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Why is this YMMV? : Acceptable Targets

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nuclearneo577 from My computer. Since: Dec, 2009
#1: May 4th 2011 at 9:50:03 AM

This goes for all the sub tropes too.

Okay, Acceptable Targets seems to be about when a show treats something as acceptable to mock. So why is it YMMV? Is it getting used as an Audience Reaction?

edited 4th May '11 9:52:27 AM by nuclearneo577

joeyjojojuniorshabadoo Since: Nov, 2010
#2: May 4th 2011 at 9:54:26 AM

I've only ever seen this used as groups it is officially OK to make fun of, as if there was some sort of objective, universal standard. If its definition was changed to in-universe only this is news to me.

nuclearneo577 from My computer. Since: Dec, 2009
#3: May 4th 2011 at 9:55:49 AM

[up]I've only seen it not used in-universe once.

Micah from traveling the post-doc circuit Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#4: May 4th 2011 at 9:58:21 AM

(as mentioned in [up][up]), Sometimes it's used to mean "things that creators won't get in trouble for mocking", which is much more clearly YMMV. In fact, I'm pretty sure this was the page's original intent (for example, the distinction between Acceptable Targets and Once Acceptable Targets only makes sense in this light).

Though I'd personally be in favor of reworking it as Designated Targets or something, with the definition you gave — that's often the way it's used anyway, and it's much more tropey.

edited 4th May '11 9:59:43 AM by Micah

132 is the rudest number.
nuclearneo577 from My computer. Since: Dec, 2009
#5: May 4th 2011 at 10:04:39 AM

[up]As far as it goes with wicks, I have only seen it used once not in-universe, on Christopher Paolini. Everything else is something along the line of "X treats Y as acceptable to mock". here are some examples.

YMMV.South Park

  • Acceptable Targets: Pretty much everyone and everything on the planet, at one point or another, has been lampooned on the show. Even the show itself.

YMMV.ptitlemxh34tsj

edited 4th May '11 10:09:32 AM by nuclearneo577

Hollikuru Hard-boiled. from not Guildford, after all Since: Feb, 2011
Hard-boiled.
#6: May 4th 2011 at 12:17:11 PM

I've mostly seen this trope used for situations where the work is mocking a group without fear of offending people, because it's "okay" to insult the French/goths/gamers/Liberal Arts majors/whatever. For example, a show uses a stereotypical Frenchman as the butt of a joke, but this is treated as harmless, as opposed to something like insulting black people or making Holocaust jokes, which is usually treated as taboo. I don't think the trope is really YMMV, since it seems to be pretty much a list of stereotypes that are commonly used because they're "okay." YMMV on if -you- think it's okay for a certain group to be insulted, but the presence of the joke itself is objective. I hope I'm making sense here.

Now, count up your sins!
nuclearneo577 from My computer. Since: Dec, 2009
#7: May 4th 2011 at 1:11:37 PM

[up]But dont we have Dude, Not Funny! if you think that they are wrong?

Hollikuru Hard-boiled. from not Guildford, after all Since: Feb, 2011
Hard-boiled.
#8: May 4th 2011 at 6:09:33 PM

[up] Yeah, that one's for subjective examples. Acceptable Targets is, as I said, more like a list of common groups that it's generally considered to be "okay" to mock. Not considered okay by -tropers- per se, but by... general culture, I suppose? It's not really about whether the target is acceptable or not, just that it's a commonly used stereotype. I think.

Now, count up your sins!
Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#9: May 5th 2011 at 12:44:15 AM

[up]The whole "I think" and "I suppose" uncertainty is derived from the fact that those pages really can't make up their mind about what they are about in the first place. They have been developed through Wiki Schizophrenia, and I'm certain that among the writers...

  • Some consider groups on the list to be inferior human beings who we ought to mock.
  • Others wanted to make a list of common targets, remaining neutral to the questions oh how common or uncommon or how right or wrong such mockery is.
  • Some believed that there somehow exist a global consensus culture with some kind of general agreement on what groups are okay to mock and what groups are not. This is a really silly idea, of course: Mock or "glorify" a group, any group, and there is bound to be people who disagree! In reality, consensus only works in small groups or media that is controlled by individuals or small groups.
  • Finally, some wanted to point out prejudices, and intended the list as a list of people getting unfairly mistreated in various media.

Anyway.

Last time I checked, most "examples" on the Acceptable Targets pages was not examples at all, just rants about how one group or another is portrayed, might be portrayed or ought to be portrayed.

Lets see if we can make an objective trope about works portraying groups as Designated Acceptable Targets.

This trope would be the (at least partial) supertrope of Activist-Fundamentalist Antics, Animal Wrongs Groups, Bondage Is Bad and Hollywood Atheist, I think.

Back in december, when we decided to make Acceptable Targets YMMV, I started a YKTTW for this very project. Lets see if we can get it flying now. What we need to do is to copy any objective in-universe examples that are not covered better by subtropes.

Designated Acceptable Targets

halfmillennium Since: Dec, 1969
#10: May 5th 2011 at 2:36:25 AM

It seems to be based on the idea that if a work's only example of a 'target' isn't what people of that group think the average member is, it's automatically an attack on them.

Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#11: May 5th 2011 at 2:40:45 AM

True. And this mentality should NOT be a part of the objective trope, if we finish it.

halfmillennium Since: Dec, 1969
#12: May 5th 2011 at 2:45:52 AM

So how else could it be done? There aren't many works which specifically say it's acceptable to target a specific group.

edited 5th May '11 2:46:41 AM by halfmillennium

Deboss I see the Awesomeness. from Awesomeville Texas Since: Aug, 2009
I see the Awesomeness.
#13: May 5th 2011 at 3:02:27 AM

There's subtropes for them, like Evil Lawyer Joke.

Fight smart, not fair.
Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#14: May 5th 2011 at 3:59:50 AM

[up][up] One of us, or whoever else get around to it first, can skim through the Acceptable Targets lists and see if we find anything that fits.

If we don't find any useful parameters, Designated Acceptable Targets works best as an index only.

Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#15: May 5th 2011 at 4:07:06 AM

[up][up] Added Evil Lawyer Joke.

Anyone got more tropes that could be indexed under D.A.T.?

Deboss I see the Awesomeness. from Awesomeville Texas Since: Aug, 2009
I see the Awesomeness.
#16: May 5th 2011 at 5:16:33 PM

Enemy Mime Everyone Hates Mimes probably.

edited 5th May '11 5:17:10 PM by Deboss

Fight smart, not fair.
nuclearneo577 from My computer. Since: Dec, 2009
#17: May 25th 2011 at 10:59:27 AM

Well, don't we have a whole category of stuff on the Permanent Red Link Club for stuff that was deleted for having no media relation?

nzm1536 from Poland Since: May, 2011
#18: Jul 1st 2011 at 10:15:08 AM

The solution is simple: leave Acceptable Targets for the targets that are acceptable in the works (some movie laughs at black people so in this movie black people are acceptable targets etc.) and nuke everything else. We are not there to judge who is it OK to laugh at or to study popular opinions in the society (which also tend to vary from place to place)

"Take your (...) hippy dream world, I'll take reality and earning my happiness with my own efforts" - Barkey
Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#19: Jul 1st 2011 at 10:26:02 AM

Not so simple as it sounds.

If we have a pattern of group X being targeted in way Y, we have a trope. Someone targeting someone in some way, however, that's People Sit On Chairs. Whining about people people sitting on chairs is not a valid objective trope That's why I made Designated Acceptable Targets an index and limited individual examples to ones that discussed designating groups as targets.

Edit: Spelling corrected, not that I'm not on my iPhone anymore.

edited 1st Jul '11 1:58:50 PM by Xzenu

nzm1536 from Poland Since: May, 2011
#20: Jul 1st 2011 at 11:01:20 AM

Certain groups of people being attacked by an author is a trope. Societal views on it isn't

"Take your (...) hippy dream world, I'll take reality and earning my happiness with my own efforts" - Barkey
Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#21: Jul 1st 2011 at 12:07:09 PM

How do we know if a group is actually being attacked?

Pretty much all characters belong tobat least two groups (gender and race), so whenever a character is attacked or portrayed in an unfavorable light, someone will consider it an attack on a group.

joeyjojojuniorshabadoo Since: Nov, 2010
#22: Jul 1st 2011 at 12:37:23 PM

I agree that certain groups of people being portrayed negatively in media is something that we should document. But I think Acceptable Target pages try to handle it in too broad strokes. Are Asians Once Acceptable Targets because Yellow Peril and buck-toothed, cross-eyed, yellow goblins don't show up in many shows anymore? Or are they still Acceptable Targets because you still see jokes about them being bad drivers or misogynists or all looking the same? Is this even a question we should be asking? Why not just have tropes about specific portrayals, and just note whether or not it's still widely used?

Xzenu Since: Apr, 2010
#23: Jul 1st 2011 at 2:07:27 PM

Those are some of the good points that have been brought up repeatedly. There have been several long threads about this already, and I think we have pretty much a consensus that Acceptable Targets sucks but that there's still good reason to merely keep it YMMV rather than Kill It with Fire. For example, it can be mined for useful bits of information, if any, when building valid trope pages about discrimination and prejudice.

joeyjojojuniorshabadoo Since: Nov, 2010
#24: Jul 1st 2011 at 5:36:19 PM

What exactly would its purpose be as YMMV? If it's for things that media makes fun of in bad taste that seems like it'd go under Dude, Not Funny! or Once Acceptable Targets. If it's to say that it is in good taste to make fun of things, I think most pages would need a massive rewrite because they seem to have a fairly disapproving tone.

Also I thought I'd mention that Acceptable Ethnic Targets uses a fairly... original definition of "ethnicity" and should probably be split.

edited 1st Jul '11 5:37:35 PM by joeyjojojuniorshabadoo

nzm1536 from Poland Since: May, 2011
#25: Jul 2nd 2011 at 10:47:50 AM

Again, we aren't here to decide what's OK to laugh at and what isn't. It is too YMMV to even be a trope. Like, for example, I think that you can laugh at exactly everyone - does it mean that everyone should be listed as an Acceptable Target?

"Take your (...) hippy dream world, I'll take reality and earning my happiness with my own efforts" - Barkey

Total posts: 26
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