Basic Trope: A character who knows a lot about something is ignored by most people, often in a dangerous situation.
- Straight: Alice is a meteorologist who has realized a destructive superstorm is coming. When she announces this to a crowd of townspeople and government officials, she is ignored.
- Exaggerated: Alice has reams of data and the latest weather-detecting technology to back up her statements, plus she points out the window at the green skies with electricity playing over the clouds. Everyone else laughs and goes back to partying.
- Downplayed:
- Alice claims a powerful storm is coming and several major cities will have to be evacuated. Doubting it can be that bad, they evacuate the city … which is directly in the storm's path, believing it will become weaker afterwards.
- A good portion of the government does accept Alice's advice, but they end up fighting about what to do about it, and their inaction costs them valuable prep time.
- Justified:
- Alice is a doomsayer who has been wrong before.
- Alice has a history of Crying Wolf.
- Alice is kind of abrasive in her methods and isn't the best at communicating.
- Nobody wants to deal with the fact that the storm is coming, so they pretend that she's wrong.
- Alice's enemies have convinced everyone that she's incompetent.
- Alice has access to information she shouldn't know and/or can't give away.
- Alice herself assured everyone that everything was safe, only to reread the data and realize the worst.
- Inverted:
- Alice is a buffoon who insists that everything is fine as the plainly visible superstorm approaches.
- Everyone instantly accepts Alice's advice, to the point they overprepare for the storm and she has to tell them to calm down.
- Subverted:
- Alice's predicted storm doesn't come.
- The government officials argue hard with Alice but eventually are convinced.
- Double Subverted:
- ...until five minutes later, at which point it comes just like expected.
- But then they don't actually act on what Alice said at all.
- Parodied: Alice took a six-year college course in predicting the apocalypse. Whenever she tries to warn anyone, they fall asleep in the middle of her dramatic speech.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice's storm does not arrive on time, but arrives later exactly as Alice predicted — until it starts to calm down just as it arrives at a big city — but a couple of hours later becomes much more dangerous again.
- Averted: People believe Alice when she presents her findings.
- Enforced: The story is about recovering from the disaster when Alice was the only one who was prepared, but she would have told someone.
- Lampshaded: "It's my job to predict the weather! I'm predicting the weather and I'm being ignored!"
- Invoked: Someone with a vested interest keeps things quiet.
- Exploited: Alice takes out multiple insurance policies on her house, which she knows will be destroyed.
- Defied: Alice gets Bob to make her case, he being more influential and/or persuasive than she.
- Discussed: "If you barge in there and tell them about it, they'll just ignore you, even with your PhD."
- Conversed: "I'm tired of seeing Apathetic Citizens like these in the movies."
- Played for Drama:
- Because nobody pays Alice any attention, millions die in the storm. Alice blames herself even though she did everything she could to convince people.
- After the government refuses to listen to Alice and people die as a result, she goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against the corrupt officials.
- Alice tries to warn the people about the coming storm, but the government discredits her. After people then die in the storm, everyone else realizes that the government is incompetent and a rebellion occurs.
- Bob, a key official who ignored Alice, agonizes about What Could Have Been had he listened to her instead.
- After the Apathetic Citizens refuse to listen to Alice and people die as a result, the survivors apologize to her and promise to listen from now on. Alice, however, has had enough of them and tells them to shove it.
- Played for Horror: Alice is correct about the impending arrival of an Eldritch Abomination, and it doesn't kill or maim anybody — it just gives them nightmares.
- Played for Laughs: Alice has never been wrong about anything and she holds several degrees from several top universities. Everyone still ignores her.
- Implied: After the storm, Alice complains that no one listened.
- Deconstructed: Alice predicted the storm and its consequences correctly, but everyone else recognizes she was Right for the Wrong Reasons. Alice loses much of her reputation as a result.
- Reconstructed:
- She used a method and/or information that was fully valid, just esoteric for her setting.
- She's still the expert, not the people who dismissed her, and they later make up.
We must get back to Ignored Expert right now, before it's too late! … Is anybody even listening to me?
