Line #22 Woobie/SouthPark


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/0513_kennysick.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:''"I can't see him like that, Kyle! All those hoses and wires. He's a kid, dude! He's supposed to be running around and laughing!"'']]
3	!!''WesternAnimation/SouthPark''
4	* Butters' sweet, innocent personality is enough to melt even the hardest of hearts. The fact that his parents take all of their problems out on him makes him this.
5	-->'''Butters:''' I don't think I'm a happy person. Every night I fall asleep to the sounds of my own screams... And every morning I wake up to the sounds of my own screams. Do you think I'm a happy person?[[note]]He says this in the BannedEpisode "Super Best Friends"[[/note]]
6	* Kip Drordy, a sad kid with no friends (both on Facebook and apparently not in real life either) who becomes attached to Kyle simply because Kyle friended him out of pity. Luckily at the end of the episode [[spoiler:all of Stan's thousands of Facebook friends become Kip's friends instead]].
7	* [[LittlestCancerPatient Nelson]] in "[[Recap/SouthParkS10E14StanleysCup Stanley's Cup]]" is designed up to evoke as much emotion as possible, with his small fragile voice and deathly appearance.
8	* Poor, poor Kenny. Even putting aside his [[TheyKilledKennyAgain constantly brutal deaths]], some of which were so slow and painful that the audience could see him suffer (particularly in "Kenny Dies"), but even his waking life is miserable due to his poverty and his parents' drug addiction and DomesticAbuse. The Coon and Friends trilogy establishes him as an IronWoobie, as he remembers all of his deaths and feels the pain, but still powers through for the sake of everybody around him, even adapting the Mysterion identity to protect the town from harm.
9	* Stan can be seen as this or a JerkassWoobie, but he certainly qualifies as this in "[[Recap/SouthParkS15E7YoureGettingOld You're Getting Old]]" and "[[Recap/SouthParkS15E8AssBurgers Ass Burgers]]" given that that it was his friends abandoning him after he was diagnosed with cynicism. Hell, in the latter episode alone he's [[ItMakesSenseInContext forced to ingest a bunch of alcohol against his will by the Secret Society of Cynics]] and spends what's implied to be ''a full week'' being chased around and nearly ''sniped on'' by a bunch of AxCrazy lunatics who are trying to butt their way into his personal life.
10	* Kenny's sister Karen. While Kenny has at least [[IronWoobie adjusted to his miserable life]], Karen is even younger and spends most of her appearances terrified or crying, and Kenny is the only one who seems to care. This stands out in "[[Recap/SouthParkS15E14ThePoorKid The Poor Kid]]" when she gets taken away from her family to live with abusive foster parents and then gets relentlessly bullied for crying in class.
11	%% * Mr. Mackey in "[[Recap/SouthParkS2E4IkesWeeWee Ike's Wee Wee]]".
12	* Music/BritneySpears in "[[Recap/SouthParkS12E2BritneysNewLook Britney's New Look]]," a mentally unstable but well-intentioned woman who wants nothing more than to see her children, but is stalked by the media circuit and made out to be an unsympathetic crazy person. This gets so bad that she shoots herself... ''and survives without a head,'' leaving her in an even worse state. The writers were apparently sick of people being mean about Britney for no good reason.
13	* [[SympathyForTheDevil Satan]] is a WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds in TheMovie, where he's abused by his boyfriend and just wants to live a happy life on the surface.
14	* Wendy falls under this trope at times due to suffering some major humiliation when she usually gets the spotlight, but "[[Recap/SouthParkS17E10TheHobbit The Hobbit]]" is especially bad to her since she gets ostracized just for trying to call out the problems of photoshopped images and [[DownerEnding ultimately fails in her quest]].
15	* Pip. He's bullied mercilessly by ''everyone''[[note]]Except for Butters and Dougie, whom he's shown to be friends with in "[[Recap/SouthParkS3E8TwoGuysNakedInAHotTub Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub]]"[[/note]] (even more so than his eventual replacements Butters or Scott Malkinson, who at least get '''some''' social acceptance), he lost both his parents, any and all of his accomplishments are ignored by kids and adults alike. How he managed to keep that cheerful demeanor up to his death remains a mystery.
16	* Kyle himself qualifies as this on occasions, when he isn't a JerkassWoobie, the episode "[[Recap/SouthParkS17E6GingerCow Ginger Cow]]" is a crowning example of this. By the time the episode ends, you will end up feeling very sorry for Kyle. Season 21 really takes a toll on him, due to his involvement with Heidi Turner, trying to get her to realize just how bad Cartman is and ''succeeding'', only for Cartman (who believes himself a victim of her abuse when it's the other way around) to manipulate Heidi into taking him back and rejecting Kyle (who genuinely does care for Heidi). By "Super Hard [=PCness=]", he gets subjected to repeated bullying and harassment by not just them, but the entire school. It gets even ''worse'' in the next season's episode "The Problem With A Poo" as Kyle's involvement with Mr. Hankey causes him to become an outcast by the town and Kyle eventually gives up helping Mr. Hankey. In essence, he becomes an ExtremeDoormat in all three episodes, the first two due to Cartman actively screwing him over behind his back (making Kyle feel like for the first time(s) he's powerless to stop him) and the latter due to being unfairly blamed for being an accomplice to someone else's actions out in the open. (On the plus side, Heidi returns to her old self in "[[Recap/SouthParkS21E10SplattyTomato Splatty Tomato]]" after hearing his ArmorPiercingResponse and breaks up with Cartman, so [[ThrowTheDogABone Kyle does succeed in helping someone]].)
17	** Kyle's suffering is nothing compared to what his brother Ike has been through. Aside from being kicked around like a football by his older brother, Ike has to deal with both his parents abusing him in different ways. First his mother declares war on the entire Canadian race, overlooking the fact that doing so would paint a target on Ike's flap-head. Then his father cons Ike into being a fall guy for his internet harassment hobby, which by this point had escalated to the point where he was considered a public enemy. Being enrolled in kindergarten at the age of 3 and advertised as a genius didn't do Ike's self-esteem any favour either, as half the class turned against him. Not to mention being ''raped by his teacher'', who also tried to get him to kill himself.
18	* Whether [[NervousWreck Tweek]] is this tends to come down on whether you find his twitchy anxiety endearing or annoying, but he definitely looks sympathetic in "[[Recap/SouthParkS21E2PutItDown Put It Down]]". He spends most of the episode going from one panic attack to another, and it's ''entirely justified'', as President Garrison keeps using his name to antagonize Kim Jong Un over Twitter. Craig attempts to either distract him or reason with him, which makes him angry that his boyfriend is treating him like a problem and trying to 'solve' him -- and he hits a few more levels of fear before Craig finally comes back to mend fences.
19	* Cartman's mother in "[[Recap/SouthParkS10E7Tsst Tsst]]", where it's made clear that her ExtremeDoormat personality is because her son is her only friend and she doesn't have the heart to alienate him, allowing him to manipulate her. This is further enforced in "SHOTS!!!" when the town chastises her for not vaccinating her son and she cries about how difficult it is to get him under control. Luckily at the end of that episode, she does snap back against Eric.
20	* Clyde in "[[Recap/SouthParkS16E1ReverseCowgirl Reverse Cowgirl]]". His mom was a complete asshole to him and then he accidentally killed her when he forgot to put the toilet seat down. The funeral wasn't any better for him.
21	* Officer Barbrady in "[[Recap/SouthParkS19E7NaughtyNinjas Naughty Ninjas]]". The entire episode is basically a TraumaCongaLine for him. To elaborate: he loses his job despite being the original cop because PC Principal told the police there was a Code Red at the school (which was actually just Leslie talking) and he accidentally shot someone. And then, he gets home to his apartment where he promises to get another job so he can care for his sick and elderly dog, with his wife implied to be dead. But due to the cop hatred, he cannot find a new job and ends up homeless. He receives a cruel HopeSpot when the mayor and everyone ask him to save the town from ISIS, actually the gang playing Ninja, and he accidentally shoots them when Randy knocks his arm trying to stop him after finding out the truth. And then he's thrown under the bus by Randy and fired again. [[spoiler: Though things do get better for him at the end of the season when he helps to save the world from the ads.]]
22	* Heidi Turner. [[spoiler: A picture of her mother is vandalized by Gerald, she leaves social media and is essentially considered dead, is left with only Cartman (but [[ThrowTheDogABone he did fall in love with her]]), her attempt to stop Gerald falls flat and fails to reunite the school genders, has to leave her home with him so they can be safe from [=TrollTrace=] because Cartman is afraid of his past catching up to him, and then [[YankTheDogsChain ends up losing his trust and love]]. All within Season 20 alone. It gets worse when the next season opens: Cartman flat out breaks up with her because he managed to convince himself she's emotionally abusive, since she isn't a doormat or a slave to him. Then he goes back on his word and begs for her back, likely because he missed the attention, and continues to pay her little mind. A TraumaCongaLine to rival that of Barbrady above]]. The poor girl has gone through so much just for who she loves, [[spoiler: since who she loves likely doesn't really love her back considering his narcissism. Arguably worst of all is how Butters (yes, the very same Butters who went through so much) was the reason Cartman ended up wanting out of the relationship, but not only will Heidi never know, it's likely Cartman would have filled in the gaps anyway without his intervention.]] Many have gone on record to state that she deserves better than what life gave her, with Kyle being used as an AudienceSurrogate to express their sympathy towards Heidi. [[spoiler:Thankfully, things do get better for her when she finally breaks up with Cartman for good and fully recovers from his abuse by season 22.]]
23	-->'''Kyle''': Heidi is a NiceGirl! How can you be so awful to her?
24	* Scott Malkinson is considered an even bigger loser than Butters over issues he can't control. Even his own father makes fun of his lisp and diabetes. When he meets Sophie -- a girl who just like him is diabetic -- his desperation rears its head and he starts lashing out at any boy who might flirt with her, all because he doesn't feel like he has anything else to look forward to.
25	** It gets worse in the BadFuture where literally nobody remembers him, and those that do, make fun of him still, and he's become a not corrupt catholic priest devoting his life to God. He greets everyone at the door of the church where Kenny's funeral is and is lucky to get a "Who are you again?" You also really feel for the guy when Adult Stan storms out of the church and mocks him, he's not angry at all and literally just wanted to be acknowledged!
26	* Thomas from "Le Petit Tourette". His Tourette's syndrome causes him to involuntarily shout curse words which naturally leads to people staring at him and his mother whenever they're in public. He explains that he hates living with his condition because he's constantly worrying about embarrassing his mother and her having to explain his behaviour to onlookers. It even lead to the breakdown of his parents' marriage as his father could no longer take the embarrassment Thomas was causing him. Thomas says he now only sees him at Christmas.
27	** All of the other children shown to have Tourette's syndrome count, too. They all look anxious and worried because they know their tics could come at any moment and they dread it.
28	* The Goth Kids in "The Ungroundable" when, after having enough of being mistaken for being part of the Vampire clique, decide to drop the goth look and wear normal clothes. When it cuts to them at their hangout dressed normally the kids from the soccer team refer to them as "That fat girl (Henrietta), the big-nose kid (Michael), the midget (Firkel) and the kid with pock marks on his face (Pete)". Michael's response is "So we're back to that, are we?" implying they were all mocked for their appearance prior to becoming goths.
29	* Shelly Marsh qualifies as a JerkassWoobie. She has low self-esteem due to her headgear, she was groomed by a twenty-two year old man, another boyfriend was inadvertently killed by her father, the singer that she idolized was actually Randy, who humiliated her during a bawdy performance, and her parents (especially Randy) blatantly favor Stan over her. One might understand just why she's so angry all the time.
30	* Butters' BadFuture alter ego Victor Chaos also qualifies as a JerkassWoobie. He's a slimy SnakeOilSalesman who's made a fortune off of tricking other people into financial ruin, but he only became that way because his parents kept him locked away in his room for years on end, and then either abandoned him or died. The fact that he only had an iPad for entertainment caused him to go insane and fall down an NFT rabbit hole.
31	* Craig qualifies as a JerkassWoobie in Season 12's ''Pandemic'' surprisingly due to being TheDragAlong who just so happens to be TheChosenOne. His points and TheReasonYouSuckSpeech about The Boys? Completely valid! Becoming a Peruvian Flute Band may not have been a bad idea on Stan's part, but dragging poor Craig into it who literally did nothing but get a $100 cheque from his grandma and is almost killed by the guinea pig leader you really feel for him.
32	* [[GentleGiant Scuzzlebutt]]. In [[Recap/SouthParkS1E3Volcano Volcano]] he was believed to be a lame made-up monster because of how ridiculous he was described. Near the end of the episode, the real Scuzzlebutt shows up and rescues the boys, Jimbo and Ned; only to be killed by one of them (Stan). His card art in [[VideoGame/SouthParkPhoneDestroyer South Park: Phone Destroyer]] doesn't help neither as Scuzzlebutt is shown offering flowers to children, but they are running away from him in fear; while Jimbo and Ned are seen aboard a helicopter to hunt him down.

Context Woobie / SouthPark