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Snub by Omission

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A character is describing, talking about or listing the members of a group but then pointedly skips over one of the members in order to snub them.

Sometimes the snub will be called attention to by having the left-out character call out their name in protest.

Reasons for this trope vary. The person doing the listing perhaps hates that member in particular and intentionally forgets their name, as if to imply they don't exist to the lister. Perhaps they actually did forget and don't notice at first, acting Innocently Insensitive. Whatever the case, it's going to end in offense and annoyance.

Supertrope of Aren't You Forgetting Someone?

See also My Friends... and Zoidberg, And the Rest.


Examples:

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    Anime and Manga 
  • In the first Accel World OVA, Kuroyukihime enlists the help of her three friends- Haruyuki, Takumu and Chiyuri- at Umesato to deal with a threat on the school network. All three agree to help, but when Haruyuki gives an answer that makes it seem as though he still thinks of himself as nothing more than Kuroyukihime's subordinate, Kuroyukihime, annoyed, says, "Then I'll see you after school, Takumu-kun, Chiyuri-kun."
  • In Death Note, Aizawa gets pumped up about going after Kira, and tells everyone to work hard, addressing them all by name… except for Matsuda.
  • In One Piece, when the Fishmen continue to doubt whether humans even care about their kind, fortune-teller Madame Shirley says that the Straw Hat Pirates that are currently protecting Fishman Island right now are all made of humans...but then someone points to Brook.
    Shirley: Look with your own eyes. Right now, in the plaza, over the skies! Those who are fighting with the Pirates of the Fishman District are humans!
    Kid: ... And him?
    Shirley: Well, I'm not so sure about some of them...
  • In Saki, after the second match out of five in the quarter-finals, during which Aislinn loses many points, Kurumi has this to say about the latter three matches, much to Sae's chagrin, since she's one of those who has yet to play.
    Kurumi: It's all right, Ei-chan! Just leave the rest to me and Toyone!
    Sae: What about me?!
  • Simoun: When Chor Tempest gets asked to show a Plumbum priestess around their ship, they naturally start off with introductions, with the priestess repeating each name as she's told it...except Aer's.
  • In the English dub for Isekai Quartet's second episode, Kazuma interrupts his companions' attempts at delivering their grandiose introductions by simply stating their names, then caps it off by telling everyone to "ignore that one (Darkness)".

    Comic Books 
  • The original Monster Society of Evil included the Axis Powers, the Crocodile Men of Planet Punkus, and all of Captain Marvel's rogues' gallery. The leader, Mister Mind, had three trusted lieutenants, representatives of the most evil sub-groups: the first, Herr Phoul, was an evil Nazi genius; the second, Doctor Smashi, a Japanese Mad Scientist; and the third was... Jorrk, the Crocodile Man.

    Fan Works 
  • In An Arc for every season, Team RWBY regularly has to remind people that they're actually Team RWBY-J and that Jaune is a trusted friend and The Heart of the group, as everyone (including Jaune himself, initially) tends to dismiss his presence due to him not only being weaker than the average Beacon student, but the others being fighting prodigies and the wielders of the most powerful abilities on the planet on top of that.
  • In Avatar: The Abridged Series
    King Bumi: Good try, but if you want to save the girl -
    Sokka: And Sokka!
  • In En Passant Harry does this unintentionally by awkwardly stopping after greeting three of a group of Gryffindors he met on the Hogwarts Express because he doesn't want to alienate his fellow Slytherins by greeting the Muggleborn member.
    Sven Rosier: That was brilliant, Evans! I've never thought of greeting everyone but him.
  • In A Witch's Family Percy Weasley greets everyone currently at the Burrow, except for Buffy.
  • Kingdom Hearts Ψ: The Seeker of Darkness: Inverted when Aqua is the only one Vanitas doesn't insult in the mediation scene, saying "Your ability in a fight I actually respect." He also doesn't immediately insult Xion, but when Sora points this out ("…kinda hope you didn’t do that on purpose.") he scoffs dismissively and calls her "the puppet", pressing Roxas's Berserk Button.
  • In A Simple Act of Vengeance Susan, Hannah, Blaise and Morag are sitting in a Hogwarts Express compartment together. Draco greets everyone but Morag.
    Morag: Hello Malfoy. I'm sitting in this compartment as well.

    Films — Animated 
  • In The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, Bugs shows off caricatures of the artists, writers, and animators who were responsible for his creation — however one key animator is left out: Bob Clampett. The film's director, Chuck Jones had never forgiven Clampett for being a Glory Hound in the documentary / anthology film Bugs Bunny: Superstar where he took most of the credit for Bugs' creation and downplayed the contribution of the others, so omitting him from his film was Jones' revenge.
    • Ben 'Bugs' Hardaway, who created the prototype version of Bugs (as well as being the namesake) was also left out in the movie, but Jones said that was due to oversight.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Captain America: Civil War has a relatively subtle example. When Tony is confronting his parents' killer, he says, "He killed my mom," implying he hasn't completely gotten over his issues with his father.
  • In Down Periscope, when Dodge calls the Orlando to congratulate them for getting the firing solution on the Stingray, he deliberately snubs Rear Admiral Graham, who's also in the submarine.
  • In Ghostbusters (1984), Dr. Venkman will often introduce Egon by first name, without his title, in comparison to the others.
    Peter: Hello I'm Dr. Venkman, this is Dr. Stanz, Egon.
  • The trigger for the argument that makes up Malcolm & Marie is that Malcolm forgot to thank his girlfriend Marie during his speech, which hurt her feelings as (a) he thanked a long list of other people and (b) she believes herself to be the inspiration for his film.
  • Ocean's Twelve: In Twelve. At Virgil's engagement party he thanks everyone present, one by one, for being so welcoming to his fiancee, but skips over his brother Turk.
  • In One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, when McMurphy sneaks some of the patients out of the ward to have some fun, he introduces the group to the charter boat harbor manager as follows:
    "We're from the State Mental Institution. This is Dr. Cheswick, Dr. Taber, Dr. Frederickson, Dr. Scanlon, the famous Dr. Scanlon, Mr. Harding, Dr. Bibbit, Dr. Martini, and Dr. Sefelt...oh, and I'm Dr. McMurphy."
  • Yes-Man, when the female lead is snubbing Jim Carrey, she thanks everybody who came to the show individually, except him.

    Literature 
  • In Animorphs, Jake decides to call a meeting to discuss strategy and names every main character except Cassie. He says it's accidental, but the reaction is the same.
  • In the Dragonriders of Pern novels, a group of Lords and Craftmasters use this to trick Lord Meron of Nabol to name the successor they wanted him to. By forgetting to mention their favored candidate half the time while they listed his potential heirs in their efforts to get him to name somebody as his heir, they convinced him that the frequently omitted heir was the one they wanted least, and he named that one as his heir in an attempt to spite them.
  • Wax and Wayne: Discussed in The Alloy of Law, the party that Wax and Steris go to at the beginning is incredibly crowded because the host invited nearly everyone just to make those he didn't invite that much more snubbed.

    Live Action TV 
  • Doctor Who: In "The Doctor Dances", after Captain Jack teleports out of the room the heroes are trapped in, vanishing into thin air, this exchange occurs:
    Rose: Why is it always the great-looking ones who do that?
    The Doctor: I'm making an effort not to feel insulted.
  • In How I Met Your Mother after an argument with Ted, Robin gives an acceptance speech where she lists her friends; Lily, Marshall, Barney, and... that's it. That's all my friends.
  • The IT Crowd has an Overly Long Gag during a company meeting where the Boss goes around thanking all the departments, such as the lawyers and the accountants and even the janitors, but not our heroes. Upon each announcement, he describes something that could potentially describe IT, only for it to be another department.
  • Monk, "Mr. Monk and the Astronaut" An astronaut is saying that anyone could have done what he did, could be a hero. "You, and you, and you and you", skipping over Monk pointedly.
  • In the final episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, when Pearl attempts to destroy the Satellite of Love via self-destruct, Mike and the bots start saying "I love you, [Fill-In-The-Name]!" When it gets to Tom, he doesn't mention Crow, instead grunting in anticipation of the explosion. When it doesn't happen, Crow calls him out on it, with Tom saying that he was going to, but he forgot his name for a moment. Crow doesn't buy it.
  • Power Rangers RPM At one point, Doctor K takes a moment to compliment each of the Ranger Series Operators... except Ziggy. Who lampshades it. "What about me?" "It's Ziggy. Z-I-G-G-Y." Of course, Doctor K had her reasons.
  • In the Scrubs episode "My House", Dr. Kelso was mad at Dr. Elliot Reid for becoming a private practice doctor and "leaving for greener pastures". He then spends the whole episode ignoring her, one incident involved him saying hello to every nurse, doctor and intern except for her. He also refused to tell her which radiographer was on call.
  • Silicon Valley: The obnoxious and overbearing Russ Hanneman treats the Pied Piper team in an overly familiar way, as if they're longtime friends, except for Erlich, whom he completely ignores. When Russ goes around the room stating his positive impressions of each team member, he just falls into awkward silence when he gets to Erlich. Ironically, Erlich is the only team member who actually seeks or values Russ's approval.
  • In Survivor: Australia, contestant Jerri Manthey excluded Tina Wesson when asked to list the members of her alliance. This eventually resulted in Tina turning on the alliance and voting Jerri out of the game in eighth place. Tina went on to win.
    • In the Reunion Season, Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains. The infamous Russell Hantz, when asked to list his allies, made the exact same mistake. The kicker was that the excluded person was Jerri Manthey from the above example. Russell finished in third place, one spot ahead of Jerri.
  • The Umbrella Academy (2019): Sir Reginald Hargreeves explicitly claims that he has only six children to the press, completely disregarding his seventh adopted child. Predictably, this only made Viktor's pre-existing insecurities worse.

    Theater 
  • This pops up in a speech from The Comedy of Errors's that compares a hideous character and various countries. When asked the speaker is asked if any part of the woman reminded him of Belgium or the Netherlands, he doesn't give them the time of day because of how gross their corresponding part must be.

    Video Games 
  • Sands of Destruction combines this with Be Careful What You Wish For. The team helps Rhi'a break a curse in the Wind Tower that was keeping one of her ancestors as a zombie. She thanks them, and Agan asks her to stop because it's embarrassing. She then declares, quite cheerfully, that she and her ancestor thank everyone except Agan. Of course he complains.

    Web Original 
  • Subverted in a popular photo format. The user will post a message about how they love all the works of a series, along with a picture of all the media related to it... except for the one or two regarded as Contested Sequels. The subversion kicks in when you look closer: the missing installment is hidden just enough so you won't notice it at first, either languishing in the background or sitting in the trash bin.
    • A similar subversion can be found in the "Not You / Tú No" meme, which portrays a themed positive message for every image on the screen but the one in the center, which is singled out with the titular phrase.

    Webcomics 
  • In The Order of the Stick, Durkon tells Hilgya that the rest of the Order are "a fine group, for humans. And an elf." Hilgya points out there's also a halfling, but Durkon left him out on purpose.

    Western Animation 
  • Last-moment subversion in the Justice League episode "Flash and Substance":
    Trickster: Captain Boomerang, you old son of a wallaby!
    Captain Boomerang: (ignores him) Mirror Master, Captain Cold! Does me good to see the old faces!... even the Trickster.
  • Done twice on Kick Buttowski during the episode "Snowapocalypse" when Kick mentions that he has to save everyone in the school bus:
    Kick: "We gotta save the driver, Jackie, Milo, Mouth, Dimitri, Janelle, Mitch and Dave!"
    Gunther "You forgot Kendall."
    Kick: "...Did I?"
    • Then once more right in front of her as he, Gunther and Wade save everyone, helping them onto the sleigh only for Kick to stop Gunther before he helps Kendall into it.
      Kick: "That's everyone, Gunther."
      Kendall: "AHEM, you forgot ME!"
      Kick: "...Did I?"
  • In A Pup Named Scooby-Doo after the villains are revealed, they will say the traditional, "And I would've gotten away with it too if it wasn't for you meddling kids." Many times, Scooby would have to remind them to finish by saying, "Oh, and that puppy."
  • The Simpsons
    • Homer loses the Employee of the Week award to an inanimate carbon rod, and does not receive a Town Pride Award, which everyone else gets.
    • A more extreme version when Sideshow Bob drives around the neighborhood with a list of people who will "not be killed by me" everyone's on the list except Bart. Homer celebrates, in front of Bart, about how he is on the list.
  • The Real Ghostbusters: In "The Grundel", Ray jokes that their lack of calls means nobody loves them and is lectured by Egon about associating self-worth with being loved. Janine reassures Ray that she loves him, Winston and Peter, but ignores Egon, much to Egon's annoyance. The three named Ghostbusters make a quick exit, followed by a dejected Egon. Janine stops him half-way up the stairs to tell him she loves him most of all; while he tries to dismiss the sentiment, he practically floats upstairs with pleasure.
    Janine: "It's okay, Ray — I love you. I love you, too, Winston. I even love Dr. Venkman here... sort of." (Three Ghostbusters leave, whistling; Egon follows, dejected.) "Oh, Egon? I love you most of all.
    Egon: (smiles, then catches himself) "A-hem. Yes, well... such displays of emotion are only needed by the insecure. Thanks for the thought though...
  • In American Dad!, the Smiths' house burns down, and Francine (who was away at the time) is naturally happy when it turns out that Stan and her adoptive parents got out safely. Then she hears Klaus clear his throat behind her, and hastily tries to say that he's the only one she was really worried about. Klaus responds "Too late, Francine. Too fucking late." Interestingly, this exchange might mark the point where Klaus' perverse obsession with Francine was Running Gagged, since it faded away pretty quickly following this episode.
  • Meta-example from South Park: Trey Parker and Matt Stone admit that they regret the way that "Butters' Very Own Episode" presents Gary Condit and the Ramseys, both of whom were later found innocent of the crimes that public opinion accused them of. Notably, they did not apologize about their portrayal of O.J. Simpson.
  • Total Drama: In "Not Quite Famous", the Killer Bass have to shove one last contestant on stage to have a shot at winning the talent show. Bridgette realizes that Tyler, Duncan, and Harold are the only options left. She follows this up with a note that Tyler is too clumsy before asking Courtney to remind her what Duncan is good for, omitting Harold from further consideration.

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