Are you allowed to edit or delete YMMV items?

Say for example someone had posted in Superman:

• God-Mode Sue: Superman himself. But then what would you expect when your entire story is about a morally perfect demi-god beating criminals whose only chance of defence is that they occasionally just happen to have some mysterious green rock that's supposed to hurt him.

Now most Superman fans know that his stories are actually about him challenging forces of evil that are just as strong if not stronger than he is, and that he can (and at several times, does) lose those fights. So if a Superman fan were to see that above entry, would he be allowed to edit or delete it?

Nope. The only reason that you can legitimately change or remove a YMMV entry is if you can demonstrate that it is factually inaccurate or is misusing the trope. Superman would pretty completely outclass many (granted, not all, but many) of his opponents if Kryptonite wasn't in the equation.

YMMV means "These are subjective. Different people will see them differently". Someone adding one is saying "This is what I think." Deleting it is effectively saying "No, you don't really think that."

edited 18th Jun '14 5:39:13 PM by Madrugada

I thought so, just wanted to check.

So I guess I should check to see I didn't make a mistake, then. A little while ago on the YMMV page for House of Anubis I decided to change the part about Chewing the Scenery. I didn't get rid of it, but instead, I reworded it so that rather than just having it bluntly say "the acting is narmy" (Paraphrased, obviously) I instead said, "Many people see the acting as being..." because I am an avid fan of the show and spend a lot of time with other fans, and we don't think the acting is bad at all save for some scenes and the majority of the first season. In other words, I wanted it to seem less like a fact and more like how it is, that some people may see the acting as being over the top but others might not. I assume this is okay, but now I want to be sure.

With respect to God-Mode Sue specifically, all of the Mary Sue tropes are technically classified as Flame Bait and shouldn't be used anywhere due to their habit of causing fights. Otherwise, no, you can't delete a YMMV item solely on the grounds that you have a differing opinion.

Adding weasel words like "Many see [X] as..." is heavily discouraged, because that's already assumed in a YMMV subpage. We are documenting opinion, not trying to persuade the reader.

edited 19th Jun '14 9:46:17 AM by Fighteer

Oh, I understand. I'll change it back now, sorry. ^^' But at least I know now, right?

edited 18th Jun '14 7:39:17 PM by Sibuna

Editing a YMMV to be less combative is fine, though. Using that God-Mode Sue example (even though, as Fighteer noted, it's Flame Bait):

• God-Mode Sue: Superman himself. He is explicitly superhuman in either nearly every way or literally every way depending on interpretation, and his only weakness is a mysterious green rock that shows up based on plot convenience, and which he can occasionally resist.

The problem with the example is that Superman is what he is by Anthropic Principle; it's the fundamental concept behind the character, without which the story would not exist. Therefore he cannot be a Sue because he does not "bend an existing narrative to be about himself." This is the problem with assigning a Sue category to canon characters, and especially canon characters who are the leads of their particular franchise.

If Superman shows up in Batman's universe and effortlessly solves all of Batman's problems while stealing the adoration of the public, that's a fair example of God-Mode Sue. In fact, this plot has been used more than once, as I recall.

edited 19th Jun '14 8:57:08 AM by Fighteer

So the current write-up can be deleted as "misuse of the trope". A new one focusing on the situation Fighteer outlined might fly, if it weren't for the prohibition on putting the Sue tropes anywhere.

edited 19th Jun '14 9:02:26 AM by Madrugada

Huh. That actually sounds more like "I don't agree" - Mary Sue doesn't have an agreed-upon definition and that is why it's subjective. God-Mode Sue is "Mary Sue with extreme, god-like power" there.

All the more reason to leave it in the Flame Bait, "never use" category, because if it can't have any objective criteria at all, then it's worthless.

edited 19th Jun '14 9:32:07 AM by Fighteer

I have to wonder why it isn't already. Lack of consensus?

We don't have a mechanism for auto-flagging stuff as Flame Bait, as you noted in Ask The Tropers, but the various Sue tropes should already be individually flagged as No Examples Please.

edited 19th Jun '14 10:13:01 AM by Fighteer

Flame Bait is something that should get the different bullets, like YMMV and Trivia; there's at least one TW thread to that effect.

Aye. I expected Ed to get to that once the TW&BR forum had been cleaned out (since it makes easier to keep track of the proposed business when it's not buried).

^ We're working on combing through that section to find the ideas that are necessary or reasonable. The threads there that were locked were clearly neither of those. The ones that are still open need to be assessed, then the ones that are worth doing need to be prioritized.

edited 19th Jun '14 11:15:41 AM by Madrugada

"If Superman shows up in Batman's universe..."

Just a note: they are already in the same universe. Metropolis and Gotham are in the same country, they are roughly New York and Chicago. Superman Stays Out of Gotham most of the time I guess.

That's ready to start at people's convenience.

I am fully aware of that, but usually Supes stays out of Gotham precisely to avoid the question of why he doesn't swoop in and upstage Batman every issue.

To use a less complicated example (one that is allowed to have examples), let's use Unintentionally Sympathetic. The point of the trope is by the way the situation was written and acted, we were not supposed to sympathize with the person. It is very black and white on the matter. But say the example in question is meant to be ambiguous, the person did something horrible and is treated as doing a bad thing, but they show bouts of guilt in between justifying themselves. Thus it was written to have a glimmer of sympathy. Listing it as an example of the trope is ultimately wrong, because it requires misrepresenting the example (leaving out the guilt) to be an example. If the sympathy becomes overblown, then you have Draco in Leather Pants.

The same basic thing applies even to objective tropes. And as far as merely editing examples, if you feel there is too much spite and vinegar feel free to modify it to something more even-handed. "People wish that bitch would die" is just too much and tends to be either a natter magnet or a discussion ender, no one wants to follow something that vitriol.

edited 20th Jun '14 12:56:24 AM by KJMackley

Something I often find in YMMV are examples that are written as a veiled excuse to complain about something that's at best tangentally related to the trope in question. Natter is natter, even on YMMV pages, and the examples should be about the tropes they're listed as. Sometimes I move them to a proper trope, sometimes I edit them to fit, and sometimes I just delete them. They're subjective tropes, but they're still tropes that have their own definitions.

But YMMV is completely subjective anyway, so does that mean all YMMV is worthless?

These pages list opinions, often with an explanation of how these opinions formed. They are not useless, in these senses.

Okay, so when you say the Mary Sue trope is useless, are you suggesting we delete ALL entries under Mary Sue?

Unless it's directly invoked, referenced, or otherwise in-universe, yes. That's part of what Flame Bait means; a trope attracts far too much natter and argument for whatever reason to be listed.

You'll note that all the Mary Sue trope pages (as well as all other Flame Bait entries) have no examples on their own pages. They're just definition pages.

edited 23rd Jun '14 11:20:54 PM by Discar