Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse / Western Animation

Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse in Western Animation.

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• 101 Dalmatians: The Series: In "A Christmas Cruella", while Cadpig as the Ghost of Christmas Past does pity Cruella for how her parents were never home for Christmas, she still points out that does not excuse the younger Cruella for taking her anger out on others.
• American Dad!
  • In "A.T. the Abusive Terrestrial", Roger is discovered by a kid named Elliot. Unfortunately, the kid turns out to be an abusive monster who even punches Roger in the eye. Roger tries to defend Elliot from an angry Steve, but Steve makes it clear nothing of it excuses how Elliot treats him.
  • As revealed in "Frannie 911", Roger Smith is such a Jerkass because his species needs to be for their own survival; as he explains, he needs to let out his "bitchiness" or it will turn to bile and poison him to death. That being said, the Smiths seem to agree it still doesn't excuse most of his heinous actions and continue to call him out on them after this reveal, with that very episode ending with Stan beating the living shit out of Roger. There's a fine line between being rude and bitchy, and just being an immoral sociopath, and Roger crosses that line more often than not; his "Ricky Spanish" persona alone has done such things as defecating in the chest of a person undergoing open heart surgery to killing Avery Bullock's wife, all just For the Evulz. Additionally, that same episode displays that Roger was willing to die beloved while keeping his need to be mean a secret, only started dying from being excessively nice for a prolonged period of time, and went from his deathbed to full health just by insulting Steve's dancing.
• Amphibia: Discussed in "The Beginning of the End". Sasha Waybright tells Anne Boonchuy that she is right that they both ignore Marcy Wu's interests, but that doesn't mean what she did is right and and should be forgiven that easily. Anne replied that while what Marcy did is indeed wrong and hard to forgive, both of them also made some terrible mistakes and they should give her a chance to to at least try and make things right between them.
• Arcane: Ekko is very unsympathetic towards Jinx, pointing out to Vi that Jinx has been willingly serving Silco, killing for him and helping to run his drugs, even as he’s done nothing but turn the undercity into an even bigger hellhole, just because she’s decided Silco’s approval is more important to her than anybody else’s actual lives.
• Archer: Sterling Archer, of all people, calls out his team for using him as an excuse to be their worse selves. Archer always had a strained relationship with his co-workers because he's an annoying douchebag on his best days and a complete a-hole on his worse days, with him constantly bullying and belittling them. Even the closest ones he has to friends have a hard time tolerating him at times. He was also a toxic influence on them. So when Archer was shot and put in a coma for three years, he found that his co-workers have become successful without him when he woke up. And it is implied that they are content without him in their lives, with them leaving him to his own devices for three months and trying to keep him from going on important missions with them. With Archer back and acting like an obnoxious, antagonistic, and impulsive Manchild, the rest of the characters start reverting to their self-destructive and dysfunctional selves; which they've always truly have had, even with him in his coma. However, Archer himself did not do much to corrupt them. He just made a few comments that started fights. And while Archer causes Cyril to lose his confidence, he didn't do much but make some mean comments and sabotage his diet, (and he was right to call out Cyril for storing his large supply of protein shakes in the break room fridge); but despite spending three years being a successful spy, it doesn't take much prodding from Archer to make him break down. This all comes to a head in the 11th season finale "Cold Fusion", where Lana angrily tells Archer despite him just saving the world, that she wishes he stayed in a coma and admits that she was OK with the Earth being destroyed if he was gone with it. Archer just asks if she ever considered that they like having him around so they have an excuse to be their worse selves, leaving Lana and the team with no words.
  Archer: Hey everyone! Why are you bitching?
  Lana: Hey! You’re the one who made all our lives worse by not being in a coma!
  Archer: (visibly hurt) Hmm, true. Cyril’s a wuss, Pam’s gone full horn-monster, Gilette’s probably binging again, and Lana, you’ve been a bitch to Sandra for, like, no reason. But let me just call up 7.5 billion of my closest friends to get their opinions. Oh, hey, guess what! They’re totally fine with it because they’re alive! And how many times did you guys save the world while I was in a coma?
  Everyone: (dead silence)
  Archer: I’LL TAKE YOUR SILENCE TO MEAN ZERO TIMES!
  Lana: Honestly, at this point, I’d wipe out the entire Earth if you went with it.
  Archer: Did you people ever consider that you need me around because you want the excuse to be your worst selves?
  Lana: Oh, shit!
• Avatar: The Last Airbender:
  • Discussed. While hiding out at Zuko's summer home in the episode "Sozin's Comet, Part 1: The Phoenix King", Team Avatar finds the picture of a smiling and sweet boy◊ and tease Zuko about it. But much to their dismay, Zuko reveals that it's not him — it's a picture of his abusive and sociopathic father Fire Lord Ozai. The gang is confused at this, wondering how this innocent-looking baby in the picture would one day become the Ax-Crazy tyrant they're now up against, but Zuko dismisses their confusion by pointing out that the baby grew up to be a monster and terrible father. Aang, however, points out the baby picture is a reminder that Ozai is still a human being and thus shouldn't be murdered even if he deserves it.
  • Earlier in that exact same location was the episode "The Beach", where Zuko at one point defaults to his Dark and Troubled Past in an argument with Mai, who is not swayed by it. Even the creators' commentary makes a note of this: that Mai already knows about Zuko's past trauma but that said trauma can't be used as an excuse for his bad behavior.
    • In "The Beach", Azula seems to embrace this trope; but mostly because her experiment of what it would be like to be a normal person fails.
      Azula: My own mother... thought I was a monster. [beat] She was right, of course, but it still hurt.
• Batman: The Animated Series:
  • Harley Quinn sometimes gets this attitude regarding her relationship with the Joker. Sometimes. In her early appearances, Batman simply treated her as one of Joker's gang members and wouldn't fall for her Wounded Gazelle Gambit strategy. Poison Ivy sees firsthand that Joker is abusing Harley, and says that she needs to get out of that bad situation; Batman himself, DA Janet Van Dorn, and Dr. Joan Leland say the same thing. They also acknowledge that while Harley has the chance to redeem herself, they still have to turn her in when she helps Joker or commits crime. We find out that Ivy, Bruce, and Barbara gave up on Harley as of the Batman Beyond continuity; she helped kidnap and torture the second Robin, Tim Drake. When Barbara confronted her about it, Harley tried justifying it as "he roughed the kid up a little" and tried to kill Batgirl.
  • "Mad Love" also discusses this. Dr. Harleen Quinzel, MD., fell for the Joker because of his tragic backstory about having an abusive father; he says that he became a clown to make people laugh because it's the one time he saw "Pops" happy. This is what spurred her eventual Face–Heel Turn into Harley Quinn, because she felt the world and Batman misunderstood Joker's intention to help others laugh. Batman, while tied up and in a Death Trap to boot, invokes his trope; he tells Harley, after laughing about her belief that killing Batman will make Joker happy, calls her a fool. He says that the Joker loves nobody and is using Harley, having pegged her for grooming when she started as an Arkham intern. As Harley denies it, he reveals that Joker gave many sob stories to his parole officers and cops about having an abusive father or runaway mom. Batman tells Harley, as she herself realizes that Joker's dad couldn't have been his happiest at "the circus" or "the ice show" at the same time, that Joker has a "million" excuses, and even if he did have a bad past, that doesn't justify his actions. Sadly, Harley goes to I Reject Your Reality, forcing Batman to pull out a trump card: reveal that Joker wouldn't be happy if she tried killing Batman, and Joker expresses that sentiment with his fists.  
  • In the episode "Trial", Gotham's new District Attorney, Janet van Dorn, blames Batman for the city's problems; she believes that Batman created each of the city's villains and wants to put him on trial. Unfortunately, the villains think this is a great idea and promptly take over Arkham Asylum, kidnap Batman and van Dorn, and declare that she's going to get what she asked for: a trial for the Caped Crusader, with her as defense attorney, Two-Face as the prosecutor, Joker as the judge, and other members of the rogues gallery as the jury. Though rattled, van Dorn demonstrates her legal skill by questioning each criminal about their connection to Batman, and while they all initially accuse him of sparking their Start of Darkness, she's able to prove that they were unstable and had criminal tendencies long before he met them, often causing their own problems and using the Dark Knight as a convenient scapegoat. By the trial's end, van Dorn has realized that her original statement was wrong, as Batman isn't the reason for Gotham's supervillain problem: even without him, the rogues would have most likely turned out the same way. He may have inspired some of their costumes and dramatic poses, but they made their own choice to become criminals. To her own astonishment, the jury finds Batman not guilty, with the Joker congratulating her...and then announcing that they're still going to kill them anyway—after all, she just proved that they're insane.
    Janet: I used to believe Batman was responsible for you people, but now I see nearly everyone here would have ended up exactly the same, Batman or not. Oh, the gimmicks might be different, but you'd all be out there in some form or another, bringing misery to Gotham. The truth is, you created him.
    Joker: Well done, counselor. You've proven that Batman didn't create us. That we in fact messed up our own rotten lives.
  • Killer Croc frequently argues that he had no choice in becoming a violent criminal because of his disfigured appearance and rough upbringing. "Sideshow" has him stumble across a group of former circus freaks like himself living out in the woods after escaping from prison. Having no knowledge of his crimes, they take Croc (a former circus freak himself) in as one of their own, offering him the perfect opportunity to escape the life he claims he hates so much and redeem himself. Instead, Croc turns on them and tries to rob and kill them, being narrowly stopped by Batman. When one of the freaks, a young boy who Croc had taken under his wing, asks why, Croc confesses "I was just being myself", accepting that for all the suffering he's gone through, he's ultimately the one responsible for his own actions and choices.
• BoJack Horseman:
  • BoJack gets repeatedly called out on the fact that he keeps blaming his Dark and Troubled Past for his reprehensible behavior, and expects everyone to just forgive anything he does because of it. It's illustrated best in the season 3 episode "It's You", where the usually laid-back comic relief character Todd points out that while BoJack's childhood was bleak and he himself suffers from his self-destructiveness as much as anyone else, those things don't absolve him of responsibility for the damage he causes.
    Todd: You can't keep doing this! You can't keep doing shitty things and then feel bad about yourself like that makes it okay. You need to be better!
    BoJack: I know. And I'm sorry, okay? I was drunk, and there was all this pressure with the Oscar campaign... But now, now that it's over I-
    Todd: No! No, BoJack, just... stop. You are all the things that are wrong with you. It's not the alcohol, or the drugs, or any of the shitty things that happened to you in your career, or when you were a kid. It's you, alright? It's you. ...Fuck, man. What else is there to say?
  • Season 4 reveals that Beatrice Horseman, BoJack's abusive mom, didn't have such a great childhood herself. Her older brother was killed in action during World War II, which led to her mother becoming depressed and emotionally unstable, and her Standard '50s Father was completely lost as to how to help, so he went with the quick (though doctor-recommended) fix of getting Honey a lobotomy. Thanks to the lobotomy, her mother didn't notice that Beatrice contracted scarlet fever, which led to her father, after showcasing he still treats his wife like crap despite her mental state, traumatically burning all of Beatrice's possessions while offhandedly mentioning that she might need to get lobotomized as well if she kept crying. He then proceeded to take a much greater role in her life, trying to steer her down the path of dutiful housewife to an heir to a company that would make a good business partner, including criticizing her weight (along with the popular girls at school), as he takes gratitude in the fact that her swollen throat from scarlet fever can help her lose weight, which leads Beatrice to become severely weight conscious as an adult that she takes weight loss pills in order to keep her slim figure (and to complain about how pregnancy “ruined” her beauty and figure after she has BoJack). Then when she met Butterscotch, she had a rebellious one-night stand resulting in the pregnancy that would become BoJack. Beatrice refused to abort the baby, and the two of them eloped and moved to California, and their marriage soon fell apart in part because of his inability to make money through his writing. However, it's made perfectly clear that while her past was undoubtedly tragic and traumatic, nothing she went through excuses her atrocious treatment of her son and the long-lasting effects it has on him.
• The Boondocks:
  • In the episode "Stinkmeaner 3: The Hateocracy", the Hateocracy think this of themselves. They want Robert Freeman and his family dead because one of their members, Stinkmeaner, was killed by Robert. After the Hateocracy kills Bushido Brown, Robert in desperation apologizes to the Hateocracy near the end of the episode for killing Stinkmeaner. The group rejects it, though not out of loyalty to Stinkmeaner. They don't even care he killed Stinkmeaner. They just wanted to ruin someone's life and Robert gave them an excuse to come after him and his family.
  • In the episode "The Color Ruckus", we learn that much of Uncle Ruckus' personality (particularly his hatred of other black people) resulted from extremely traumatizing childhood abuse by his hateful father, Mister Ruckus. It later turns out that Mister became the way he is because he was also treated like shit by his own mother, Nelly Ruckus, along with multiple racist white men during his working years. After Nelly passes away, Mister takes his family to her funeral just to celebrate her demise. However, Uncle finally gains the courage to stand up to his father and call him out for taking out his frustrations on his own family.
    Uncle Ruckus: No no, that's okay. Keep talking. Keep talking, Daddy. That's the eulogy this woman deserved. She did this to you, and now you're doing it to me. You've been doing it our whole lives, and it's getting old! It's gettin' real old, old man! So get it out yo' system, then sit down AND SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!
• Centaurworld: From the very moment she entered his backstory in episode "The Last Lullaby", this trope was Horse's intuition about the Nowhere King. True, his self-hatred drove him to split his Elktaur self into the Elk and the General. True, it was tragic circumstances that the Elk was an intelligent being who couldn't marry the Princess or integrate into society the way the General did. And sure, the Elk's steady transformation into the Nowhere King was born from a place of hurt that drove him to believe he didn't belong anywhere. But at the end of the day, Horse won't take any of it as a sound excuse for what he's done. As much as she sympathizes with the pain of ever being separated from a loved one, no amount of sympathy can change how his machinations have destroyed many innocent lives in the long run.
• Code Lyoko: It's implied that the Lyoko-warriors and more accurately Odd, Ulrich and Yumi were traumatized and grew to be used to fight XANA-William. This, combined with William's short time as a good guy against XANA, could explain why they give him the cold shoulder in "Fight to the Finish", with Odd going as far as to say that William is their enemy even though he's been freed from XANA's control and regretting William's clone's "demise", and Yumi brutally rejecting William when he tries to help them and trying to justify it by saying that William isn't "strong enough", an excuse even William doesn't seems to buy. However, Aelita calls them out on their thinking, stating that William was unwilling to be their enemy in the first place, and that she was xanafied as well (and much more times than William to boot), but they never treated her like they treated William. Sadly, her arguments are barely acknowledged, and leaving William on Earth led to him being xanafied once again and almost killing Jeremy, Ulrich and Yumi. Only Odd regretted rejecting William's help, and in the sequel series Code Lyoko: Evolution, it ends up being an Ignored Epiphany.
• Danny Phantom: The Christmas Episode "The Fright Before Christmas" shows Danny hates the holidays because his parents spent so much time bickering over the existence of Santa that they neglected their kids and caused nothing but ruined Christmases. He takes his frustrations out on some Christmas ornaments and, when he finds he destroyed a Christmas poem by the Ghost Writer, he's pleased with it. Angered, the Ghost Writer punishes Danny by trapping him in a new Christmas poem. During the entire episode, the Ghost Writer causes everyone's holidays to be ruined and putting the blame on Danny. After seeing the devastation caused because he chose to act out of spite towards Christmas, Danny realizes he had no right to act the way he did and agrees to do better from now on.
• Darkwing Duck: In episode Planet Of The Capes, Ordinary Guy from planet Mertz is the only guy on Mertz with no powers. Because of this, the other superheroes on the planet have to constantly rescue him from dangerous situations. He grows sick of this, so he disappears, takes on a supervillain persona, Not-So-Ordinary Guy, and invents a large ray gun which steals the superpowers of all of Mertz's heroes. He justifies this by saying he is fed up with no privacy, no social life, and the beatings he takes. He asks Darkwing Duck "Surely you know what I'm talking about, I watch them do to you what they did to me". While Darkwing Duck is sympathetic and admits the other superheroes are pesky, he points out "You don't see me going bad." Ordinary Guy fires back with "Maybe I like being a villain, Mr. High, and Mighty".
• Delilah & Julius: Tibor, the main villain of Season 2 who is after the Zero List, is revealed to be Julius Chevalier's older brother, whose parents gave him up to a secret special operatives training program to raise spartan mega-strong agents; the program was cancelled when some of the agents became unstable. When he reveals to Julius that he's his older brother and explains that their parents gave him up to the program while having Julius to replace him, Julius is disgusted and mockingly asks if this is about avenging his lost childhood. Tibor admits it was about vengeance, but the Zero List had a way of changing things. It's implied that Tibor wanted to use the Zero List to change the past so he does not get put in the program. Even still, Julius has no sympathy for Tibor and plans to stop him because using the Zero List could damage or destroy the world.

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• Elena of Avalor: Esteban has spent his life at the beck and call of others, from his grandparents to Shuriki to Elena, and has never been able to accomplish his own dreams. On top of that, he desires more power because he was not listened to when it truly mattered; before his parents departed on a ship ride, he had felt something was wrong and his concerns were dismissed, only to be proven right when a storm at sea took them down. Feeling he wasn't loved or listened to after his parents' deaths, and desperate to be seen and heard, this led him to assist Shuriki in her takeover of Avalor in exchange for political power, only helping as long as she promised not to hurt his family. Unsurprisingly, Shuriki lied and killed Elena's parents. Esteban got the power he wanted, and regretted it deeply. When the truth comes out in "The Magic Within" and Esteban tries to justify his actions this way, only his grandfather is willing to forgive him; everyone else, especially his grandmother and Elena, tells him point-blank that there's no excuse for selling his family out to Shuriki, getting his aunt and uncle killed, and bringing a dark age to Avalor. However, the trope itself gets Deconstructed later on; yes, Esteban's reasons cannot justify what he did, but they shouldn't be ignored either, as ignoring the bad things that happened to him only leaves the circumstances behind his Freudian Excuse to fester. In "Dia de las Madres", Elena and Aublea Luisa realize that Esteban never properly recovered from the loss of his parents and they never properly helped him cope. When Esteban confronts his abuelos in the Grand Finale "Coronation Day", he tells them he wants to be king because he wants people to listen to him when no one in his life would. Luisa, instead of dismissing his excuses, tells him that, yes, people will finally listen to him, but they will hate him and remember him as the villain who betrayed his family for power. This answer hits Esteban hard and it causes him to really think if that's what he wants, and it influences his decision to sacrifice himself to save Elena from Cahu later on. This, combined with him using his last breath to truly apologize, is what allows Elena to finally forgive Esteban, creating enough of her emotion magic to resurrect him, save Avalor, and defeat Cahu. Afterward, Esteban promises to spend the rest of his life making up for his mistakes, which allows the rest of the family and Avalor to forgive him and welcome him back.
• F is for Family: William "Big Bill" Murphy had a horrible relationship with his son Frank because of how abusive he was to him as a child. So, the first time in years where he visited Frank and his family after years of having no contact with them, it appears he grew into a nice old man. Frank is understandably shocked when Bill is kind to him and his family, and his children love their newfound grandfather. However, slowly Big Bill's nice guy facade begins to fall apart, with his grandson Bill getting to witness his true character firsthand when he almost hits him over accidentally knocking a display case over. And even when it appears that he and Frank are making peace with each other, Big Bill refuses to acknowledge his abuse of Frank, causing the two of them to fight and Bill getting a split lip after daring Frank into punching him after another round of insults. However, when Big Bill's grandchildren Bill and Maureen tell him off, pointing out he the reason their father messed up, he listens to them and realizes they were right. At a hospital he confides to a nurse that he raised Frank the best way he knew for the times. As he says, he knew he was not perfect, admitting that he messed him up and just could not admit it to anyone, even himself. So when Frank is in the hospital to see his wife, Bill genuinely apologizes. Frank is so touched that he promises that they will talk after he sees his wife.
• Family Guy: Quagmire's Mom: After Glenn Quagmire is arrested for statutory rape after sleeping with a teenage girl, he tries to convince the judge that his sexual deviancy is the fault of his mother, who was an even bigger deviant than him, and being raised by her warped him. The judge disagrees, pointing out that while his childhood wasn't perfect, it doesn't excuse his crime, and sentences him to prison. Brian later tells him that he's a grown man and should take responsibility for his own actions and not blame his mother for them.
• Fangbone!: In the episode "The Breaker of Oaths", Fangbone, Bill, and Cid see memories of Venomous Drool's past in the Nightlands and consequently learn his backstory of how he was banished from the Mighty Lizard Clan as an infant for his hideous appearance, raised by giant slugs, became a self-taught wizard, and gained his evil power by dipping his toe into a pool of liquid evil. Bill feels sympathy for Drool, saying that Drool wouldn't have become the Evil Sorceror he is today if he hadn't been shunned by the barbarians as a baby. Cid points out that it was his choice to become evil by dipping his toe in the pool, remarking that he could have just stayed angry.
• Futurama: In "Proposition Infinity", Professor Farnsworth opposes robosexuality (a paring between human and robot) and tries to get the legalisation cancelled. During a hearing, Farnsworth reveals why he's against robosexuality, his girlfriend left him for a robot. Amy interrupts and calls out Farnsworth for having such a petty excuse for opposing the movement. Which causes Farnsworth to reveal in a fit of frustration that his girlfriend was a robot, and the reveal makes him realise his wrongdoing and support the cause.
• Gargoyles: In the past, Demona was mistreated by the humans she protected in Castle Wyvern. She watched her clan be destroyed by the Vikings, and set out to rebuild a new clan of gargoyles of the last of her kind, only for them to be destroyed, leaving her miserably alone for centuries. But as Goliath pointed out, Demona herself was the one that caused the destruction of her first clan because she was the one to betray the castle to the Vikings, because of her and the Captain of the Guard's short-sighted plan for the Vikings to take the humans and leave the gargoyles. She was also responsible for scarring Gillecomgain's face when he was just a child during a raid for food on his family's farm, turning the kid's heart to hatred toward her kind and turning him into the Hunter, who would proceed to massacre the entire Sruighlea Cell of her second clan and pose a dire threat to the rest of it. And her second clan was destroyed because she herself betrayed Macbeth to Canmore because she suspected Macbeth's plan to betray her, only for Canmore to betray her in turn and destroy her clan. The Weird Sisters force Demona to face the truth of her actions, only for her to ignore the truth later.
  The Weird Sisters: You must give them the code.
  Demona: I will have vengeance for the betrayal of my clan. Vengeance for my pain.
  The Weird Sisters: But who betrayed your clan? And who caused this pain?
  Demona: The Vikings destroyed my clan.
  The Weird Sisters: Who betrayed the castle to the Vikings?
  Demona: The Hunter hunted us down.
  The Weird Sisters: Who created The Hunter?
  Demona: Canmore destroyed the last of us.
  The Weird Sisters: Who betrayed Macbeth to Canmore?
• Weirdly both played straight and subverted in God, the Devil and Bob. When Bob's emotionally abusive father dies, he's openly upset that he wound up going to heaven despite the things he did to Bob during their lives. When God points out that his Dad was abused himself, Bob scoffs at it, pointing out that it didn't excuse the way he treated his own kids. Unusually, God fully agrees with this, acknowledging that Bob has every right to hate his father and never forgive him, but He has to take a person's past and full actions into account, and commends his father's attempts to "pass on a softer punch". Bob does come around and forgive his father after hearing God's speech, if only because the experience got him to reflect on his own shortcomings as a father.
  "And you're right to be mad at him. But it's not your job to forgive him. It's mine."

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• Harley Quinn (2019):
  • Dr. Psycho decides, without prompting, to explain his backstory to Darkseid: he couldn't ride a ferris wheel when he was a kid due to his short height, then the wheel collapsed, killing the people on it. He says that's when he decided to hate women. The story is a rambling mess having nothing to do with Psycho's misogyny, motivations or even his psychic powers. Darkseid reacts accordingly.
  • Harley Quinn blames her criminal life on the fact that her dad is a criminal, and her bad taste in men on her mother's refusal to leave her dad, as well as the Joker himself for turning her into a supervillain, convinced he pushed her into a vat of chemicals. The episode Being Harley Quinn has her go on a Journey to the Center of the Mind, which reveals that Harley has had Ax-Crazy tendencies ever since she was a child, long before Joker ever got to her; her attempts at playing with dolls involved a wife murdering a husband for cheating, she stalked her Celeb Crush to the point legal actions needed to be taken, and she may have killed a girl at her camp for spreading humiliating rumors about her. The final memory reveals that Harley in fact jumped into the chemical vat of her own volition, but repressed that part since it had always been easier to give agency to the Joker and blame him for her turn to villainy. In the end, the Joker didn't corrupt her so much as reawaken what was already there, and Harley acknowledges that she is responsible for her own life and had a choice every step of the way.
• Hey Arnold!: In episode "Helga and the Nanny", Inga does a more gentle, sympathetic version of this trope at the end — lampshading how she sympathizes with Helga G. Pataki for the situation she's in, but at the same time noting how Helga has cultivated some of that herself through her refusal to accept help.
  Inga: You are such an angry girl, Helga. And you won't let anyone help you. So you must live with your unhappiness.
• Infinity Train:
  • The Book 1 season finale has Tulip acknowledging that she feels sorry for Amelia, since she doesn't know what it's like to lose your husband young. Tulip also calls out Amelia for hurting Atticus and trying to Mind Rape Tulip, merely for the crime of protecting One-One from her. She says that Amelia has the capacity to change, but it has to be a choice rather than using your pain as an excuse to hurt others.
  • In Book 3, Simon becomes more and more unhinged, as his entire worldview comes crashing down, and Grace and him grow apart after Hazel and Tuba are introduced, that is not even to consider the fact that, to be on the train, it means he already has problems to begin with. As the season goes, Simon grows violent, manipulative, and insane as he denies all the revelations that happen. By the end of the season, he has gathered the highest number ever, even higher than Amelia, whose number went up to her neck, his covers his entire face and legs. When he confronts Grace in the season finale, she acknowledges how much pain he is in, but also says that it's not her fault, since he rejected every chance of redemption they were offered while she took it, and she doesn't owe him anything.
  • Grace's parents were neglectful towards her and she was ostracized by her peers for no reason. That said, this does not excuse her for everything she did as part of the Apex, something that a memory of Hazel calls her out on in "The New Apex" and she's forced to admit it as well.
• Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts:
  • In Season 3, Wolf reunites with Margot, her former "sister" from the wolf pack that had secretly raised Wolf just to be a final practice hunt for the cubs. At the time, Margot had been the closest to her, but nevertheless overcame her reluctance and attacked Wolf with the rest. In the present, Margot is regretful but says that she had no choice but to go along with the rest, which neither Wolf nor the rest of the group accept. It's only by the end that Margot tries to actually make things right, and by then it's too late for her to keep the others out of the trap she was leading them into.
  • Song explains that Dr. Emilia was raised by a tyrannical, anti-mute zealot who rebuked his son and daughter if they showed interest in anything but "find a way to destroy the mutes and return humanity to the surface." But while Liam was able to change his mind after finding Ratland and befriending Brad and Amy, Emilia is so devoted to her father's cause that she murders Liam and then tells the rest of the burrow that mutes did it. Song's story illustrates that despite having the opportunity to follow her brother down a better path, Emilia refused and actively chose to be hateful.
• Mighty Max: While it initially seems like Arachnoid is simple lashing out over being turned into a human-spider hybrid, and later that he has been driven so insane by his condition that he desires to turn every human on Earth into spiders as well, Max eventually realizes he’s really doing this so he can get the recognition he thinks he deserves.
• Miraculous Ladybug
  • Adrien's identical cousin Félix Fathom is a Jerkass who is cold to everyone and plays mean-spirited pranks. Plagg gets a bad feeling about him after witnessing him smash a piece of his camembert under Adrien's pillow and tries to warn Adrien. Adrien says he's probably just lashing out because he recently lost his father. Plagg points out that Adrien recently lost his mother but didn't react in the same way. (Unfortunately, Plagg's remark is Innocently Insensitive and his point is lost over his apologies, at least until Félix starts doing far worse things than putting cheese under pillows.)
  • Early in Season 2, it's implied that Chloé Bourgeois needs to be the center of attention because her mother left when she was little, and she hasn't had emotional growth since. A seemingly throwaway line in "Zombizou" further supports this: Chloé gets surprisingly defensive when Sabrina mentions her mom. Season 3 onwards displays that Chloé is mean regardless of her mommy issues. Even Mylène states in "Derision" that Chloé being abandoned by her mom when she was little doesn't justify her constant bullying of Marinette when Rose says that Chloé acts the way she does because her mother left her, Mylène points out that her own mother left her too, but she doesn't use that as an excuse to take it out on others.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: In the season 5 finale, "The Cutie Re-Mark – Part 1" and "The Cutie Re-Mark – Part 2", Starlight Glimmer reveals that her hate for cutie marks and fear of making friends stems from her childhood, when her best friend getting one caused the two to become separated, and her anger lead her down a path of villainy. After Twilight manages to talk her down from her trying to destroy Equestria, Starlight acknowledges that her past is no excuse for what she's done and she's ready for whatever punishment Twilight and her friends think is fair. Oddly for this trope, Starlight's Easily Forgiven by literally every other character such she's the only one holding it against herself.
• My Little Pony: Make Your Mark: Once Misty's ousted as working for Opaline and kidnapping Sparky, she tries to explain herself as Opaline having saved and raised her as a foal and promised her a Suite Mark (a ponies sense of self and propose), but midway through breaks down and admits it doesn't excuse betraying those who've been nothing but nice to her. Nor do her fiends forgive her betrayal despite her remorse and apologizing (a big deal given how forgiving this and the prior series have been]]) until Misty dramatically proves she's genuinely repentant and reformed.
• Ōban Star-Racers: Eva's distant father Don Wei was once a successful and happy man who managed one of the biggest racing companies on earth and was Happily Married to the pilot Maya. Then his world came crashing down when Maya was killed in a racing accident. Sinking into despair, Don began to doubt his ability to raise a child, which led to him abandoning his daughter at a miserable boarding school. After some time as a drifter with no purpose, he soon grew into a cold, hard man who distanced himself emotionally from everyone. When Eva confronts him about this, she furiously tells her father of all the years she waited for him to come back, that she was just as hurt by Maya's death as him, and that he never made an attempt to even contact her. What's more, Don eventually did find a successful team, and he still could never find the time for his daughter, to the point where he didn't even recognize her when she showed up again. Don himself admits he can't blame Eva for hating him after his utter carelessness.
• Pantheon: While his murder and digital imprisonment was inhumane and his anger at Prasad understandable, David, a husband and father himself, makes it clear he's enraged that Chanda murdered an innocent family to hurt one man.
  Chanda: Of course they made sure to erase this memory. But after I recovered it, I knew I had to stop him from doing this to anyone else.
  David: And his wife? His son? His daughter?
• Paradise PD: Kevin does this to himself in Season 4 when he tries to prevent the childhood incident (accidentally shooting his father Randall in the balls) that ruined his family, causing him to grow into a pathetic, Extreme Doormat wimp who can't even go to the bathroom by himself. Using Time Travel, he manages to stop it, and returns to the present to find a virtual utopia with everyone happy and well-adjusted unlike the dysfunctional white trash they were before... except Kevin himself, who's STILL just as pathetic, if not more so, to the point that he's managed to turn his badass love interest Gina into just as big a loser as himself. This finally makes Kevin realize that he's been using his shitty upbringing as an excuse to never having to mature or stand up for himself.
  Alpha!Kevin: You let your father take away your own name! You let a bunch of sex dolls kick you out of your apartment!!
  Beta!Kevin: But I'm a victim...
  Alpha!Kevin: No. You're the problem! *BLAM!*
• Pasila: Played With in episode "Karrelle palanut enkeli". Raine points out that his violent behaviour oght to land him in jail, since his excuses for doing them are self-created and weak; if he were imprisoned he wouldn't be able to keep hurting people. Everybody agrees he has a point, but the fact that he admits this causes everyone to feel sorry for him and demand he not be punished.

R-S

• The Real Ghostbusters episode "Ragnarok and Roll" has a man trying to unleash Ragnarok and destroy the world just because his girlfriend dumped him. His deformed assistant and Only Friend gives him a speech about how foolish his actions truly are, which causes him to call it off.
  D'tillio: Look at me! I'm small and weak and ugly, but at least I'm still human! If you weren't sufficiently loved, it's your own fault, and not the world's! You had everything, I had nothing, but I'll have more love and decency in my going out then you ever will!
• Recess: In the episode Don't Ask Me, Guru Kid needs to use the bathroom, so he allows Spinelli to substitute. When her advice works so well that people start to go to her for advice, Guru Kid is fine with Spinelli taking over his job, and he doesn't even try to take it back until he feels that his time has come. While at first things were good, Spinelli started to advise the kids to use violence to the point where almost every kid was fighting with each other on the playground. Spinelli does not see the problem, as she gleefully advises the kids to use violent moves and badmouths Guru Kid for not giving the kids "advice they could use", which, as Vince points out, is advice kids could use on each other. Eventually, the kids turn on Spinelli, blaming her for the negative consequences of their actions. Guru Kid steps in and saves Spinelli by pointing out that they all chose to follow Spinelli's advice, and they are in control of their own actions. The kids concede his point, admitting that no one said they actually had to listen to Spinelli.
  Guru Kid: Wait, this is not the way.
  Swinger Girl: Step aside skinny, Spinelli's got it coming.
  Guru Kid: Does she? And why is that? Did you not all receive the help you sought?
  Group of Kids: Yeah and Maybe.
  Guru Kid: Blame not the advisor if one chooses to take her advice. Do we all not have the free will to do as we choose? Why not hold her responsible for her actions or you for yours?
  Swinger Girl: You know, Turban Boy makes sense. I mean, nobody told us we had to listen to Spinelli.
• Sabrina: The Animated Series: Tim was born with no magic, despite having a witch for a mother, though he does have immortality. Viewed as a freak, he was mercilessly bullied by the children of his hometown, mocking him for his lack of magic as a kid. He left home with his only friend, an aardvark named Elton. Becoming the apprentice to Leonardo da Vinci, Tim stole some of his inventions and modified them so they could be used to capture witches and seek revenge for what they did to him all those years, becoming the most feared witch hunter of all time, Tim the Witch Smeller. Quigley was very sympathetic to Tim and was sad that all those witch and warlock children were cruel to him. However, when Quigley stops Tim from hurting his family, he points out how just because he was bullied by a few witches is no excuse to attack those who've done nothing to him. He points out that Sabrina is a preteen and a child, and Hilda and Zelda for all their previous misbehavior never messed with Tim. When Tim tries to justify himself by saying that all witches are alike, Quigley revokes him, saying that everybody's an individual responsible for their own actions and that he judges people by their actions, not what they are. At first it appears that Quigley got through to Tim, with him apologizing, but the apology turns out to be a ruse to a trap, showing that he does not care if who he hurts is innocent or not, he just wants to hurt witches.
  Tim: Let go of me, you're a mortal, don't you see how horrible these witches are?
  Quigley: That's a load of hooey. Sure, maybe a group of witches excluded you hundreds of years ago, but that's got nothing to do with these girls. They've never lifted a finger against you.
  Tim: No, you don't understand old man, witches are all alike.
  Quigley: You're horsefeathers! Everybody's an individual responsible for their own actions. I judge people by what they say and do, not by skin color or sex, or nationality or whether they happen to have magic powers!
• Static Shock:
  • In the episode "The Usual Suspect", Marcus Reed spent time in juvenile hall and wants to turn his life around, but is constantly kept short by the prejudice of others. During a talk with his counselor Sharon Hawkins, Marcus talks about how people see him as nothing but a gangster and, in a fit of self-doubt, sadly decides that's all he'll ever be. Sharon goes along with it, saying that he should give up. Surprised by her answer, he points out she's supposed to be supportive. Sharon reasons that she is supportive of him, but says that buying into that gangster label only confirms other people's preconceptions. When Marcus brings up that he did not have it easy growing up, Sharon tells him she knows and she's sorry, but that is in the past and he has to be responsible for his own actions. She tells Marcus that he has a lot of potential and he can choose to use it or he can throw it all away. Later in the episode, it's revealed that the new Bang Baby attacking people is Marcus' ex-girlfriend Tamara Lawrence, who went to the docks looking for him, hoping to get him back, but he wasn't there. As it was the night of the Big Bang, she was hit by Quantum Vapor and gained the ability to change into a powerful monster. Hungry for revenge, she decided to frame Marcus. As she tells Marcus this, Tina says she tried to control her powers, but he's got no idea what it's like to live with a monster inside of you. After Tamara is defeated and taken away by the police, Marcus admits to Sharon that Tamara was wrong, he does know what it's like. Sharon tells Marcus the difference is that he can learn to control his monster and eventually make it go away. It's implied Marcus took her advice to heart and turned his life around.
  • The episode "Jimmy" has the titular character constantly being bullied by Nick and his cronies. Eventually, the bullying causes Jimmy to take his father's handgun to a school event and aim it at Nick. Unfortunately, Nick's gang tackles him, causing him to accidentally shoot Richie, one of the few people who actually cared about him, in the leg. After this, Jimmy is sent to juvie and now has to live with the guilt of accidentally hurting one of the few people who were even close to being friends with him.
• Implied in She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. Glimmer has an Inferiority Superiority Complex caused by her childhood and the loss of her mother, resulting in her becoming the new Queen of Bright Moon. However, her reckless actions resulted from this leaded to Horde Prime's invasion to Etheria. At one point, Glimmer tried to remind Bow of the good times they have in the past, but Bow realized despite everything, a lot has changed and she is still accounted for her actions.
• South Park seems to like this trope.
  • "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" deals with the boys unwittingly joining the North American Man Boy Love Association and narrowly escaping being sexually abused by the pedophiles. In the end, the men are all arrested and the leader tries Playing the Victim Card by explaining that his attraction to little boys isn't something he can control and that it's wrong for him to be persecuted for just being himself. Kyle and Stan's response?
    Kyle: Dude. You have sex. With. Children!
    Stan: Yeah, you know, we believe in equality for everybody and tolerance and all that gay stuff, but dude: fuck you!
    Kyle: Seriously.
  • "The Jeffersons" has Michael Jefferson (actually Michael Jackson in a Paper-Thin Disguise) act like a Manchild and being overly friendly to the kids in the cast, neglecting his own child, Blanket. Cartman defends Jefferson by saying that he should be able to act like a child because he had to work all the time when he was young and never had a chance at a proper childhood. Kyle rebukes this by saying that even if all of the charges he has were all made up and he didn't have a good childhood, that doesn't give him the right to be a manchild because he has a kid of his own. He needs to grow up and take responsibility to raise his own son.
  • Kyle Broflowski in "Splatty Tomato" who tries to justify his actions to Ike by telling him he's been through a lot in the past few episodes, only for Ike to angrily retort by saying that his actions resulted in the president nuking Canada, Ike's birth country, and causing millions of deaths.
    • Heidi Turner, after hearing Kyle's response to her newfound attitude from the same episode, realizes that even though she suffered a mentally abusive relationship with Cartman, it doesn't mean she can become a horrible person because of it, which leads to her decision to break up with Cartman.

T-Z

• Teen Titans (2003): When Terra is being controlled by Slade and moans that she has no choice, Beast Boy tells her that she always had a choice.
  "That's a lie! You've always had a choice! It's all been your choice! You chose to work for Slade, chose to betray us, and now you've chosen to give him control! Slade isn't doing this, Terra! You are!"
• The Owl House: Although Belos denies it, it becomes clear to Luz and her friends that his resentment from witches come from his brother falling in love with a witch and leaving him behind after hearing his story in "Thanks to Them". When Belos accuses "Caleb" of backstabbing him, Luz tells him he's actually the one who did it first.
• Totally Spies!: Almost every single villain the spies face has some level of Freudian Excuse that they use to justify their villainous plans. It even gets to the point where Clover (easily the one most apt to break the fourth wall) drops this gem: "Finally, an evil villain who isn't bitter about being dissed or something..." when it seems like that trend will be broken. However, the spies themselves have zero sympathy for the tragic backstories of the villains they face. Clover gives a classic example. (As shown on the video example)
  Sunny Day: If I'm mean, then what do you call the owners of Bronze-Me-Baby, who fired me at first wrinkle?!
  Clover: Ugh! That's beyond harsh, Sunny. But maybe you should get over it?
• Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy: During the third chapter, Kingdom, Starscream pulls an Enemy Mine with Dinobot and Blackarachnia to obtain Allspark and the Golden Disk for themselves. While arguing, Starscream tries to justify his actions as the result of cycles of abuse at Megatron's hands. Dinobot flatly calls him out on it, noting he uses that excuse to justify hurting others at his own pleasure.
• Tuttle Twins: The two bandits have spent the majority of the second half of "When Laws Give You Lemons" stealing cows (both legally and illegally). Then when they're finally defeated, they both lament that they really need cows and are so jealous that Carla has so many of them. Emily sets them both straight by saying that it's no excuse to violate Carla's right to property.
• Velma: Velma Dinkley's cynicism and vindictiveness are a result of guilt because she believes her mom went missing because of her dreams of being a detective, as well as her father's bad parenting skills. Although Daphne and Norville pity Velma for losing her mom, even they don't believe it excuses her selfishness and how she treats them. Daphne tells Velma (who was in disguise) that Velma only cares about her Missing Mom and treats everyone else as irrelevant. After getting his father nearly arrested and then trying to blame the cops instead, Norville says he no longer cares about Velma's mom and calls her a terrible friend for treating him so horribly. Even her dad agrees that while he and Diya contributed with how their daughter turned out, he also points out she was hard to handle when she was younger and stressed them out.
• The Venture Brothers: After witnessing the murder of his therapist, Rusty Venture and the other boy adventurers go to fight the culprit. They turn up at Dr. Z's house and accuse him so they can beat him up for trying to kill them. Instead, Dr. Z calms them down and tells them he had nothing to do with the therapist's death and they can only help themselves by letting go of their traumatic past. Rusty realises that he doesn't need therapy because he got over his problems in his own way and he's the least damaged of the group. He never took drugs to cope, he never developed a disorder as a coping mechanism, he never resorted to murdering his abuser, and he started his own business and family.
• Wakfu has this as a Recurring Element. All Big Bads faced each season have varying degrees of sympathetic reasons and are all Anti Villains, however, every season they're called out for their actions and their justifications at the end of the season:
  • Nox bemoans the death of his family and states that he was told that he could make time go back, to meet his family again and undo the calamities he caused. When Yugo sees this, he automatically reacts with anger, seeing Nox as a madman who justified himself via the imaginary words of a seemingly inanimate object. Though when he sees Nox is legitimately sad and crying Tears of Remorse, Yugo's anger gives way to surprise and sympathy and he prevents the Sadida from attacking Nox, allowing the villain to leave.
  • At the end of season 2, Quilby is cornered, and Yugo expands that the fact that Qilby remembers all his past lives and must suffer the existential crisis of a truly unending life while everything else dies, turns to dust, or reincarnates with no memory is not a reason for him to have done the atrocities he has, including ending several planets, starting a war that lead to many of his race killed, and starting another war against his own race when they realized his deception. Qilby tries to shift blame and claim Yugo and the other Eliatropes never truly cared or understood his struggles and viewed "his" happiness as always worth less, but even if it were true, his way of lashing out was still unjustifiable.
  • In season 3, it's Amalia who gets to call out Oporo for his actions. Yes, he is a different version of Yugo and has seen everybody else of his race die, but he keeps looking for justifications for his own actions and try to show he is in the right because he is Yugo. Oporo aggressively tries to assume his place in the Brotherhood of the Tofu, ignoring those he hurt, blaming Yugo for creating him and causing every tragedy of the series to keep the Stable Time Loop. Amalie tells him in clear terms he and Yugo are nothing alike and that the latter would never dodge guilt and manipulate others as he does. Of course, Oropo simply gets pissed off and proceeds with the final stage of his goal to replace the gods via destroying them and making select demigods the new ones, but ironically it's the fact he still cares about those very people he hurt and manipulated (both the Brotherhood of the Tofu and his own brotherhood the Siblings), that prevents him from going through with his plans when he's put in a position where he would have to kill them all to finish off the gods, and even sacrifices himself to save them from his own super-weapon.
• What's New, Scooby-Doo?: The culprit of the week dressed as a Headless Snowman and terrorizes a small town during the Christmas season because he was looking for gold bricks that were stolen from his ancestor. In a rare case for this trope, the culprit himself admits that he had no excuse for ruining everyone's Christmas and was fully prepared to pay for his crimes. Fortunately for him, it's a Christmas Episode, so he is Easily Forgiven. He was so touched, he decides to give the gold to the town people.
• Young Justice (2010): Both Ma'alefa'ak (M'comm M'orzz) and M'gann were subjected to harsh, racist treatment at the hands of the Green and Red Martians since they were children. However, M'gann makes it clear it's no excuse for his current actions, and that he's become just as bad as his oppressors not only by trying to start a war on New Genesis to get support for his own cause, but by working with Darkseid to achieve it and going one step further than even other racist Martians by using an Apokoliptian bomb to attempt the genocide of the other Martians.
• Zevo-3: Crust Sparrow is the leader of the Moloks, a group of mutants who were fused to parts of the Footville Subway System by the Zevo Compound. He rules the Moloks with an iron fist and treats the subway as a kingdom. He believes that the Moloks' mutations were caused by the gods of transformation, so every year he would make a sacrifice to please the gods. Kewl Breeze was planned to be this year's sacrifice. Kewl is rescued by Z-Strap and Elastika, who comes with Crust's own son Bugs, who ran away from the Moloks some time ago. When Bugs asks what happened to him, Crust says his life was ruined, and Bugs fires back that he ruined everyone else's life.

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