History Main / UnwantedAssistance

* The above goes double for video games. Trying to "help" a player advance through a game denies the player the opportunity to figure out solutions on their own, deprives the player of gameplay experience (including bits of the storyline), and may conflict with the player’s style of play. This is known as "backseat gaming" or simply "backseating", is a BerserkButton of many video game-focused streamers, unless they explicitly state otherwise that it's okay to help out. Sometimes [[StopHavngFunGuys the backseating can turn into outright harassment of the player]] for not playing the "correct", optimal, or "{{meta|game}}" way.

* The above goes double for video games. Trying to "help" a player advance through a game denies the player the opportunity to figure out solutions on their own, deprives the player of gameplay experience (including bits of the storyline), and may conflict with the player’s style of play. This is known as "backseat gaming" or simply "backseating" and is a BerserkButton of many video game-focused streamers, unless they explicitly state otherwise that it's okay to help out.

* The above goes double for video games. Trying to "help" a player advance through a game denies the player the opportunity to figure out solutions on their own, deprives the player of gameplay experience (including bits of the storyline), and may conflict with the player’s style of play. This is known as "backseat gaming" or simply "backseating" and is a BerserkButton of many video game-focused streamers, unless they explicitly state that backseating is okay to do so.

* The above goes double for video games. Trying to "help" a player advance through a game denies the player the opportunity to figure out solutions on their own, deprives the player of gameplay experience (including bits of the storyline), and may conflict with the player’s style of play.

* The Microsoft Windows 10 Updates. It won't take no for an answer, it decides on its own if and when it will update, and it takes hacky LoopHoleAbuse of GoodBadBugs to ''almost'' turn them off. Very annoying if you're the kind of person who leaves your computer running overnight to perform tasks only to later find that your computer spontaneously decided to install updates and reset itself in the night, cancelling and ruining the task you expected it to have completed by morning. Hypocritically, if you try to manually shut down or restart your PC, and any programs block the shut-down (usually due to a "Would you like to save your changes before exiting?" prompt), Windows may stop indefinitely until you make a decison whether to close the programs one by one so you can save your work or force-close them all...but if Windows is attempting to update and restarts on its own, it will happily and immediately close all those programs.

* Microsoft Edge (the browser that came with Windows 10 as a system component) is already infamous by sending pop-ups to dissuade people from using Chrome (using other browsers such as Firefox and Brave doesn't trigger Edge though), however those who opt to use Edge will often get hit by popups introducing new features or obnoxious introductions that most PC users doesn't need (or want) to. Those who try to set the default browser other than Edge will got hit by reminders of Edge's supposed "features" to persuade users to switch.

* McAfee for many users is annoying with its constant nagging pop-ups that it's been deemed "nagware" and worst of all, these popups make a noise, so if you're recording audio on your PC, the nagware popups ruin that take. Many people uninstall McAfee and go for more reliable programs like SpySweeper, MalwareBytes, and Webroot, which despite their false positives, aren't nearly as overzealous as McAfee.
* Website/YouTube automatically removes comments deemed offensive starting in summer 2019. That's all well and good, but it also removes a lot of innocent comments, not even allowing users to rescue them from the spam folder, and in many cases it's led to anger and animosity from users who used a wrong combination of letters and thought the [=YouTube=] content creator removed their comment. This has impacted site functionality so much that it's gone from unwanted assistance to [=YouTube=] being seen as a WellIntentionedExtremist for being so overzealous. Given the fact that scammers and bots spamming viruses and porn links are NOT removed (even if they are deboosted), others might call [=YouTube=] a NotSoWellIntentionedExtremist who did a lazy "quick fix" to appease advertisers.

** While well-intentioned (at least software that isn't straight up scammy malware), it can sometimes delete or quarantine false-positive files that it thinks are viruses. While you can usually undo the action, or shut your anti-virus off temporarily, it's possible it'll just zap the innocent file again.
** Avast Antivirus is infamous for its "sandbox" mode that is triggered when you open an executable for the first time. This is meant to help catch malicious software by running it for 15 seconds in an isolated environment. However, not only does it take up time, it can even interfere with the functionality of the file or files that depend on it, or even permanently cripple whatever software you were going to run, forcing a reinstall of it.

* Windows 11 has introduced auto-fill into everything it has a search bar into, such as File Explorer. If your cursor is in the "wrong" place, it fills in the search bar for you based on popular searches, forcing you to do extra work to search for what you actually want.

* Website/YouTube has disabled comments on all videos for young children and videos featuring anyone younger than the age of 12, moving them into the [=YouTube=] Kids category (people often dread seeing that logo). The claim is that it's to protect kids (which is dubious, given its past of allowing pro-pedophilia content in the name of free speech), however, sometimes users 12 and older, and even users 18 and older, are automatically branded [=YouTube=] Kids. It's also had a few related consequences.

[[folder:Software]]
* UsefulNotes/MicrosoftOfficeAssistant could be turned off, but it caused a certain amount of teeth-grinding first. It tried to help with various office-software tasks, but it was rarely helpful enough, and its interface tried too hard to be cute.
[[/folder]]

* Windows 11 has introduced auto-fill into Google. If your cursor is in the "wrong" place, it fills in the search bar for you based on popular searches, forcing you to do extra work to search for what you actually want.
* Windows 10 and 11 constantly try to restore programs that you've closed off when you load them again. Sometimes you don't want it to store things ''at all'' let alone again. Worst of all, when a virus-pop up whose [[MortonsFork only way out is to either stupidly hit the accept button or click the x and involuntarily accept the virus on your PC]] appears and you try to TakeAThirdOption and turn your computer off by force, you reload windows and that same virus pop-up is there. You can run rootkill from Bleeping Computer to disable the malware but you're still left with the task of cleaning it up.

* The Microsoft Windows 10 Updates. It won't take no for an answer, it decides on its own if and when it will update, and it takes hacky LoopHoleAbuse of GoodBadBugs to ''almost'' turn them off. Very annoying if you're the kind of person who leaves your computer running overnight to perform tasks only to later find that your computer spontaneously decided to install updates and reset itself in the night, cancelling and ruining the task you expected it to have completed by morning.

* YouTube automatically removes comments deemed offensive starting in summer 2019. That's all well and good, but it also removes a lot of innocent comments, not even allowing users to rescue them from the spam folder, and in many cases it's led to anger and animosity from users who used a wrong combination of letters and thought the YouTube content creator removed their comment. This has impacted site functionality so much that it's gone from unwanted assistance to YouTube being seen as a WellIntentionedExtremist for being so overzealous. Given the fact that scammers and bots spamming viruses and porn links are NOT removed (even if they are deboosted), others might call YouTube a NotSoWellIntentionedExtremist who did a lazy "quick fix" to appease advertisers.
* YouTube has disabled comments on all videos for young children and videos featuring anyone younger than the age of 12, moving them into the YouTube Kids category (people often dread seeing that logo). The claim is that it's to protect kids (which is dubious, given its past of allowing pro-pedophilia content in the name of free speech), however, sometimes users 12 and older, and even users 18 and older, are automatically branded YouTube Kids. It's also had a few related consequences.
** The vague language has led some to believe "for kids" and "not for kids" means "family friendly" versus "not family friendly", causing some people putting PG and PG-13 rated content in YouTube Kids by mistake.
** YouTube doesn't notify people that they did this so they might wonder why they aren't getting comments then notice their video got moved to "for kids".
** People have begun adding profanity to videos with a cartoony art style to avoid being marked YouTube Kids. It didn't help that YouTube [[ScareEmStraight scared users into doing so]] with threats of $41,000,000 FCC fines if they marked "for kids" content as "not for kids", pushing this into WellIntentionedExtremist territory.
* YouTube search has rolled out a bunch of new options and changed how it operates, although most hate the changes.
* YouTube briefly experimented with a "For you" tab set to default on channel pages, which proved to be incredibly unpopular with creators as it scrambled the videos and would keep subscribers who didn't get there from notifications in the dark about the new video, instead pushing old videos.

* Elon Musk's attempt to use a submarine to save the children trapped in a cave in Thailand was waved off by professionals who had the situation handled, and was largely seen as him trying to capitalize on the trapped kids as part of a publicity stunt for his company. His meltdown on Twitter afterward certainly didn't help.

* The organization Autism Speaks is infamous among actual autistics, as it promotes unscientific claims about autistics, promotes 'therapies' designed to mold autistic people to be more 'neurotypical' (ABA was created by the same person who created ''[[CureYourGays conversion therapy]]'', using the ''same'' underlying principles, '''and''' has been shown to leave [[https://www.scienceopen.com/document?vid=4e5163dc-da6e-4952-9797-882ef5c0b2b2 autistic individuals at greater]] [[https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311908.2019.1641258 risk of suffering from PTSD]]), uses scare tactics to make the parents of autistic children view them as a burden, AND has zero input from actual autistic people.

Compare ChronicHeroSyndrome, UnwantedRescue, ComplainingAboutRescuesTheyDontLike, TheLoad, TheMillstone, UngratefulBastard. Especially self-righteous and/or stubborn "helpers" may display CondescendingCompassion. Contrast ShutUpAndSaveMe.

!!InUniverseExamplesOnly

!!Examples:

* In ''Animation/ElArca'', in the English dub at least, Xiro and Dagnino are having their final battle, and this happens:

'''Ms. Tarantula:''' [[GoshDangItToHeck Oh my gosh,]] [[SarcasmMode you fixed it!]]\\

'''Ms. Tarantula:''' ''[[SuddenlyShouting NO!!]]''

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'', Mr. Incredible encounters a really annoying boy, Buddy Pine, who tries to be his sidekick, Incredi-Boy. [[spoiler:When turned down, Buddy gets mad and grows up to become the villain, Syndrome.]]

'''Mr. Incredible:''' ''(flashback)'' Fly home, Buddy, I work alone.\\

* Although by the end of the movie he's actually managed to be fairly helpful, Mushu of ''WesternAnimation/{{Mulan}}'' starts off as an incredibly awful companion to her. Witness how he tries to help her "befriend" her fellow soldiers, thus leading to a free-for-all, a great deal of resentment, and a very bad first impression on Shang. Not to mention his advice on how to be a man is at best contradictory and at worst, just plain ''wrong''. What makes this worse is that the only way he'll ever get in good with the ancestors again is if he succeeds in making Mulan a hero -- so his pathetic attempts to help Mulan not only make things worse for herself, they shoot him in the foot as well. When Mulan is found out and subsequently disgraced, Mushu, equally disgraced, finally comes clean about himself.
--->"The truth is, we're ''both'' frauds. Your ancestors never sent me; they don't even like me. But you risked your life to help people you love. I risked your life to help myself. At least you had good intentions."
** Mulan got it better than the last member of the Fa family Mushu got assigned to, however: apparently Mushu got demoted from his position as a guardian because his guidance led to Fa Deng getting his head chopped off.
* In ''Animation/ElArca'' (''Noah's Ark''), in the English dub at least, Xiro and Dagnino are having their final battle, and this happens-

''(Dagnino punches the daylights out of Xiro)''\\

'''Dagnino:''' Haha! Yes, I am. ''(kicks Xiro into a wall)''\\

For "helpers" provided by a program who annoy or otherwise have a negative affect on the player, see AnnoyingVideoGameHelper.

* [[UnwantedAssistance/LiveActionFilms Films - Live-Action]]

[[folder:Films — Animation]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheBadGuys'': During the Golden Dolphin heist, Ms. Tarantula struggles at first to hack the security system guarding it. Mr. Wolf and Mr. Snake, talking to her through their earpieces, desperately give her nonsense advice, only succeeding in irritating her.

* ''WesternAnimation/ABugsLife'': Due to Flik's inventions backfiring or malfunctioning, many feel this way to him. Because of this, when on trial for what happened to the offering, Flik mentions that he only wanted to help. A member of the council then replies: "Then help us: DON'T HELP US!"

Compare ChronicHeroSyndrome, UnwantedRescue, ComplainingAboutRescuesTheyDontLike, TheLoad, TheMillstone and UngratefulBastard. Especially self-righteous and/or stubborn "helpers" may display CondescendingCompassion. Contrast ShutUpAndSaveMe.

* In feminist circles, this is known as "mansplaining": a man approaches a woman, assumes she knows nothing about an activity she's doing or topic she's discussing, and explains every single detail to her under the assumption that she knows less than him, even when she makes it clear she's knowledgeable about the subject.
* As a rather sad example there is [[https://www.upi.com/Archives/1986/12/16/Charities-thanks-but-no-thanks-to-strippers/4869535093200/ this story]] of a bunch of [[HookerWithAHeartOfGold strippers who raised a bunch of money for charity]] yet had trouble getting anyone to accept it, presumably because they disapproved of their life style.

* For people who enjoy doing puzzles, which can include assembling items, about the ''last'' thing they want is for someone else to complete the task for them - or to keep offering unwanted suggestions on how to complete said puzzle. After all, part of the thrill of doing a puzzle is being able to figure solutions out yourself. If they should get stumped somewhere along the way - they can look at the manual instructions themselves, thank you very much!
* The above goes double for video games. Trying to "help" a player advance through a game, in addition to denying the player the opportunity to figure out solutions on their own, such "help" deprives the player of gameplay experience, including bits of the storyline, and may conflict with the player’s style of play.

* This was one of many things that waylaid the Second Pacific Squadron: they got a message from High Command that reinforcements were on the way, and they should sit tight and wait for their salvation before engaging the Japanese. Rozhestvensky, the admiral of the fleet in question, was fully aware that the Second Squadron essentially consisted of every ship available at the time that had even a hope of contributing against the Japanese--hence, the ''Third'' Squadron was likely to consist of the absolute dregs that he'd turned down already. Not to mention, he was on a tight schedule, had been delayed already, and his ships really weren't meant for sailing most of the way around the world through tropical waters, so he wanted to spend as little time as possible sitting around waiting for reinforcements. Rozhestvensky was so firmly against it that he deliberately sent back the wrong directions in the hopes that High Command would simply give up and have the Third Squadron go back home. They didn't.

Compare ChronicHeroSyndrome, UnwantedRescue, ComplainingAboutRescuesTheyDontLike, and UngratefulBastard. Especially self-righteous and/or stubborn "helpers" may have CondescendingCompassion. Contrast ShutUpAndSaveMe. Can lead to AlwaysNeedWhatYouGaveUp if the person ends up [[{{Irony}} in a position where the aid of the person they ordered not to help is needed]]. May overlap with OverzealousUnderling.

* The iOS/iPadOS 16 update for iPhone and iPad devices introduces a gesture where tapping with three or more fingers triggers a clipboard menu in the center-top portion of the screen. While this can be useful for typing, the popup and disruption of further input creates headaches for people who use certain productivity apps (such as those for producing music) as well as people who play games on their devices. And it can't be turned off. RhythmGame players in particular are significantly affected, as several rhythm games on mobile have patterns requiring the player to make three or more touches at the same time, and even in games that don't, certain playstyles may incidentally press three or more fingers at once. The developers and publishers of multiple rhythm games, such as ''VideoGame/{{Arcaea}}'', ''VideoGame/{{Phigros}}'', and ''VideoGame/ProjectSEKAI'' have put out in-game notices and social media statements warning players that upgrading to iOS 16 can adversely affect gameplay experience.

* The iOS/iPadOS 16 update for iPhone and iPad devices introduces a gesture where tapping with three or more fingers triggers a clipboard menu in the center-top portion of the screen. While this can be useful for typing, the popup and disruption of further input creates headaches for people who use certain productivity apps (such as those for producing music) as well as people who play games on their devices. RhythmGame players in particular are significantly affected, as several rhythm games on mobile have patterns requiring the player to make three or more touches at the same time, and even in games that don't, certain playstyles may incidentally press three or more fingers at once. The developers and publishers of multiple rhythm games, such as ''VideoGame/{{Arcaea}}'', ''VideoGame/{{Phigros}}'', and ''VideoGame/ProjectSEKAI'' have put out in-game notices and social media statements warning players that upgrading to iOS 16 can adversely affect gameplay experience.

* ''[[Machinima/MeetTheBLUTeam Meet the BLU Medic]]'' has the rest of the BLU Team dreading getting healed by the Medic, particularly since the "healing" does the opposite. In fact, for once the team had the upper hand up until the Medic stepped in.
* ''Machinima/RedVsBlue'':