modded.
• The pricing of the remake for Spider-Man (Stern), at US$8,000. The original release cost US$3,500. Some are saying that this is an acceptable price because of the improved durability, new artwork, inflation since 2007, and increased demand for pinball since 2007. Some are saying that a price increase this big is unacceptable. And some are assuming Stern is pricing based on the used market (the original version, if in a decent condition, always sells for higher than it was originally worth) and are worried about the prices of future releases.
• Whoa Nellie! Big Juicy Melons has created flame wars all over the Internet on two fronts: The first is its thoroughly sexist artwork, featuring the buxom daughter of a farmer and men all over the playfield gawking at her. There are some people who are disgusted and revolted at this artwork (men and women alike), and there are people who love it. The other front is its price: It is a Palette Swap of a machine from 40 years ago (Continental, to be precise), meaning it has a simple layout, simple rules, and is electronically simple inside, but at US$6,500, is more expensive than modern-looking games with modern gameplay and audio.
• Playing for points vs. playing for content. Before the 1980s, this was a non-issue, as pinball machines had no plot to begin with, but starting with Black Knight, pinball now had stories, challenges to be overcome, villains to be defeated, and days to be saved. The matter of contention here comes from how people want to play pinball: Some just want to go for the highest score possible, and some want to get to the end of the story and see everything the machine has to offer, which are not always the same thing. In fact, due to the risk of getting a Game Over before you get to the end, playing for score and playing for story are rarely the same thing.
• Electromechanical machines vs. solid-state machines. During the late 70s, advances in computer technology allowed pinball machines to have computer processors and memory storage inside, allowing for pre-recorded audio, digital displays, and more complex rules. This put a wedge among pinball fans that exists to this day due to the starkly different ways pinball machines play based on their electronic components. That being said, the divide has somewhat melted away over the decades, with only the hardest of the hardcore refusing to accept both kinds.
• Flow^note Pinball games with few interruptions and rely on fast momentum-based gameplay vs. stop-and-shoot^note Pinball games that frequently stop the ball and are more about careful and deliberate aim. There are plenty of pinball fans who swear by one and are quick to dismiss the other, due to how their contrasting gameplay styles—fast action vs. slow aiming—require very different kinds of thinking. This extends to creators too: Steve Ritchie makes almost nothing but flow games, and Pat Lawlor makes near-exclusively stop-and-shoot games, though said rivalry exists strictly with the fans. The two of them get along pretty well.
• For much of the Turn of the Millennium, there were many fans who demanded unlicensed themes, as they felt pinball was suffering from The Problem with Licensed Games (for a variety of suspected reasons). Finally, in The New '10s, unlicensed themes started coming out, with releases like the aforementioned Whoa Nellie! Big Juicy Melons, plus Full Throttle, America's Most Haunted, and Dialed In. When said unlicensed machines were not as mind-blowingly awesome as these fans had hoped they would be (albeit they still have their merits, especially with America's Most Haunted), the Hype Backlash soon overtook the call for unlicensed machines. Now there is a group calling for a lot of unlicensed themes and a group who argue that the manufacturers should go back to what they were doing before.

Sports

• National Football League:
  • The NFL began seriously attempting to reduce the number of concussions in The New '10s with increased emphasis on player safety. CTE scans were made for any serious blows to the head, those who showed concussion symptoms were kept out of the game for longer, and helmet-to-helmet hits, as well as tackles leading with the head, were made against the rules. The rule changes have been divisive among fans of American Football, with some seeing this as a good way to reduce the dangers of an already dangerous sport, with others saying it makes the game slower and less exciting to watch, referring to the NFL as "the No Fun League."
  • The question of what the best format for overtime is has been a contentious one, as people have begun questioning the modified sudden-death format is the best way or if something else should take its place. Those opposed to the current system will cite situations, particularly in the postseason, where MVP-caliber quarterbacks (including three actual MVP winners in Aaron Rodgers in 2014, Patrick Mahomes in 2018, and Matt Ryan in 2016 in the Super Bowl) weren't even given a chance to win the game for their team due to the opponent getting the ball first and scoring a touchdown. Proponents of the current system, meanwhile, will counter that defense is part of the game too and that it should be on the second team's defense to prevent this scenario and give their offense a shot.
    • Among those who do support modifying the overtime rules, there are further splits as to exactly what the modification should be. Change the rules to guarantee that each team gets at least one overtime possession (a change that was ultimately put into effect for the playoffs ahead of the 2022 season)? Make overtime set extra quarters and do away with the sudden death aspect altogether? Go to college-style overtime? Roll out a radical new system, such as the spot-and-choose method that's been discussed at length by the sports media? And should these modifications apply to all NFL games, or should it be a special rule exclusive to the playoffs, given the higher stakes that come with the playoffs' single-elimination format? All of these various potential modifications have both proponents and detractors.
• Women's artistic gymnastics:
  • At the 2018 Gymnastics World Championships, Simone Biles won the women's individual all-around despite falling twice (once on her vault landing, and once off the balance beam). Fans were divided on the matter: some insisted that no one should be able to win a major competition with two falls, with some even suggesting the rules should be amended to prevent it, while others felt that if she could absorb the fall deductions and still come out ahead of her competitors, she must have been doing something right and had therefore earned the win. A third group wasn't thrilled with the circumstances of Biles' victory but also pointed out that Simone Biles is an exceptional case as far as being able to absorb two points in fall deductions and still come out ahead (because her difficulty values are just that insane compared to what even other top gymnasts are doing), and felt that making a rule modification based on one extremely unusual situation would be unnecessary and would just result in unfairly harsh fall penalties for gymnasts who already have no chance of doing what Biles did.
  • In general, there is a sharp divide amongst fans between those who prefer the more classical, artistic gymnastics characterized by the Soviets at their height, pointing to athletes like Ludmilla Tourischeva, Elena Mukhina, Oksana Omelianchik, and Shannon Miller as true all-arounders who blended solid tumbling with beautiful dance elements and elegant artistic expression in their choreography, and those who prefer the more powerful and explosive, but not elegant, routines (particularly on floor and to a lesser extent balance beam) typified by athletes like Simone Biles, Larisa Iordache, and Aly Raisman. The two sides more or less hate each other's guts.
  • Another debated question is what to do with tied scores at medal positions — should athletes be allowed to tie for a medal, or should the judges apply a tie-breaker to decide who gets it? Supporters of the former point to such situations as He Kexin and Nastia Liukin's tie in the 2008 Olympic uneven bars final being broken down by judges individual scores rather than allow them to both get the gold^note although this particular level of tiebreaking has since been eliminated, which is why Mai Murakami and Angelina Melnikova were allowed to tie for bronze on floor at the 2020 Games or Aly Raisman losing the bronze in the 2012 Olympic all-around to Aliya Mustafina in a tiebreaker despite Raisman arguably having a better competition (Mustafina had a fall while Raisman did not) as reasons that tiebreakers should be eliminated; those who favor breaking a tie will often point to the uneven bars final at the 2015 World Championships, in which four athletes (out of a field of eight) won gold in a four-way tie, as an example of why tiebreaking is necessary.
• The addition of the Designated Hitter^note A player who bats instead of the pitcher, and who does not have a field position in Baseball's American League (and beginning in 2022, the National League) caused (and still causes) divisions among fans. Some appreciate the increased chances for the ball to be put into play by the hitter, while others decry the loss of a strategic element in deciding whether to replace a pitcher.

Tabletop Games

• BattleTech: Double heat sinks. Depending on who you ask, double heat sinks are either a travesty that completely unbalances the game, or the only way to make energy weapon-based builds competitively viable. The only thing both sides agree on is that any attempt to fix the situation would make things worse.
  • Land-Air 'Mechs are also another bone of contention in the fan community. Numerous discussion threads have been shut down in the past on the official forums (and for a long while, any discussion of LAMs was banned outright) as discussions on the designs became overheated. On the one side is a group of fans who believe LAMs to be a useful and powerful asset to the game's arsenal, while another side sees them as overpowered and with inconsistent rules (and a subset of this faction also sees the idea as an unwelcome vestige of the game's anime origins that don't gel well with current lore).
• Among fans of so-called hobbyist board games, Monopoly is extremely contentious. Many board game enthusiasts hate Monopoly with a burning passion, so much so that some might call it The Scrappy of board games, and argue that its reputation for being drawn-out and cutthroat outright damages the reputation of board games as a whole and makes people unwilling to try "modern" board games. However, other board gamers argue that Monopoly itself is perfectly fine—the problem is that everyone learns to play it incorrectly, and that the game has been stuffed full of house rules that are counterproductive to the way the game is meant to be played. Mentioning the game anywhere around board gamers invariably leads to a debate on the game's merits or lack thereof.
• Warhammer 40,000, with its Unpleasable Fanbase, has had plenty of dividing issues through it's lifetime, some of the more notable ones being:
  • Should there be female space marines? One side flat out can't stand the idea, the other wants them brought in ASAP.
  • The T'au Empire's existence as a faction has been a contentious question among the fanbase since their introduction, with detractors seeing them as too noble and idealistic for the setting while supporters find the Naïve Newcomer approach to have some merit along with the fact that the T'au tend to apply common sense logic and tactics to win against more fanatical, Rule of Cool loving enemies.
  • The transition from one Edition to another would always attract debate over whether things were fixed or not, but none were as heated as the transition from Seventh to Eighth Edition. Eighth Edition changed everything about how 40K was played, ranging from how weapon damage was calculated to vehicles losing armor facing and gaining strength and toughness values to make them more like Monstrous Creatures. Either the transition is a refreshing change that removed a lot of bloat that slowed the game down, or a travesty that gutted 40K of any semblance of tactical nuance for the sake of appealing to newcomers.
• When Magic: The Gathering created the Gatewatch, a group of planeswalkers dedicated to protecting the multiverse that the story would focus on, player reaction was strong in both directions. Fans enjoyed that the Gatewatch brought some much-needed focus to a story which had been rather scattered and disparate up to that point; detractors felt like they stole that focus from potentially more interesting characters. Fans liked that they brought closure to storylines that had been dragging on; detractors felt like that 'closure' came too easy, as they defeated huge threats like Bolas, the Eldrazi, and Liliana's demons with little effort, cost or consequence. Fans liked having a continuous cast to follow: detractors preferred a more diverse 'anthology' style to the lore, feeling that a continuous cast made the multiverse feel much smaller and the planes, and their natives, feel less important. There are players who found their story more fun and gripping than the game has ever had been, and those who found it a dry and formulaic attempt to cash in on the comic book superhero trend. Even after the Gatewatch story wrapped up in War of the Spark, there are players who can't wait to see them again, and those who hope they never return.

Technology and Weapons

• Boeing vs Airbus is a huge one in the aerospace industry world. The two companies are notable for possibly the bitterest and nastiest commercial rivalry in the world of manufacturing. It is exacerbated by various factors, such as Airbus's "Reimbursable Launch Investment" from EU governments (loans that have to be paid back at generous rates of interest, plus royalties if the aircraft is a success) and the US government's effective subsidizing of Boeing with pork barrel military contracts (and in a few cases free money), which were the subject of the world's largest trade dispute ever during 2005-2012, which ultimately ended with a World Trade Organisation decision in Airbus's favor. The fallout is still settling, although there are signs that the US and Boeing have tried to get around the decision, and the EU is threatening to place trade sanctions of $19 billion on Boeing. Add lots of internet Misplaced Nationalism (Americans want red-blooded American planes whose wives make them apple pie and who take their kids to baseball practice, not cappucino-drinking European commie planes with bad teeth and who spend their time looking at modern art galleries, and vice-versa) and the thing can get very nasty on enthusiast forums. It also reaches the pilots too - older pilots who were weaned on Boeing products before Airbus hacked out its market share in The '90s prefer their old friends, but younger pilots prefer Airbuses because they are easier to fly and because of their standardized cockpit layouts a pilot can qualify on one and have done most of the work for all the others.
  • Similar case happens with so called NewSpace and OldSpace. NewSpace believes with the advances of private spaceflight and privately funded science ventures NASA should be abolished, while OldSpace believes private ventures will fall into greed and unable to produce science results truthfully. With success by SpaceX and the increasingly unlikelihood of SLS and JWST being actually operational with billions of dollar already spend, NewSpace is gaining ground. However, since both are silence minorities against the American public, they are unable to change anything in Congress, which is gearing toward funneling pork barrels to Boeing, Lockhart Martin and ATK while trying to abolish NASA.
• Porsche cars. Every single time a new model line is introduced it divides the owners/fan base. This happened when the Cayenne SUV came out, before that it was old school air-cooled 911 fans incensed at the new water-cooled 911, universally the 911 fans are putting down anything not-911 and getting a similar treatment from non-911 fans, and way back in the sixties there was the now familiar cry of "It's not a real Porsche!" when Porsche made their first major model change, introducing the 911 to replace the 356 model.
  • Car companies can fall victim to this. General Motors is a very good example, being the automotive equivalent of Sonic the Hedgehog. Pontiac's dead? Good riddance, or is is ruined forever? Cadillac having front-wheel-drive cars? Acceptable or not?
• AK-47 vs. M-16 for firearms collectors. The youtube videos have huge numbers of comments, and that's just the beginning.
  • To ~93% percent of the participants on both sides, the AK-74 is just an academic term, and the AK-100 series doesn't even exist. To the AK side, the M-16 never got upgraded, or cleaning kits, or any sort of improvement at all. To the M-16 side, the AK is so inaccurate that the safest place to be when it is fired is directly in front of the muzzle, and they refuse to even touch Kalashnikovs, or even discuss the fact that certain members of the AK-100 family come in the same caliber as their beloved M-16's. Then the AK fanbase assumes that an M-16 will always jam, no matter what, and that the small caliber rounds can only kill you if you are shot 10 times, or if you bleed out on the ground for a couple minutes, and woe betide you should you either take a third option or say that you like both. ^note  Each side looks at the other gun as it was when first issued in Vietnam, ignoring improvements during the conflict, let alone the many decades since. However, depending on the setting, your mileage may vary significantly.
  • Even more vicious is the infighting between different members and factions of each camp. The M-16 people argue over mods and manufacturers. The AK people go on over the 74's 5.45X39 round vs. the old 7.62 and whether or not it was a good idea.
    • Nowadays this have eased somewhat, with AK's availability in almost any caliber imagined. People still argue which one is better, though.
    • Don't forget country of manufacture (particularly the cheaper ones like Romanians are very divisive), importer, chromed vs non-chromed, and stamped vs. milled.
• In handguns, there's the debates about revolvers versus pistols. The revolver camp goes on about the low caliber ammunition used by pistols and how unreliable they are. The pistol camp goes on about how revolvers are antiquated and that magnum catriges are just silly.
  • Don't even get started on the M9 vs. M1911 debate, or for that matter, any sort of debate about which makes a better bullet: a small, fast cartidge that tumbles through flesh, or a big heavy slug that wrecks whatever it hits.
  • Any brand of pistol vs. another brand of pistol. One common example (involving the two biggest selling types of firearms) is Glock "Safe Action" vs 1911-style "cocked and locked" carry.
• Swords are not immune to this. Probably the deepest divide is about the katana: are they the greatest sword ever made, perfectly designed by master craftsmen and capable of outclassing any Western design? Or are they completely worthless hunks of glorified pig iron, doomed to shatter like glass and get the wielder killed the moment they come into contact with a good European longsword, overrated by weeaboos desperate to justify their love of all things Japanese? Or are they the best possible response to the poor quality of Japanese iron ore?
• World War 2 German weapons and vehicles. Hyper-advanced designs that paved the way for all modern military weapons, could beat anything the Allies made three ways to sunday and would have let the Nazis win the war had they just been produced enough/Hitler not been so crazy, or overly-complex and ridiculously expensive designs that while using some innovative features were not at all reliable and have been blown out of proportion by history. Expect arguments to veer into the territory of Artistic License – History and Godwin's Law.
• In the earth sciences, there's a pretty stark divide between earth scientists in the private sector, who generally view the planet as a resource to be utilized, and earth scientists in academia who tend to view the planet as a wonder to be conserved.
• In 2013, Apple massively changed the interface of its iOS software, replacing the then-iconic pseudo-3D designs with a much flatter appearance. The public was largely divided on whether it was a refreshing modernization or an ugly, user-unfriendly gimmick, and though most people have forgotten about the disagreement by now, it doesn't seem like it will ever die down as long as Apple keeps the same basic design language.

Television Channels and Digital Distributors

• [adult swim]: Anime vs Comedy. And within the comedy fanbase, Animated vs. Live-Action... as well as Original Programming vs. Syndicated/Imported.
• While many shows on Nickelodeon are prone to this, the network itself has been prone to this for years. 1) When it started to "decline", which is usually chosen as 1986, 1990, 1997, 2000, 2005, 2006, and 2009. 2) When it started to get "good", which many people say is in 1985 when Fred Seibert and Alan Goodman saved the network, 1991 when the Nicktoons debuted, 1999 when SpongeBob SquarePants debuted, or many different years. 3) When it started to get "better", which is often divided by many people with real no specific time. Lastly, 4) if the network is still "good", or keeps getting "worse and worse".
• Cartoon Network: Either it really hit its stride with the Powerhouse era and went to hell in 2004 with the Cartoon Network city era, really got good with the CN City era and started to decline in 2007 with the Fall era, or got bad in 2009 with the debut of CN Real. Others will say it hit its stride with the Powerhouse era, declined, but not by a considerable margin, in the CN City era, fully cemented into its Audience-Alienating Era with the Fall era and reached its nadir in 2009 with the debut of CN Real. Another huge debate is if it's still sucking to this day, or it got a whole lot better in 2010, and continues to get better.
• Disney Channel also gets this, though not to the extent of Nickelodeon. Either it was great from 1983 to 1997^note When it was a commercial free pay TV channel like HBO and Showtime but got worse from 1997 to 2002, and got really bad in 2002, was at it's best from 1997 to 2006 and got bad since, or got bad in 2006, was at it's best from 2006 to 2015 and went downhill from there, and may still not be the best but has gotten a little better since.
• Disney Channel and Nickelodeon have the cartoons vs Live Action debate. People tend to side with the cartoons for both channels, but everyone agrees that Cartoon Network abandoning animation was a bad idea.
• The digital video game store GOG.com branching out into selling movies proved to be controversial among its userbase, since plenty of people are afraid that it will take away the focus from games. The fact that they don't sell any big-name movies (just indie films and documentaries) caused people to feel underwhelmed and disappointed. (And the inclusion of Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony in the initial lineup annoyed people who are sick of seeing the fandom leave its mark on everything.)

Theatre

• In 2018 in Florence, Cristiano Chiarot's production of Bizet's Carmen pulled a particularly controversial Not His Sled moment: instead of getting killed by Don José as in the previous productions of nearly 150 years before, Carmen shoots him in self-defense. Chiarot meant the production to address Domestic Abuse, and he meant the revised ending to be a Moment of Awesome on Carmen's part. Whether it really is such is heavily contested, since it ignores major plot points, such as the fact that Carmen, upon reading the tarot cards, sees death for herself and her lover, in that order. Screw Destiny or Ass Pull?

Theme Parks

• Among Luna Park Sydney fans, there is a serious debate about whether the park should bring back the Ghost Train (which was destroyed in a fire in 1979, and 7 people were killed in said fire). People who argue in favor of reviving it claim that it was an important part of the park's fabric and that its niche is unfilled (it was hugely popular back in its day, and modern Luna Park lacks any type of dark ride), while the other side claims doing so would be disrespectful to those who lost family/friends in the fire.

Toys

• Hero Factory vs BIONICLE, since the former is a replacement for the latter.
  • As far as their basic story concepts and plotlines go, at least. The Hero Factory sets seem to have been received well enough, especially the 2.0 figures.
  • And, oh, on a larger scale, there is the pro-Bionicle/Hero Factory and anti-Bionicle/Hero Factory "debate". Certain older members of the LEGO community seem to utterly hate these "action figure" lines (and sometimes the people that like them as well), while their fans just want to be left alone to enjoy what they like.
  • With regards to the BIONICLE story, there is that ever-resurfacing argument over which "era" was best. Nostalgic fans tend to view the original saga-trilogy of 2001-2002-2003 as the most defining age, while others insist that the quasi-spiritualism made it cheesy, the stereotyped characters made it uninspired and the Strictly Formula plots just made it stagnate.
    
    The 2004 Metru Nui era is when the biggest They Changed It, Now It Sucks! shift took place — from a tropical island with lovable tribal people to a futuristic, high-tech city where angst and corruption abounded. The revelation that this was meant to be the "true" theme of BIONICLE turned many people away, but others liked it for its sudden avalanche of world-building and for the story being a bit more character-driven. 2005 isn't that popular, though.
    
    The post-2005 story is both hailed and hated for its dark tone, focus on intense sci-fi action and the tension-filled atmosphere, likewise for its subversive nature regarding some worn-out clichés of past years (which was often invoked by the characters in-story).
    
    Also, the latent Earth Drift tendencies of the later stories, organic characters replacing the biomechanical ones, is a heavily frowned-upon aspect for the older fans. Though, whether they remember or not, this has been part of the story since the beginning that just got more focus as the mysteries unveiled. Meanwhile, fan fiction writers at least now had semi-canon grounds for doing all kinds of things with these new, organic characters.
    • Related to the last point, the writer-enforced No Hugging, No Kissing rule is a frequently argued-over topic of the fandom.
  • Toy-wise, there was always someone complaining that the diminishing of action features made the figures boring, often going as far as to say "dumbed down", but others liked the improved articulation and the easier, faster construction.
    • While their use of the "CCBS" system was always going to be controversial, the 2015/16 toys won people over by having both a high degree of articulation and action features.
  • Of the franchise's two main multi-console licensed games, the second, BIONICLE Heroes divides the fandom. On one hand, it's praised for its scope, straightforwardness, varied environments, the characters' unique special abilities, for being a decent time-killer, and for not being as horrible as the first. On the other, it's hated for not following canon, turning the characters into jokes completely unrelated to how they're featured in the story, and for being far too easy and monotone. That said, the DS version is warmly received.
  • Another recurring topic of interest is the way the Big Bad was eventually defeated — shoving his head into an oncoming planetoid. Some are adamant that's it's ironic in its simplicity, for finishing off such a developed villain notorious for his inextricable plans in such a casual way, others say it was just plain anticlimactic, too sudden and mundane, and not near worth waiting 9+ years for.
  • The web serials, which either granted the writer Greg Farshtey the all-too-needed freedom to explore and develop the universe without the bounds of having to promote toys, or just gave him an excuse to write his own tacked-together crowd-pleasing fanfiction into canon material, and kill off whichever character he found challenging to make interesting. Greg's writing in general strongly divided the fandom in later years, with some hailing him as the only person worthy of ever touching the property, and others condemning him for wrecking the universe.
  • The art of Stuart Sayger, who did the artwork for the '06-'07 comics and for a story in one of the later graphic novels, seems to have an equal share of lovers and loathers, as some greeted his style as a welcome and refreshing new take on the BIONICLE world, but others felt it was too different, and unsuitable for the theme's complex, robotic character designs. One thing they all agree on is that it was rarely ever not Off-Model.
  • One of the most divisive sets is the titan-sized Toa Mata Nui◊. Fans (those that could get it at least) are of two minds about the figure. Some see it as one of the best large-size sets of the whole franchise, with a unique and complicated construction, and praise it for giving Mata Nui the sword he had in The Movie. Others regard it as a sub-par follow-up to the previous year's well-received titan Takanuva, with a poor design, messy color scheme, bad proportions, and hate it for being wildly Off-Model (even the sword) and for not fitting into the established scale of the figures. One thing they all like, though, is that it has a golden Mask of Life.
  • Prior to the news of the line resurfacing in 2015, there was another break between those fans that wanted to bring the franchise back and those who thought it would have been a bad idea. Much of the former crowd has been made up of Fan Dumb, with the "anti-revivalists" often being more reasonable in their position, as they realized that, with all the similar but newer LEGO Themes (Hero Factory, Ninjago, Legends of Chima) adopting a much more Lighter and Softer approach, BIONICLE's darker and complex story would probably only suffer if it was really brought back. Part of what made this break so big is that a lot of the "pro" fans misinterpreted the other side's position, thinking that they didn't want to have BIONICLE back. After the first rumors about the series' return started appearing, the arguments mostly ceased.
  • The Hero Factory mini-movie Invasion from Below has caused an interesting fandom break: generally, many BIONICLE fans have maintained that the animations and promos done by Ghost VFX and Advance were the "true" way of telling a story, and when these companies were announced as the episode's creators, they cheered that Hero Factory might finally rise up to its predecessor. After the episode aired, some now claim that they should never try to expand their influence to LEGO media outside of short promos with minimal or no dialogue. The episode itself was met with very mixed reception, it's either the best or worst episode of the series.
  • The original BIONICLE DVD movies redesigned the characters drastically to make them look more biomechanical, accurate to the backstory in which they have many organic parts. The fourth film and all other media depicted them with more robotic, toy-accurate designs. Fans are split over which is more "right" — most old-school fans who watched the old animations and played the games claim that giving them organic properties is stupid because mechanical robots are cooler, whereas fans who followed the story more closely attack this notion. The designs of the original movies also divide the fans purely by aesthetic merit — some love them for making the characters feel more "alive", others hate them for often looking nothing like the toys, and because they barely have any recognizable LEGO parts on them.
  • Fans of LEGO action figures tend to be divided on whether the standard building system used in older lines or the balljoint-based "CCBS" introduced in 2011 is better. A lot of people do use a combination of both, but there are "extremists" on both sides, with the highly vocal Gen-1 BIONICLE purists who hate CCBS due to its smoother, blockier pieces deserving a special mention.
  • During the 2010s, another rift appeared between fans who loved the 2001 BIONICLE series the most for its mystical tribal setting and those who consider the franchise's tribal elements to be cultural appropriation and offensive against real-life Polynesian islanders. The second group thinks the franchise did well by veering away from these cultural elements and berate fans who prefer early-BIONICLE as insensitive or outright racist. The other group thinks the tribal motifs made the franchise distinct and memorable in the first place and that Lego's handling of the matter was good enough. An incident called the "Maori lawsuit" is often brought up in this discussion, even though it never happened — actual Maori people met with Lego and the company agreed to remove overt references to their culture but kept a lot of the tribal elements regardless, which the Maori were completely fine with.
• The My Little Pony toys have a completely different set of issues from the cartoon adaptations. G2 gets the most hate, due to the fact the toys look nothing like any other MLP toy-line before or since. G4 gets a small amount of hate too, both from fans of My Little Pony toys and the typical fan of the source cartoon, due to Show Accuracy/Toy Accuracy. Although a lot of hate of the G4 toys is because Princess Celestia is pink (which was resolved when Cadance was introduced at the end of Season 2.)
• Dinosaur toys, models and statues. There is a wide collector community for them, and opinions are often divided if figurines should strive to keep up with modern paleontological thinking and scientific accuracy above all else, or should they focus more on general sculpt quality, details, stability and paint even if the science is lacking. This is not to say that toy makers only focus on one or the other, but this discussion pops up on a regular basis among collectors thanks to different companies having different priorities. Manufacturers like CollectA (which falls more on the scientific end of the spectrum with superbly sculpted models but at times basic paint jobs) and Papo (who make more fanciful and unrealistic but surprisingly highly detailed figurines) both have their share of fans and haters. This topic even inched its way into the wider figure collecting community, many of whom care little about the state of paleontology and are only intersted in "striking" display pieces or fun toys.

Other/Real Life

• Video game magazines aren't safe from this either. Nintendo Power got the most flack since many anti Nintendo fans would always claim that the magazine was "biased" towards its own first party games by giving them high scores. When Nintendo Power was outsourced to another publisher, the staff slightly changed. People claimed Nintendo Power was biased up until the very end, but would somehow agree with them if the magazine gave any game an 8 or less. Then you had people who thought the reviews were just fine and got into Flame Wars against those who bashed the magazine.
• What should be considered porn or "nude/erotic art"... or both. If there's a line, where should the distinction be drawn, or is it so blurry that there's effectively no difference?
• Black and white vs colour photography: one side points to the impact of monochrome, and questions why any photographer worth the name would want to use anything else; the other side points to the fact that we see in colour, and that the technical issues with colour fidelity and dynamic range were resolved years ago.
• Talking about certain contestants on The Price Is Right that make bids that just says "I'm only making this bid to get attention", such as making a $2,000,000 bid, bids that are $420, or any bid whose last two numbers are 69. Fans of the show can't seem to decide whether or not the silly bids doesn't do anyone any harm or if it robs other people a spot on contestant's row because the idiot contestant wanted to get attention to themselves and not play the game seriously.
• Two such instances pop up in the tenth chapter of the crossover between Lyrical Nanoha and Sailor Moon, White Devil of the Moon, and surprisingly, they are unrelated to Nanoha and Fate getting together
  • Was Nanoha justified in harshly calling the Queen out on how she raised Serenity? Additionally, was this in character for Nanoha, who is more responsible than Usagi or Serenity, or was this contrary to someone who would "befriend" her enemies?
  • Vivio defeating Picoha (a character based off of Usagi's future daughter Chibi-Usa) and causing her and her alternate timeline to disappear was also a controversial action, especially since it was killing her. Word of God has clarified, however, that Picoha was the aggressor, attacking without stating her intent, and Vivio tried to defeat her non-lethally, without knowing what would happen to her.
• Analytic vs. continental philosophy.
  • Moral philosophy/ethics in general. Okay, the debate about what's morally right and wrong is going to be cause for a lot of arguments in near enough every academic and professional field, but in philosophy, it's divided even more significantly among followers of different schools of ethical thought. Is the best/most accurate theory a consequentialist one like utilitarianism, holding that the consequences of an action dictate whether it's right? A deontological one, holding that the intentions dictate how ethical an action is? Virtue Ethics based on ideals and personalities? Various other theories based on everything from social/political theories to attempts at scientific ones? And then there's the religious side of things and the various churches and groups making up the likes of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, and what they each say are morally right and wrong...
• In tattoo circles, stick n' poke tattoos (tattoos done with a singular needle by people that aren't tattoo artists): are they unsanitary and the people that get them idiots, or are they an important part of tattoo culture and the people against them are snobs?
• In psychiatry, should patients be treated with drugs or counseling? This one is particularly nasty, and is at the heart of the controversy over the DSM-V.
  • There is also some debate over whether therapy must be validated/evidence-based, like like cognitive-behavioral therapy, dialectical behavior therapy and family-based treatment, with some saying that only relying on things that have been proven to actually work is unrealistic for a real world, clinical setting, and that the view ignores the value of experience/anecdotes, and the other side insisting that mental health practitioners act like health professionals. It doesn't help that the group against evidence-based-psychology is mainly made up of therapists, who have lower accreditation requirements than psychologists and psychiatrists, and that the evidence-based camp also says that practitioners should make their success rates available so potential clients can judge what's worth paying for.
• Descriptivism vs. prescriptivism in spelling and grammar. Do language experts prescribe "correct" spelling and grammar, or merely describe spelling and grammar as it's actually used? The Descriptivists won that one, but that only leads to further splits. When does a grammatical construction or alternate spelling pass from the vernacular to the "standard"? How many people need to make a certain mistake before it stops being a mistake and starts being the new accepted usage? Should etymology figure into these decisions? What about clarity? These debates have been raging since the days of Samuel Johnson and Daniel Webster.
• In statistics, there are several fairly exotic types of probability that take a great amount of time to understand and practice, and have fairly unusual and strict assumptions that must be met, leading to debates as to whether they are of any value to practicing statisticians.
• Bev Francis triggered one for female bodybuilding as a contestant in Miss Olympia 1991. She weighed in at 160 pounds (and is 5'5"). Previously, no other female contestant had ever been that muscular. She came in at second place, having lost by a single point and was leading after two rounds, only to be overtaken in the concluding rounds. The debate of "How much muscle on a woman is too much?” has raged on ever since.
• Cosplay:
  • Making one's own costumes vs. commissioning or ordering them. Some feel that craftsmanship is a very vital element of cosplay, while others find that it's too much extra effort just to have a pretty costume and prefer to focus on the modeling aspect of it.
  • Cosplaying simply for recreation vs cosplaying for competition or as a profession.
  • Whether one should match the body type of the character they're cosplaying. Those who say it should think it's aesthetically unpleasant at best and Nausea Fuel at worst to see, for example, a chubby Yoko Littner or a non-muscular Ira Gamagoori. Others point out that they should be able to cosplay whoever they please and that some people simply aren't able to match their characters' physique even if they do put their efforts into it, especially if height is the main issue (going to chubby to lean or vice versa can be done with a lot of time and dedication, but losing or gaining anything more than one inch as an adult with a fully-developed skeleton is straight up impossible). In fact, people of the former opinion have deterred many people from cosplaying certain characters that they want to cosplay, out of fear not just of negative reception but outright insults and harassments.
  • Skin tone is an even more touchy topic. Some people insist that people should only cosplay characters of their race, or who at least seem to be. White people playing Asian characters is sometimes allowed in these debates because the characters "don't look Asian" though it's not unknown to be against that. Others consider this racist and you should be able to cosplay whomever you want.
  • Whether light-skinned people can darken their skin for cosplay is very controversial; some see it as simply trying to replicate a character,while others feel that it's too evocative of Blackface for comfort.
  • The regulation of weapon props at conventions, especially gun props, is a very hot topic, especially in jurisdictions where gun control is a big deal. Those who push for stricter regulations or outright bans argue that it's better to play it safe especially since most cops are unlikely to know about the series people cosplay and thus may assume anything that looks like a real gun is a real gun because of the "better safe than sorry" principle. Others don't like working on fancy weapon props, being sure to make them distinguishable from real weapons, only to be told by con ops that they can't have that on the convention grounds. This is especially a temper-breaker argument in the United States, as the whole weapon prop debate goes hand-in-hand with the Second Amendment/gun rights debate.
• Anything and everything about animal welfare and animal rearing is up in the air. Many things are outright Flame Bait:
  • Physically altering your pets. Declawing, debarking, cropping ears, docking tails, etc. Practical or horrible abuse?
  • 'Designer dogs' such as "Labradoodles" or "Yorkie Poos". Are they okay to breed or not? Themes of dog overpopulation, backyard breeders, and puppy mills come into play. Do any of them have potential as genuine breeds? Are their nicknames cute or should they be treated like normal mutts?
  • The best diet for any species of pet. The best brands, vegetarian dogs, and whether you should make your own food.
    • To give a very specific example, within the blue-tongued skink community, the "dog food debate" has been raging for years. Blue-tongues are omnivores, and canned dog food supplemented with fresh vegetables is a staple diet favored by many owners for its convenience and nutritional balance.^note Canned cat food is too high in protein, as cats are strict carnivores, though it's sometimes recommended for babies or underweight skinks Others decry it as unnatural and swear by insects (live or canned) for a skink's protein needs, since that's their primary source of protein in the wild. You will find care sheets on both sides.
  • Dog breeds in general. Other species like cats, fish, and horses have similar debates but dogs are by far the most discussed. With documentaries like "Pedigree Dogs Exposed" many have come to question many breeds. Pugs, Border Collies, Basset Hounds, Bull Terriers, and German Shepherds are some of the most commonly debated. Working bred dogs vs Show dogs, whether dog breeds are an outdated and irrelevant concept, how to fix breeds' faults, whether certain breeds should become extinct, whether certain breeds are inherently dangerous, etc
  • Dog leashes. Should you use a harness, let them walk freely, or use their collar?
  • The topic of outdoor cats within the cat community. Opponents consider the practice abusive and/or neglectful, in addition to being bad for the environment (since cats are hunters) and dangerous for the cats themselves (because of dangers like cars); the abuse/neglect argument is less prevalent when discussing indoor-outdoor cats (those who live inside a home, but are allowed to go outside), but the dangers to the cat and to other wildlife like birds still apply. However, some on the other side think it's neglectful to keep cats indoors 24/7.
  • How to deal with fully outdoor cats and feral cats (as opposed to the indoor-outdoor type) is an even more touchy question — whether neutering and releasing does any good, and whether feral cats are pests who should be killed, are all hot topics.
  • Which exotic pets are okay to own differs from person to person.
  • How to treat livestock.
  • How should certain animal breeds look. This usually, but not always, overlaps with the aforementioned issues on health in dog breeding. For example, according to breed standards there is only one type of Chihuahua: the small "apple headed" variety. Many who own "deer headed" Chihuahuas insist that they are "better" and healthier than "apple headed" ones (due to their larger size and the fact that their heads are completely fused). Many Chihuahua purists, especially breeders, however believe that "deer headed" Chihuahuas are ill-bred and improper. Sometimes this whole issue goes so far that it even affects breeding. For example, some Bull Terrier breeders are trying to backbreed the older non-egg headed type back and some Basset Hound breeders are trying to breed their dogs to have less wrinkles and longer legs. To many other breeders this is terrible and the breeds should be kept as is.
• Vegetarians and the different variations.
  • Veganism vs vegetarianism is the most common debate. Vegetarians still eat eggs, dairy, and honey—animal products that don't require killing the animal—while vegans do not. The animal welfare aspects of eggs and milk are commonly debated, as are how healthy or dangerous being vegan is.
  • Raw veganism is notoriously controversial. Some jump up and down praising it while others find it unhealthy.
  • People who are vegetarian for health vs those that are in it for moral reasons.
  • Is being vegan a "lifestyle" or is it simply food related? Whether vegans can have pets, visit zoos, and the like is a touchy topic.
  • Asking whether it's safe to raise a child vegetarian or especially vegan is asking for trouble. What age it's okay to be vegetarian also depends. Some parents, especially non-veg ones, say they wouldn't let their kids be vegetarian until they're eighteen while others are okay with having a vegetarian teen. Whether elementary or junior high schooler should be allowed to become vegetarian is more debatable though.
  • What counts a diet as "plant-based" is also very controversial. Are plant-based diets vegan diets by another name? Are small amounts of animal products are permitted in a plant-based diet?
  • Is it possible to call oneself vegan and eat honey? Some vegans say no, since veganism is defined as not using animal products, but others say yes, claiming that the whole point of veganism is to take a stance against animal exploitation, and bees aren't being exploited since they're choosing to remain in their hives.
• Among cruise fans, private balconies are a highly contested design element. Some people won't stay in a suite without them but others think they are ugly, windy, and would prefer bigger suites with windows instead. The issue tends to represent the two different groups that cruises market to, the deal seeker and the ocean liner enthusiast. The deal seeker wants a cruise ship with amenities, including things like water slides, a surfing pool, and private balconies. The ocean liner enthusiast cares more about the look of the ship and how well fitted out her public spaces are and generally don't show interest in any features you couldn't find on the Titanic.
• Among editors, writers, and English teachers, the Oxford comma is Serious Business. Some people think you should use it every time because some sentences (e.g. "I love my parents, Miley Cyrus and Leonardo DaVinci") would be confusing, whereas others think it isn't necessary.
  • And this is further complicated by the fact that there are circumstances where adding an Oxford comma can make things confusing too (e.g., "I love my dad, Leonardo DaVinci, and Miley Cyrus") or even circumstances where both arrangements are unclear.
• Parenting:
  • Where to put a baby down to sleep. Some say that having the baby in their own room is best, since it allows the parents to take a break from the baby, while others say that babies should share a room with their parents since it makes it easier to hear when something is wrong. Some parents even advocate sharing beds with a baby, while others think this is potentially dangerous.
  • Is it okay to pretend magic (for example, Santa Claus) exists to your kids? Some see this as lying, while others think it's part of the fun of childhood.
  • Any "How old does my kid need to be before I start ____?" question is sure to provoke heated debates, with the leading two issues being weaning and potty training. Those who want parents to start early think the child's social development is at stake, while those who want them to start late think that starting early could be bad for the child physically.
  • Pacifiers. Some people say they're bad for the kid's teeth or distract them from breastfeeding, while others believe they prevent SIDS.
  • Anything that's harmless in moderation, but which kids can have too much of (e.g. candy, screen time) will spark debates over how much is too much. The answer to "when can my kids have this?" will range from "never; it's not worth the risk" to "only on special occasions since that's what special occasions are for" to "as much as they want, so long as it's not to the point of making them sick".
  • Whether or not to allow a baby to cry during sleep training. Some people say this is the only way they'll learn, while others say that it can lead to attachment issues in the baby.
  • Any sort of punishment, from mild ones like Go to Your Room!, all the way up to Corporal Punishment. Some people think that without these punishments, kids are being coddled and won't learn good behavior, while others believe that the punishment could damage the kids' relationship with their parents and/or just make them try to hide bad behavior instead of stopping it.
  • When toilet training kids, should they wear pull-ups or not? On the one hand, this means that if the kid has an accident, there's no mess to clean up. On the other hand, since pull-ups are essentially a different kind of diaper, some people think this would slow down toilet training.
  • Should babies be breastfed or bottle fed (provided that they have a parent who can lactate)? Some parents believe that "breast is best" since breastmilk contains antibodies and a feminine breasts can breastfeed on demand, whereas it takes time to prepare a bottle, but others point out that breastfeeding can hurt, some babies have trouble learning to latch onto the breast, and breastfeeding is more time-consuming than bottle feeding. Others give their children both breast milk and formula.

---