History Main / SafetyInMuggles

** Homelander discovers Queen Maeve has a lesbian ex-girlfriend called Elena, so "outs" Maeve on live television to humiliate her. Elena doesn't want to have a relationship under the gaze of the paparazzi and Vought's publicity machine, but Maeve knows Elena will [[PsychoExBoyfriend be safe from Homelander]] as long as she remains in the public eye.

* In ''Manga/DeathNote'' when going to meet the second Kira, Light/Kira invites a large group of friends to accompany him on the outing in case Ryuk is seen by the second Kira's shinigami, he/she won't be able to tell which person Ryuk is following. [[spoiler:The second Kira is able to spot him anyway, due to a quirk in how the shinigami eyes work that Light wasn't aware of]].

* Averted in ''Franchise/TheMatrix'' films, where the Agents have zero qualms with leap-frogging from car to car on a busy freeway, tearing the roof off of one, and then dodging the stream of bullets fired at them, all in plain view of the civilian drivers. Presumably, this is because the Machines have the power to just rewrite the memories of those imprisoned in their LotusEaterMachine. Meanwhile, the human heroes have to keep a low profile and maintain the masquerade to avoid drawing the attention of the Agents in the first place. One scene shows a bystander witnessing a superhuman display and being taken over by an Agent before they can even finish expressing their surprise.

* Averted in ''Film/TheMatrix'' films, where the Agents have zero qualms with leap-frogging from car to car on a busy freeway, tearing the roof off of one, and then dodging the stream of bullets fired at them, all in plain view of the civilian drivers. Presumably, this is because the Machines have the power to just rewrite the memories of those imprisoned in their LotusEaterMachine.
** The aversion only works for the villains, the human heroes have to keep a low profile and maintain the masquerade to avoid drawing the attention of the Agents in the first place. One scene shows a bystander witnessing a superhuman display and being taken over by an Agent before they can even finish expressing their surprise.

* In most incarnations of ''{{Transformers}}'', this is the rationale behind becoming robots in disguise, being able to masquerade as common, everyday vehicles and objects.

Contrast KilledToUpholdTheMasquerade. Compare VillainOverForDinner and HumanShield.

* In ''Film/{{Witness}}'', John Book is able to take out two of the bad cops who come to the farm, but the main one takes Rachel and her father hostage. He's going to shoot Book, but the rest of the Amish community, summoned by Rachel's son ringing the bell, arrive and he gives up, unable or unwilling to kill so many.

** ''Film/{{Moonraker}}'': Jaws, TheDragon, is about to strangle Manuela, the tertiary BondGirl when he's interrupted by a group of Carnival revelers. Even more fortunate for her, the distraction lasts long enough for Bond to arrive and rescue her, and another group of partiers saves both of their lives when they not only stop Jaws, they sweep him along with them, away from the couple.

** ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'': Bond escapes Kamal Khan's palace, [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame who embarks on a literal manhunt through the Indian jungle]]. He only gets away when he joins a tourist group which was passing by.
** In ''Film/LicenceToKill'', after Bond "resigns" and escapes to the street, M stops a guard from shooting because they can't risk hitting a civilian.

* ''WesternAnimation/LiloAndStitch.'' Jumba can't open fire on Stitch because of his close company with Lilo, a member of a "protected species." He enjoys reminding Stitch of it though, such as when he revealed the handle of his plasma weapon from inside a paper sack.

* In ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension'', mages suffer from a MagicMisfire called "paradox" whenever they do anything that can't be explained away as coincidence. Paradox is bad enough when it's just supernaturals around to witness it, but it gets really bad if a {{Muggle}} sees something that's definitely magic. Therefore, mages of pretty much any faction tend to lay off the really heavy magic when there are civilians around.
** The prologue story in one edition of the main book had a character invoke this deliberately. Realizing that her opponent had too much paradox going, she grabbed a random guy off the street and asked him to help her. The mere presence of an ordinary man was enough to increase the paradox to the point where the enemy mage was simply pulled out of reality.

Of course, characters attempting to do this run the risk of the pursuer deciding to use conventional means to separate them from the crowd (like posing as a "common" kidnapper or using a gun instead of a LaserBlade) or eschewing collateral damage / breaching the masquerade and trusting people's WeirdnessCensor to convince them it was something mundane after the fact (if they even care). In the absolute worst case, the pursuer may decide to eliminate the characters and uphold the masquerade by the simple expedient of [[LeaveNoSurvivors killing everyone]].

** A-Train is beating The Female to death in a subway, so Frenchie loudly informs the people waiting on a nearby platform that the famous superhero is right over there. The Female escapes while A-Train has to pose for selfies.

** Homelander discovers Queen Maeve has a lesbian ex-girlfriend called Elena, so 'outs' Maeve on live television to humiliate her. Elena doesn't want to have a relationship under the gaze of paparazzi and Vought's publicity machine, but Maeve knows Elena will [[PsychoExBoyfriend be safe from Homelander]] as long as she remains in the public eye.

** It's actually because most humans are so comfortable with the Matrix's fairly comfortable emulation of reality [[WeirdnessCensor they'd rather ignore all the strangeness and keep living that way]]. The ones that do take notice and remember these things are candidates for extraction the Agents just [[KilledToUpholdTheMasquerade hunt down later]].

** ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'': Bond escapes Kamal Khan's palace, [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame only to have him hunt him through the Indian jungle]]. He only gets away when he joins a tourist group which was passing by.

* ''Series/TheBoys 2019''. While their powerful corporate backers are adept at covering up their mistakes, any celebrity superheroes is still a SlaveToPR, so this trope comes up several times.
** A-Train is beating The Female to death in a subway, so Frankie loudly informs the people waiting on a nearby platform that the famous superhero is right over there! The Female escapes while A-Train has to pose for selfies.

*** In ''Film/ForYourEyesOnly'', Bond is stalked through a ski resort by the bad guys, but they are deterred from harming him because of the crowd.

** A villainous version in ''Film/{{Spectre}}'', where the bad guy Bond is chasing flees into a crowd, knowing it will deter Bond from killing him. Later, two thugs attempt to capture Q in a ski lift, but are foiled when a bunch of tourists get on. Q is able to slip away once the lift stops.
*** This is a likely reference to a similar sequence in ''Film/ForYourEyesOnly'', when Bond is stalked through a ski resort by the bad guys, but they are deterred from harming him because of the crowd.

** Homelander discovers Queen Maeve has a lesbian ex-girlfriend called Elena, so 'outs' Maeve on live television to humiliate her. Elena doesn't want to have a relationship under the gaze of paparazzi and Vought's publicity machine, but Maeve knows Elena will only be safe from her PsychoExBoyfriend while she remains in the public eye.

* ''Series/TheBoys 2019''. While their powerful corporate backers are adept at covering up their mistakes, celebrity superheroes are still SlavesToPR so this trope comes up several times.