History Main / OurBetterIsDifferent

* Literature/{{Discworld}}'s dwarfs & ''Literature/TalesOfMU''[='s=] dark elves, for who lower is better.
** Also to Discworld dwarfs, "enlightened" is seen as a negative term, as light makes your pupils contract and can therefore blind you.
** Also seen among the demons in ''Literature/{{Eric}}'' and of ''Literature/TheScrewtapeLetters'', who do bad deeds in the hopes of being demoted through the lowerarchy.
** Another Discworld example is that trolls believe history is lived backwards, because you can only see what's in front of you, which is the past, so the dawn of time is actually the end, and the sunset is the beginning.
** Also, Creator/DCComics' Hell works like this.
** The humans in ''Literature/AboveGround'' are yet another example.
* ''Literature/TheDispossessed'' by Creator/UrsulaKLeguin: In the ConLang Pravic, the term "more central" is used instead.

* Used occasionally in ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'', as Zim's alien species has a hierarchy based off of height.

* In Creator/SergeyLukyanenko's ''Literature/LineOfDelirium'', the [[SiliconBasedLife Silicoids]] (floating sentient columns of rock) value stability and balance above all else. As such, their hierarchy is inverted compared to humans. Unlike TheEmperor, who rules from the top, Sedimin (the ruler of the Silicoid Basis) rules from the very bottom, supporting the Basis, thus his title is the Foot of the Basis. When the protagonist is thinking of how the Silicoids decide leadership based on a duel to the death, he has to mentally correct himself in that Sedimin did not ''ascend'' to his position, as a human would, but ''descend''.
* In some games, such as golf, a lower score is better.
* [[Literature/TheScrewtapeLetters Screwtape]] frequently mentions the Lowerarchy of Hell.
* [[http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/~ak621/DOS/ This website]] by the [[LampshadeHanging amusingly named "Doctor DOS Betamax"]] seems to be dedicated to demonstrating how the normally-held-to-be-technically-inferior DOS is a better operating system than Windows. (A JustifiedTrope to the extent it demonstrates how the command line and batch files are useful for power users, which many hardcore techies swear by, noting that the command prompt continues to feature in every version of Windows to date for a reason; however, trying to convince us that DOS isn't dead might put it a little too close to DiscoDan territory for some people's liking.)

* "The Author of the Acacia Seeds", by [[Creator/UrsulaKLeGuin Ursula K. Le Guin]], discusses a manifesto written by an ant, which ends, "Up with the Queen!" The narrator notes that to ants, the safe and desirable direction is down, while danger comes from above. Also, the author of the manifesto was a revolutionary. So a better translation would be, "Down with the Queen!"

* In Creator/LFrankBaum's ''Tik Tok of Oz'', Dorothy is dropped through a hollow tube to the other side of the world. Here, most people are Kings or Queens, with a lesser number of lesser royalty, but there is only one "Private Citizen" who is the most important (to the extent that anyone in the Oz universe has more than local and transient effect).

* In "Creator/LFrankBaum"'s "Tik Tok of Oz" Dorothy is dropped through a hollow tube to the other side of the world, where most people are Kings or Queens, with a lesser number of lesser royalty, but there is only one "Private Citizen" who is the most important (to the extent that anyone in the Oz universe has more than local and transient effect).

** Also seen among the demons in ''Discworld/{{Eric}}'' and of ''Literature/TheScrewtapeLetters'', who do bad deeds in the hopes of being demoted through the lowerarchy.

** Also seen among the demons in ''Discworld/{{Eric}}'' and of ''TheScrewtapeLetters'', who do bad deeds in the hopes of being demoted through the lowerarchy.

* [[TheScrewtapeLetters Screwtape]] frequently mentions the Lowerarchy of Hell.

** Also, DCComics' Hell works like this.

* In a variant of this trope, the song "Ain't Your Fairytale by SonataArctica, which is [[{{Xenofiction}} sung from the perspective of a wolf]], uses the phrase "the dawn of our way of life" to refer to an end (and the rise of Humankind), inverting the standard (human) symbolism of sunrise as a hopeful beginning and sunset as an end.

* ''Literature/{{Ringworld}}'' by Creator/LarryNiven: the Puppeteers value cowardice above all things, so their leader is called "The Hindmost".

* In SergeyLukyanenko's ''LineOfDelirium'', the [[SiliconBasedLife Silicoids]] (floating sentient columns of rock) value stability and balance above all else. As such, their hierarchy is inverted compared to humans. Unlike TheEmperor, who rules from the top, Sedimin (the ruler of the Silicoid Basis) rules from the very bottom, supporting the Basis, thus his title is the Foot of the Basis. When the protagonist is thinking of how the Silicoids decide leadership based on a duel to the death, he has to mentally correct himself in that Sedimin did not ''ascend'' to his position, as a human would, but ''descend''.

** The humans in ''AboveGround'' are yet another example.

* [[http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/~ak621/DOS/ This website]] by the amusingly named "Doctor DOS Betamax" seems to be dedicated to demonstrating how the normally-held-to-be-technically-inferior DOS is a better operating system than Windows.