Selective Obliviousness - Television Tropes & Idioms

"I choose not to understand these signs."

~Bender, Futurama

"It's not denial. I'm just very selective about the reality I accept."

~Calvin, Calvin And Hobbes

"I reject your reality and substitute my own!"

~Adam Savage, Myth Busters (sorta)

Selective Obliviousness is when a character refuses to comprehend a particular fact, usually someone else's feelings for them. They'll especially turn it up when someone attempts to tell them directly, which usually results in said would-be confessor aborting the attempt because not only was it a difficult subject to begin with, they can't bring themselves to smash this person's sense of reality.

Regarding unrequited relationships involving someone with Selective Obliviousness; even if ''everyone'' else is aware of someone's crush on that person, nobody will ever mention the possiblity to the practicioner. Nobody likes to gossip about who is interested in who, especially teenagers.

Stop laughing. This is one person's cross to bear alone.

This contrasts with Weirdness Censor, in which everyone except the main characters is oblivious to the bizarre occurrences around them.

Usually this is supposed to denote a sense of innocence, however to more cynical viewers, it may appear that the person either conciously or subconsciously knows, and just doesn't want to deal with it. It also seems inexplicably popular with characters whose main trait is apparently perceptiveness of other people's character. Selective Obliviousness is also a tool that the writers use to keep things in the air, such as for Will They Or Won't They? Like all stalling tactics, overuse breeds contempt.

If a character is Not Himself expect them to confront the person who likes them and tell them that they know how they feel, but just don't feel the same way - in a creepy evil manner.

If this happens in real life, it is called Dis Continuity.

Plot Sensitive Snooping Skills is a sort of involuntary Selective Obliviousness imposed on a character by the limits of the plot. Contrast with Failed A Spot Check, in which the character fails to comprehend something everyone else is aware of.

Examples:

Anime/Manga

A staple in romantic comedies (Love Triangle and Love Dodecahedron). Remember kids, open honesty is not what's required in a relationship!
In Ranma 1/2, the bombastic Tatewaki "Blue Thunder" Kuno refuses to believe that the hated Ranma Saotome and his beloved "Pigtailed Girl" are one and the same, even when Ranma changes right in his arms. After a while, one wonders if he isn't fully aware and just forcing himself not to think about it. His sister has a similar ailment, but she isn't confronted with the evidence quite as often.
- Akane Tendo is often accused of this regarding the fact that her pet pig is actually the cursed form of one of Ranma's rivals for her affections.
- Kasumi Tendo calls people who are actively trying to murder Ranma his "friends". Often Flanderized in Fan Fic into one of her defining traits.
Sakura Kinomoto from Card Captor Sakura is somehow not aware that her best friend Tomoyo is in love with her. Somehow. But then again, obliviousness is her defining character trait.
Revolutionary Girl Utena was interesting in that it didn't portray the girl (Shiori) practicing Selective Obliviousness in a positive light.
Subverted in Magic Knight Rayearth where it seems that Umi is unaware of Ascot the Summoner's feelings for her. It becomes apparent that she knows, she'd just rather stay friends and not talk about it.
Naru in Love Hina falls into this with regards to her feelings for Keitaro. Later on, it is more a case of willful denial.
In Kanon, Yuuichi has been doing this regarding Nayuki's feelings for seven years straight. Probably the only reason that she hasn't given up or decided that he wasn't worth the trouble was because he'd already gone through too much at the time of the revelation. Indeed, in the end he realizes that his own amnesia is also caused by Selective Obliviousness— he wanted to forget the town where he "lost" Ayu.
In Cromartie High School, no one (except Kamiyama and Hayashida) seems to notice that Mechazawa is, in fact, a robot.
Kyon from Suzumiya Haruhi, despite being told several times by Koizumi (who openly and exasperatedly states that he can't believe Kyon still doesn't get it) about his importance to Haruhi, despite her hitting him with clues as subtle as a brick, despite him kissing her in closed space being the only thing that makes her want to return to the real world, still insists he has absolutely no idea why Haruhi gets so upset every time he acts too familiar with other girls. Partly on account that Kyon is an Unreliable Narrator, and partly because he's very good at putting walls up in his mind around things he doesn't want to think about.
- It's not just love. He'll very deliberately ignore Koizumi hinting that the Chessgame of Life may have a King (who decides the game) as well as a Queen (who has the power in the game); he refuses to acknowledge Tachibana flat out telling him that he has the power to transfer Haruhi's power as well as Tsuruya's telling him that he and his friends really need to work on their Masquerade better.
Souichi of the Boys Love manga The Tyrant Falls In Love doesn't seem to realize that he's making an awful lot of exceptions to his homophobia in regards to his gay companion Morinaga, not even after he says outright that he doesn't want Morinaga to leave him and that he can have sex with Morinaga only. That must be one hell of a balancing act between "I hate hate homos!" and "I can't let Morinaga leave my side, even if he likes me that way!" in Souichi's mind.
Nearly the entire cast of Hayate No Gotoku has this about one subject or another (Sakuya, for example, believes her destiny is to become Japan's greatest comedienne, with Nagi as her partner) — except for Hayate, who's just blunderingly ignorant to romantic advances.
Ouran High School Host Club: Tamaki often thinks of Haruhi as a "daughter", and much of the humor comes from his protectiveness and attempts to 'educate' Haruhi on how to act. The other characters seem to imply this is misdirected affection obscuring an actual attraction; and given the satirical nature of the show, might be an example of the unusual albeit well-intentioned 'pure' love people have for moe characters.
Penguin Revolution: After rooming together for five volumes and counting, Ayaori still thinks that Yukari is a boy pretending to be a girl instead of a girl pretending to be a boy. Sure, he's Blind Without Em, but she isn't even trying any more.
Wilhelm Schultz in Allison And Lillia manages to remain completely unaware of his childhood friend Allison's feelings for him, in spite of his Hyper Awareness and Photographic Memory. Until she pins him down and forces him to kiss/marry her, anyway. In the second half, his daughter Lillia can also be like this, though it's exacerbated by the fact that the people around her help to keep it that way.
Hikari from Special A is utterly unable to seperate "rival" and "lover" in her mind, and despite the most obvious hints from Kei (even a kiss and Kei attempting to get a date with her), she continues to be blindly ignorant of this. Yet everyone else around them seems to have caught on.
Hidamari Sketch has an expanded version, in that everyone tiptoes around Sae's quite obvious crush on Hiro—even when Sae goes into a barely concealed fit of jealousy when Hiro gets a love letter from a boy.
- Natsume's feelings for Sae also fit this trope. C'mon, does she have to jump her object of affection before anyone notices it?
Otani of Lovely Complex initially all but refuses to consider the possibility that Huge Schoolgirl Risa would be interested in a short guy like him even when she tells him outright that she likes him (he thinks she was joking), which causes Risa and just about everybody else to attack him or shake their heads over his mind-boggling stupidity.

Live Action TV

Clark has Selective Obliviousness regarding Chloe's feelings for him in Smallville. But under the influence of Red Kryptonite or other forms of Phlebotinum, Kal-El repeatedly taunts her with the truth that Clark just doesn't feel that way for her.
Sent up in (what else?) Arrested Development:
Tobias: You know, Mother Lucille, there's a psychological concept known as 'denial' that I think you're evincing. It's when a thought is so hateful that the mind literally rejects it.
Lucille: You are a worse psychiatrist than you are a son-in-law, and you will never get work as an actor because you have no talent.
Tobias: Well, if she's not going to say anything, I certainly can't help her.
Rachel of Friends is in constant denial about her true feelings for Ross when she's not with him. On the day before Ross's wedding to Emily, she somehow finally figures it out: "Sure, I like Ross, but as only a friend...okay, I'm attracted to him, but not that way...oh my God, I love him." When she demands of Phoebe on why she didn't tell her about her own feelings before, Phoebe replies, "Well, it's so obvious to everybody. It's like saying, 'Gosh Monica, you sure like to clean.'"
The Colbert Report: Stephen Colbert insists that he is completely straight. Evidence to the contrary is dismissed with convoluted excuses when possible, ignored when not (as with the diagram of his brain in which one area was labeled "Repressed Homosexual Urges").
How has no one mentioned Gul Dukat on Star Trek Deep Space Nine? His imagined friendship with Captain Sisko escalates to ridiculous levels throughout the series, to the point where he chides Sisko for being so obtuse about his feelings while on the opposite sides of a battle line or in the middle of a no-holds-barred hand-to-hand fight. In fact, you could probably form a whole section on all the things Dukat pointedly ignores.

Western Animation

Happened to an absurd amount in Clone High, with Abe completely oblivious to Joan's feelings until the final episode. When he realizes he loves her, he proceeds to ask Gandhi whether his feelings could be reciprocated. This causes a flashback showing all the extremely obvious hints seen so far. It takes a while to get through them.
In King Of The Hill, despite his rampant paranoia and suspicion of everyone and everything, Dale Gribble is completely unaware that his wife is having an affair, although it's obvious to everyone else - with the exceptions of Joseph, "his" son, and Peggy (Who gets Clue-by-four'd later on). Nobody has the heart to tell him about it.
Invader Zim has two cases: Zim, who refuses to acknowledge that his leaders would like nothing more than his swift and painful death, and Dib, who thinks that exposing Zim as an alien will change how his family and peers think of him, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary.

Comic Books

Can be seen in Western depictions of a Superhero with a secret identity, attempting to tell it to the loved one. (Example: Spider-Man's Aunt May.) One Superman story has Lois admonishing the Man of Steel for "that creepy Clark Kent impersonation." (Indeed, one might make a claim that the whole Superman mythos embodies this trope, as it would seem painfully obvious that Superman is just Clark Kent without glasses.)

Literature

In The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy (at least the novels), Zaphod is literally selectively aware of his own motives, due to having both of his brains surgically altered so that certain thoughts wouldn't be detectable by the brain scans he needed to undergo in order to become President of the Galaxy.
- This is also in the movie. It's more of a Hand Wave of Zaphod's two heads because they don't go into specifics.
Clifford manages to be shocked when he finally learns that his wife has been having an affair with another man in Lady Chatterley's Lover. His maid recognizes that he subconsciously knew about his wife's infidelity from the start, but just didn't have the courage to face it.

Webcomics

In El Goonish Shive, Melissa is so madly in love with Justin, she keeps asking him out even after it is revealed that he is gay. Justin, needless to say, finds this extremely irritating, especially since she is the one who (either directly or "indirectly") blew the secret.
- Earlier in the series (though chronologically after Justin was outed), Elliot pretended not to notice Sarah's feelings towards him, because he was afraid that a romantic relationship with her would destroy their friendship; he may have had Justin and Melissa's ruined friendship in mind, since he'd known Justin for some time at that point.
In Fans, club president Rikk is utterly oblivious to fellow member Rumy's painfully obvious attraction to him. When third member Katherine gets fed up with this and tries to inform him directly, he exhausts every other member in the club, Katherine included, as potentially having a crush on him. Not once does he even consider Rumy.
In Misfile, Doctor Upton can hardly have failed to have noticed that his "daughter" appears to have developed some rather severe identity problems, especially considering that it was shouted out at full volume at one point. Despite this, the issue is never raised.
In Schlock Mercenary, Lt. Elf had a major crush on Captain Tagon, a crush that was obvious to every member of the crew except Tagon. (Pretty much every attempt by Elf to broach the subject was interpreted by the one-track minded - and occasionally stunningly dense - Tagon as referring to their current mercenary job). She eventually gives up on Tagon and hooks up with Second-In-Command and company Mad Scientist, Kevyn.

Machinima

Sarge of Red Vs Blue takes this attitude in Reconstruction when told that Grif's been promoted to Sergeant and is his new squad's CO. Grif actually said he didn't even think it was physically possible for him to understand.
- Of course all of this is now a moot point since Wash told them that none of them are ranked soldiers and that they've all been unknowingly participating in an elaborate training simulation for the past few years. Grif and Simmons still refer to Sarge as "Sarge" however.
  - They may be referring to him as "Sarge" because there has been No Name Given as an alternative.

Seiza Squirm

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