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Removing complaining, bashing and other negativity from the wiki

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Inspired by this thread, I've noticed that this wiki doesn't have a dedicated cleanup thread for negativity.

As we all know, Complaining About Shows You Don't Like, Creator Bashing and other negativity isn't desired on the wiki, except in a few selected areas like reviews and several Darth Wiki pages (and even then, with limitations). And yet, it's one of the most common sins wiki contributors can make.

So, if you find a page, TLP or discussion whose content seems like a straight-up insult or any other bitching - including complainy soapboxing -, you might ask here for help with removing said content.

The sandbox for this project is located at Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining.

Edited by MacronNotes on Apr 27th 2022 at 5:36:47 AM

GastonRabbit C'est la vie. (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
C'est la vie. (he/him)
#4976: Feb 22nd 2021 at 7:42:00 PM

[up]I agree. Also, believe it or not, the text "believe it or not" in an example (such as this one) is Word Cruft.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Feb 22nd 2021 at 9:42:50 AM

I got a rock for Halloween.
AegisP Kindhearted SSSSSNAKE Man Since: Oct, 2014 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Kindhearted SSSSSNAKE Man
#4977: Feb 22nd 2021 at 7:55:22 PM

There is plenty of bashing and flimsy backhanded compliments on So Bad Its Good.

As long as this flower is in my heart. My Strength will flow without end.
AlleyOop Since: Oct, 2010
#4978: Feb 22nd 2021 at 9:14:50 PM

On Yakuza there's this:

  • Draco in Leather Pants: By pretty much any standard, Goro Majima is a pretty terrible person. On camera, he has beaten his wife, beaten his subordinates because he was bored, attempted to kill subordinates over minor insults, actually killed subordinates for not laughing at his jokes, kidnapped a traumatized little girl, held a woman hostage at knifepoint because he was bored, driven a truck through a wall, not caring if anyone was on the other side, for no apparent reason, and stalked and goaded Kiryu into bloody, brutal and utterly pointless fights because it amused him. And all of this doesn't cover what he's done when the camera was somewhere else. However, a disturbingly large number of fans are willing to ignore or whitewash all of these because his backstory is just so tragic, his sense of humor so wacky, his occasional moments of genuine empathy so moving, his homoeroticism so rampant and his abs so rippling...

There's a lot to unpack here. For example the violence towards subordinates is largely Early-Installment Weirdness, and future instances are Kick The Son Of A Bitch. The wife beating is treated with the gravity it deserves, and the main reason people give it a pass is the series treats it as a huge low that Majima is deeply regretful of, and also because the person it happens to is hugely divisive by her lonesome. Most of the other incidents are blatantly Played for Laughs or at worst part of the series' own known in-universe Moral Dissonance so the game itself does not take them all that seriously.

So this comes off as a single person complaining and ironically going on the opposite direction. Of course I don't know how serious the entry itself is trying to be in the first place, but ultimately it seems pointless.

Edited by AlleyOop on Feb 22nd 2021 at 12:16:14 PM

nanakiro Since: Feb, 2011
PlasmaPower Piece of Cake. Since: Jan, 2015
Piece of Cake.
#4980: Feb 23rd 2021 at 4:51:04 PM

Found this in Trivia.Super Monkey Ball

  • No Export for You: The infamously bad Super Monkey Ball Adventure was never released in Japan, which is a blessing to Japanese gamers.

Thomas fans needed! Come join me in the the show's cleanup thread!
nrjxll Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Not war
#4981: Feb 23rd 2021 at 4:57:05 PM

[up][up][up]Um... "It's okay he hit his wife because she's a Base-Breaking Character" is pretty much the definition of fan whitewashing.

AlleyOop Since: Oct, 2010
#4982: Feb 23rd 2021 at 6:39:30 PM

It's less "fans think it's acceptable per se", and more "he slapped her once over an extremely heated moment that many believe neither was fully in the wrong over (she aborted his child behind his back when he wanted a family), except he's shown to be regretful for it and has been trying to make amends for years, whereas several of the harsh things that make her such a Base-Breaking Character have the effect of also making her seem like she didn't care about how she had hurt him, thus fans think he comes out the more sympathetic of the two and it's something they can forgive".

mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#4983: Feb 24th 2021 at 2:39:45 AM

Does Action Park need a cleanup? Almost all of the page is not troping the rides themselves, but the real-life issues surrounding the park's infamous lack of safety regulations. Many of them look like shoehorns too, like Bubblegloop Swamp, Nintendo Hard, and Guide Dang It!, which are video game tropes. Its reputation is definitely notable but not to the extent of shoehorning in tropes unrelated to the rides themselves.

It could probably go on Infamous And Controversial Works due to these issues, though it'd need a new folder for "Rides," I guess. I'm not even sure if the page could survive after a cleanup of all the real-life tropes.

Edited by mightymewtron on Feb 24th 2021 at 5:42:54 AM

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
jandn2014 SMILE! from somewhere in Connecticut Since: Aug, 2017 Relationship Status: Hiding
SMILE!
#4984: Feb 24th 2021 at 3:23:02 AM

Is there anything we can even trope about Action Park? From what I can tell, the park didn’t have any themed attractions.

Edited by jandn2014 on Feb 24th 2021 at 6:23:22 AM

ccorb from A very hot place Since: May, 2020 Relationship Status: It's not my fault I'm not popular!
#4985: Feb 24th 2021 at 3:41:39 AM

[up] We should put Action Park on the cutlist, or cut the trope list and move it to Useful Notes. I just watched a documentary about it called Class Action Park. I could probably make the page.

Rock'n'roll never dies!
HalfFaust Since: Jan, 2019
#4986: Feb 24th 2021 at 5:07:28 AM

Yeah, Action Park seems to be all tropeing real life, and I guess complaining. If there weren't any themed attractions, we can probably cut the page.

Class Action Park may be tropeable, though I don't know what our policy on documentaries is.

PhantomDusclops92 Nitpicky Nitwit from Italy Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: Faithful to 2D
Nitpicky Nitwit
#4987: Feb 24th 2021 at 8:01:41 AM

I just checked that Action Park page... oh god, not only is filled with bashing at the park itself, but someone also added an Everyone Has Standards example that is actually stealth Trump bashing.

Crossover-Enthusiast from an abaondoned mall (Lucky 7) Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#4988: Feb 24th 2021 at 8:20:43 AM

Can we torch it all now?

Jawbreakers on sale for 99¢
Berrenta Bejeweled (she/her) (Ten years in the joint) Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
Bejeweled (she/her)
#4989: Feb 24th 2021 at 8:25:07 AM

Cutlist away!

themayorofsimpleton Short-Term Projects Herald | he/him from the Island of Koridai (Captain) Relationship Status: I won't say I'm in love
Short-Term Projects Herald | he/him
#4990: Feb 24th 2021 at 3:44:51 PM

YMMV.Law And Order Special Victims Unit is a complaining nightmare. We should probably go through it at some point.

Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall
mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#4991: Feb 24th 2021 at 4:15:12 PM

[up] Yeah, I checked that page after casually watching the show and was surprised at how much people hate the characters, though I also understand why they would.

I'm also unsure of how we're allowed to talk about "Intimidation Game," possibly the most hated (or at least mocked) episode of the show. The page says not to talk about the subject that inspired the episode, but there's still a lot of allusions to it on the page without explicitly naming the event.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
Nen_desharu Nintendo Fanatic Extraordinaire from Greater Smash Bros. Universe or Toronto Since: Aug, 2020 Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Nintendo Fanatic Extraordinaire
#4992: Feb 24th 2021 at 7:03:25 PM

Action Park does not deserve its own page. It does not have any themed attractions.

Even a major theme park operator like Cedar Fair (all of its parks are more popular than Action Park, even when Action Park was operating) doesn't have its own page!

Edited by Nen_desharu on Feb 24th 2021 at 10:06:01 AM

Kirby is awesome.
Siegfried1337 Calabash. from The Eastern Luminant Since: Sep, 2018 Relationship Status: Will you go out with me to the End?
Calabash.
#4993: Feb 24th 2021 at 7:47:20 PM

@Super Monkey Ball Adventure: Well, I've seen the ratings... and they suck. That being said, calling it "infamously bad" is an exaggeration. Remove that part.

Also for the goddamned umpteenth time, I need some help regarding certain examples in AssPull.World Of Warcraft. While some of them seem to be obvious complaining, some I think are more subtle than others.

    Examples 
  • "There must always be a Lich King". What was obviously intended as a "Keep the Scourge around in case we want to use them later" finale ran into all kinds of story problems. Biggest of all was the revelation that the Scourge without a master would rampage across the world, destroying all living things. This means Arthas the Lich King already had the power to overwhelm the world and raise it in Undeath. So why didn't he? The player is given two opposing explanations at the same time.
    • The first is that Arthas's assault was a feint to lure Azeroth's heroes to Northrend where they could be turned into Scourge. This raises two additional questions. One: why does he need the heroes at all when it was just established he can accomplish his goals without them? Two: even if he does need them for some reason, why go through all the trouble of cultivating new servants instead of just increasing the power of those he already had? Was it because our potential was greater? But why must this plan involve purposefully letting us lay waste to his own army and lieutenants and only come to fruition moments before it culminates in his own death? And if his servants were so weak as to be that expendable, then how is the Scourge still a threat when what little he had is gone?
    • The second explanation is that there was still humanity within his soul, holding him back. Two problems with this: it contradicts everything players were repeatedly shown and told: that Arthas had no humanity left, including a storyline where players personally witnessed the end of his humanity. However even assuming this was true, how exactly does this fit in with what we were just told? Was he holding back as part of a master plan, or because his inner humanity was subconsciously sabotaging himself? Which is it? And what happens when his plan succeeds? The end logical result is a villain who is carrying out an extraneous and needlessly convoluted plan that ultimately leads to his own demise for no reason.
    • The explanation for Arthas' actions is weak, but slightly more nuanced: He purged his humanity from himself, but Uther's ghost says that "the piece of Arthas that might be left inside the Lich King is all that holds the Scourge from annihilating Azeroth." This clearly implies mercy, but the truth was never really spelled out after that. The remaining fragment was pride. The convoluted plan was to hold back just enough for the players to decide to follow Arthas' path into darkness to finally beat him. Arthas needed to know that he had no failings, it was just the way of heroes to fall. Though just killing the greatest champions of Azeroth and turning them into undead slaves kind of ruins his point.
  • The Reveal that Fenris Wolfbrother was Durotan's big brother and Thrall's uncle. Totally out of the blue, not supported by any prior lore and almost certainly just a hat trick pulled to make Fenris even more of a scumbag and account for Garad's absence.
  • Many accusations of this were hurled at Grom Hellscream's redemption at Warlords of Draenor's climax, not helped by Blizzard themselves admitting that the planned fate for this character changed while the expansion was already well into development. The end result is most of the expansion depicting him as a genocidal and unambiguous villain ultimately responsible for most of the Iron Horde's many invasions, campaigns, and atrocities, which is then promptly forgotten as his victims, the two most prominent of whom have suffered not only the threat of their peoples' extinction at his hands, but also very personal loss, somewhat blandly decide to let bygones be bygones after an Enemy Mine. That this occurred without Grom showing a single shred of remorse for bloodying Draenor with war and conquest makes it all the more jarring.
  • Vol'jin's terminal injury on the Broken Shore at the hands of an unnamed demon and subsequent death after only about one expansion of being Warchief. Not helping is that it was the Horde counterpart to Varian's death in that same scenario, but the latter at least had a Dying Moment of Awesome. Leading off of this is Vol'jin using his last moments to give the title of Warchief to Sylvanas, someone who's been Slowly Slipping Into Evil for about half the game's run and that just about nobody outside her own Forsaken faction trusts. Vol'jin even lampshades this by saying many people won't understand why he chose her but otherwise gives no reason for why he thought she was the right choice.
  • Sylvanas's zero-effort defeat of Bolvar strains belief to a ridiculous degree. Granted, Bolvar is no Arthas but the Helm of Domination is supposed to increase his psychic might ten-thousand fold and he has successfully defended the veil for a decade. Yet he didn't manage to scratch her, she restrained him with ease and broke his crown with her bare hands. To recap, she went from running from the Lich King to utterly curb-stomping him.
  • The creation and addition of the void elves is widely regarded as this, as they had little to no foreshadowing beforehand (in fact, they're "created" during the quests to unlock them) and unlocking them required grinding reputation for a faction of Broken draenei, making many think the Broken would be the next allied race. It does not help that, as void elves are essentially just a small scientific expedition of blood elves corrupted by the Void, making them playable characters flies in the face of the "there are not enough of them" justification for why other, much more requested races such as the high elves remain unplayable.
  • During the leadup to the Darkshore warfront, several night elves are raised by Sylvanas's val'kyr, and these elves (who were killed by the Horde, on Sylvanas's orders, who died defending their lands from the Horde)... accept serving Sylvanas in helping the Horde kill their former kin. Of particular note is Delaryn Summermoon (the night elf from Sylvanas' Warbringers short, who saw Teldrassil set on fire with her own eyes by Sylvanas as she died) blaming Tyrande and Elune for having abandoned them and letting so many night elves die... and so deciding to lead the Horde warfront, helping them kill the remaining night elves.
  • Breaking the Helm of Domination breaking the veil between the Shadowlands and the living world in the Shadowlands cinematic. It was never established as being the key between the two worlds or having anything to do with the Shadowlands before, especially considering it was originally a suit of armor forged by the Burning Legion within the Twisting Nether.
  • The Shadowlands expansion in general came with pretty heavy retcons to how the afterlife worked, in order to make it a full expansion. (Seriously, this is too short)

Edited by Siegfried1337 on Feb 24th 2021 at 7:48:55 AM

Eh, good enough.
mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#4994: Feb 24th 2021 at 7:53:59 PM

Just noticed that Action Park has over 2,000 inbounds, so maybe we should move its contents to something like UsefulNotes.Action Park if it's relevant, or make a page for that documentary if possible.

Edited by mightymewtron on Feb 24th 2021 at 10:54:05 AM

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
nrjxll Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Not war
#4995: Feb 24th 2021 at 9:50:08 PM

[up][up]It would help if you went into more detail about what's wrong with the examples. That first one in particular is an eyesore, but some of them aren't even ringing any bells for me, and I at least casually follow Warcraft lore.

Tenebrika she/her (Less Newbie) Relationship Status: Not war
she/her
#4996: Feb 25th 2021 at 4:43:05 AM

There are a few suspicious entries on YMMV.Maleficent. Let's start with these two:

Firstly, this: "Maleficent never actually did anything evil and the real villains are everyone in the story not named Maleficent" is incorrect. She is subjected to Adaptational Heroism but still commits evil acts like, you know, cursing a new-born baby.

Secondly, the potholes seem odd. Does ...And That Little Girl Was Me equal cheesy? Does Black-and-White Morality equal feel-good?

Finally, does the entry even convey So Bad, It's Good? Or does it just say the movie is bad and that's it? The description of So Bad, It's Good says there should be "fairly unanimous consensus outside TV Tropes that the work is of poor quality." I don't think this is the case. The movie has its fans who like it unironically, ignoring or admitting its imperfections.

  • Took the Bad Film Seriously: Some people believe that the film's story is pretty silly, essentially applying Draco in Leather Pants to one of the most evil characters in the Disney Animated Canon, and yet, Angelina Jolie delivers such a great performance as Maleficent - to the point that some only watch the movie for her.
Again, can this trope be applied to a movie that sure has its flaws and detractors but also has genuine fans? Also, the page mentions that Elle Fanning as Aurora is praised by some, too.

Edit: [nja]

Edited by Tenebrika on Feb 25th 2021 at 8:02:42 PM

nrjxll Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Not war
#4997: Feb 25th 2021 at 5:13:03 AM

[up]I think I've mentioned in the past that I have concerns about whether Took the Bad Film Seriously is being used for stealth complaining, but I'm not sure what to do about it, because I'm not entirely sure what the requirements are for being a "bad film" in this case anyway. But there's definitely multiple examples out there of it being used as "I disliked this film but liked this actor", which is not really what the trope is.

Edited by nrjxll on Feb 25th 2021 at 7:13:43 AM

miraculous Goku Black (Apprentice)
Goku Black
#4998: Feb 25th 2021 at 5:28:30 AM

Maybe limit it to critically panned works only.

"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
GastonRabbit C'est la vie. (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
C'est la vie. (he/him)
#4999: Feb 25th 2021 at 5:50:50 AM

[up]That might work. We'd have verifiable opinions to base examples on instead of Weasel Words like "some people believe [whatever]".

Edited by GastonRabbit on Feb 25th 2021 at 7:52:27 AM

I got a rock for Halloween.
BigJimbo Since: Dec, 2017
#5000: Feb 25th 2021 at 9:48:42 AM

YMMV.The Secret Of NIMH 2 Timmy To The Rescue seems to be outright brimming with complainy entries, but the following stands out for me:

Edited by BigJimbo on Feb 25th 2021 at 9:49:42 AM


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