Note: If a newly launched trope was already given a No Real Life Examples, Please! or Limited Real Life Examples Only designation while it was being drafted on the Trope Launch Pad, additions to the proper index do not need to go through this thread. Instead, simply ask the mods to add the trope via this thread
.
This is the thread to report tropes with problematic Real Life sections.
Common problems include:
- Conversation on the Main Page
- Flame Bait
- Squicky content
- Impossible in Real Life
Real Life sections on the wiki are kept as long as they don't become a problem. If you find an article with such problems, report it here. Please note that the purpose of this thread is to clean up and maintain real life sections, not raze them. Cutting should be treated as a last resort, so please only suggest cutting RL sections or a subset thereof you think the examples in question are completely unsalvageable.
If historical RL examples are not causing any problems, consider whether it would be better to propose a No Recent Examples, Please! (via this forum thread) for RL instead of NRLEP. If RL examples are causing problems only for certain subjects, consider whether a Limited Real Life Examples Only restriction would be preferable to NRLEP.
If you think a trope should be No Real Life Examples, Please! or Limited Real Life Examples Only, then this thread is the place to discuss it. However, please check Keep Real Life Examples first to see if it has already been brought up in the past. If not, state the reasons and add it to the crowner.
Before adding to the crowner:
- The trope should be proposed in the thread, along with reasons for why a crowner is necessary instead of a cleanup.
- There must be support from others in thread.
- Any objections should be addressed.
- Allow a minimum of 24 hours for discussion.
When adding to the crowner:
- Be sure to add the trope name, a link to where the discussion started, the reasons for crownering, whether the restriction being proposed is NRLEP or LRLEO (and in the latter case, which subject(s) the restriction would be for), and the date added.
- Announce in thread that you are adding the item.
- An ATT advert should be made as well (batch items together if more than one trope goes up in a day).
In order for a crowner to pass:
- Must have been up for a minimum of a week
- There must be a 2:1 ratio
- If the vote is exactly 2:1 or +/- 1 vote from that, give it a couple extra days to see if any more votes come in
- Once passed, tropes must be indexed on the appropriate NRLEP index
- Should the vote fail, the trope should be indexed on KRLE page
Sex Tropes, Rape and Sexual Harassment Tropes, and Morality Tropes are banned from having RL sections so tropes under those indexes don't need crowner vote.
Crowner entries that have already been called will have "(CLOSED)" appended to them — and are no longer open for discussion.
After bringing up a trope for discussion, please wait at least a day for feedback before adding it to the crowner.
NRLEP tag:
%%https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=13350380440A15238800
LRLEO tag:
%%The following restrictions apply: [list restriction(s) here]
%%https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=13350380440A15238800
Notes:
- This thread is not for general discussion regarding policies for Real Life sections or crowners. Please take those conversations to this Wiki Talk thread.
- Do not try to overturn previous No Real Life Examples, Please! or Limited Real Life Examples Only decisions without a convincing argument.
- As mentioned here, the consensus is that NRLEP warnings in trope page descriptions can use bold text so that they stand out.
- The [[noreallife]] tag doesn't currently work. This is a deprecated tag that was introduced many years ago — originally, it would have displayed a NRLEP warning banner when you edited the page. However, there's been some staff conversation (Feb 2024) about what a new technical solution might look like, so we'd advise against deleting these from pages, at least until we have a decision as to whether it'll be fixed or replaced.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Mar 8th 2024 at 10:49:13 AM
Goku Black
I don't think we're allowed to do that last time I checked.
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
Showtime!
Looking at the crowner, aren't the upvotes for cutting the real life examples/making it NRELP? So the 15 "yay"s for La Résistance would actually be for NRELP
Absolute destiny... apeachalypse?
The Draftsman of Doom
We could page a mod to weigh in, if we have to.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
![[nja]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/user_ninja_2074.png "[nja]"){kind=small}
2:1 ratio, 'seraph. 2:1 ratio.
Edited by SkyCat32 on Feb 5th 2020 at 8:29:37 AM
Rawr.
No-lifer
Like I said, we are keeping real life examples for Insult to Rocks, but I still find entries that may look like they should be erased. Let's look here.
- In a lot of earlier seasons of The Steve Wilkos Show, Steve Wilkos would often refer to particularly disgusting guests as 'pigs', and would provide the analogy of pigs wallowing in dirt. However, he seems to have dropped the use of this, as in real life Pigs are fairly clean animals, and only lie on dusty or waterlogged ground to cool off.
- Regarding the Allied nations' need for cooperation with the Soviet Union to defeat the Axis forces, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill remarked "If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favorable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons", just before Germany implemented Operation Barbarossa, invading the Soviet Union soon after Churchill's remark.
- “I’d say you were a carnival barker — except that wouldn’t be fair to carnival barkers! A carny will at least tell you up front that he’s running a shell game!” U.S. Senator Peter Fitzgerald (R-Illinois) to Kenneth Lay, Feb. 12, 2002
- David Letterman on the O.J. Simpson trial: “To call this trial a circus is an insult to the fine people at Ringling Brothers!”
- “I’d call her a cunt, but she lacks the depth and the charm.” — William Styron. Nobody seems to know to whom he referred.
- A common form of rebuke from an instructing NCO to a recruit in the British Army was “I’d call you a cunt, but unlike you, cunts are useful. And decorative.”
- In one of Bill Maher’s 2010 monologues, he compares the anti-immigration reforms of Arizona to Nazi Germany. He then takes it back because “the Germans knew how to dress themselves.”
- There is a Facebook group that claims that calling Edward Cullen gay is an insult to gay people. One would argue this is a Justified Trope: most gay people don’t break into someone’s house to watch them sleep.
- Jon Stewart, towards Sarah Palin:
- On the Usenet newsgroup news.admin.net-abuse.email, comparing a spammer to anything will get you a metaphorical call from the proper Anti-Defamation League.
- "I would call them scumbags, but that would be an insult to bags of scum." — Dennis Miller, in reference to the French.
- Another generic one is calling someone "retarded", then taking it back because "that insults the intelligence of the mentally retarded." Jon Stewart did this as part of a bit describing the U.S. government's response to Hurricane Katrina at the 2006 Emmys.
- Binghamton (New York) High School athletic director Joel Thirer compared the basketball team to a zoo. The Binghamton Zoo got offended. ("Not one of our tigers has been arrested with cocaine. No otter knocks over old ladies to shoplift condoms.")
- Quoth Dan Savage: "Your boyfriend is an asshole. Wait, maybe I'm not being fair... to assholes, which are as delightful as they are functional. Your boyfriend is a piece of shit, a loose stool, a santorum slick."
- British MEP Nigel Farage was ordered to apologise after comparing the President of the European Council to a low-grade bank clerk. His response was to issue an apology to bank clerks.
- In addressing a Republican convention, Ronald Reagan said, “To say Congress is spending like drunken sailors is an insult to drunken sailors…” The cheers and applause kept him from delivering his punchline, “…who at least are spending their own money.”
- After Matt Taibbi called Goldman Sachs "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity", he received responses from a number of zoologists saying he was slandering the squid.
- After the Italian election of 2013, German politician Peer Steinbrück made a comment about being shocked that "the two Italian clowns” won, referring to Silvio Berlusconi and Beppe Grillo. Afterwards, the clown and boss of circus Roncalli Bernhard Paul protested against the comparison, stating that clowning is an honorable, difficult, and sensible job.
- Marilyn Manson once mentioned, when One-Hit Wonder New Radicals released their hit “You Get What You Give,” which contained this closing rap:
Fashion shoots with Beck and Hanson
Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson
You're all fakes, run to your mansions
Come around, we'll kick your ass in!
- He was less insulted by lead singer Gregg Alexander mentioning he’d kick Marilyn's ass in as he was being mentioned in the same breath as Courtney Love.
- Some people compare the user interface changes in Windows 8 to the flavor changes in New Coke. Robert X. Cringely called it an insult to New Coke.
- In June 2013, The Sun published the following retraction/apology:
In an article on Saturday headlined ‘Flying saucers over British Scientology HQ,’ we stated ‘two flat silver discs’ were seen ‘above the Church of Scientology HQ.’ Following a letter from lawyers for the Church, we apologise to any alien lifeforms for linking them to Scientologists.
- In a 1910 trial Judge Ralph H. Latshaw declared that grouping rapists with murderers was an insult to the murderers and even went so far as to deny the rapists the dignity of being hanged on a Friday, the traditional day on which hangings take place.
- Conservative commentator David Frum declared Sarah Palin to have demonstrated that she wasn’t up to the job of being Vice President of the United States and compared her to Dan Quayle, before admitting that he felt such a comparison unfair…to Quayle.
- Comparing anyone to the Westboro Baptist Church is literally an insult to everyone else. Jerry Falwell (who believed, like them, that gays caused 9/11) thought they went too far, and even the Ku Klux Klan officially disavowed any connection with them.
- As part of the Uruguay government's infliction of damnatio memoriae upon the Tupamaros, the word "terrorist" could not be used to refer to them, as they were making such inept fools of the government with their antics that it was held that to call them terrorists would be an insult to terrorists.
- Many people have quipped along the lines of "To call X 'sophomoric' would be an insult to sophomores."
- In the 1964 British general election, the constituency of Smethwick swung from Labour to Conservative against the national tide, partly thanks to a campaign that was accused of race-baiting (more information here). Prime Minister Harold Wilson called on the Tories to disavow Peter Griffiths MP, whom he called a "parliamentary leper". Several Conservative MPs proposed a motion to condemn Wilson's insult to Griffiths, while some of Wilson's own Labour MPs also proposed a motion to condemn his insult... to lepers.
- The controversial practice of using "Applied Behavior Analysis" to teach children on the autistic spectrum to interact with others in an outwardly 'normal' way is frequently compared to dog training by its detractors. (And, tellingly, some of its advocates.) At least one professional dog trainer has weighed in on the subject here, describing the comparison as deeply unfair: She would never treat a dog that way.
![[down]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_down.png "[down]"){kind=icon}
For ROCEJ violations, I mean.
Edited by FridgeGuy2016 on Feb 5th 2020 at 1:40:16 AM
Limpin' with the bizkit.
The Draftsman of Doom
The least problematic one is probably the zoo one.
Rawr.
Are you saying they should be removed for ROCEJ, not fitting the trope, or another reason?
The Draftsman of Doom
~SeptimusHeap what say you? Should La Résistance be made NRLEP to account for the change in consensus, or should the crowner at least be re-opened? I personally feel that listing real life examples of the trope flies in the face of ROCEJ by virtue of portraying specific political factions as”heroic”, and it seems I am not alone, as evidenced by the NREP thread.
Rawr.
Remind me, when was that decision taken?
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
The Draftsman of Doom
Feb 3rd, 2020; 5:48PM.
Rawr.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
...Why is there a separate NoRealLife.Gossip And Stereotypes page? Did I miss something, or...? It's not indexed, and it doesn't link back to the main page, so I'm confused. How is anyone meant to find it or use it?
Edited by WarJay77 on Feb 7th 2020 at 10:16:27 AM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Short-Term Projects herald
I believe that was an old attempt at sandboxing splitting the pages.
I would honestly rather merge the lists together, add context to each entry, and if needed, split the page alphabetically.
Contains 20% less fat than the leading value brand!
No-lifer
That sounds like a good idea.
I don't like the idea of overturning a decision a mere 5 days after it happened...
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
It strikes me as rather odd that tropes that unambiguously violate the rules on real life examples are going up for a vote in the first place, TBH.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
IDK, the whole thing is weird since part of the debate was over whether or not restrict what examples could be used, but then in discussing that restriction, all we did was convince ourselves again that there shouldn't be examples at all.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Assuming you're referring to La Résistance, it's most certainly not an "unambiguous violation." Nearly 40% of votes went in favor of keeping examples, and the discussion in the NREP thread of neutering it to the point of uselessness is a blatant attempt to get around that.
I wasn't referring to La Résistance specifically (I'm not entirely sure why it is a morality trope in the first place when we already have The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified). It's more just a general observation.
The Draftsman of Doom
La Resistance is "A small band of rebels fighting against tyranny." However, I have a hard time believing that people can list real life examples without violating ROCEJ, since calling certain figures tyrants is flame bait.
I think I misunderstood the trope, but to say that organizations such as Aryan Brotherhood, Da'esh or Shining Path, are rebels fighting against tyranny is just asking for trouble.
The truth is, it's hard to list many real life revolutionary organizations as La Résistance without violating ROCEJ since almost all of them have, at one point or another, either singled out civilians for death or have been accused of such actions.
Edit: Perhaps I should just bring the worst ROCEJ violations to the appropriate thread.
Does it have its own RL section that needs to be removed? If not, there's no need to make it official just yet.
Edited by SkyCat32 on Feb 9th 2020 at 4:19:40 AM
Rawr.
Bitch in Sheep's Clothing sounds like a trope that should be NRLEP, but apparently it isn't. Should I put it on the crowner?
Edit: I'm bringing this up because recently this stealth-RL example appeared in the Music folder:
- The lead singer of Hole, Courtney love is actually responsible for the murder of almost her whole family excluding her daughter. She even killed the original bassist of Hole. In most interviews Courtney love says she has never done anything wrong. But the truth is she is a horrible creature. She made Her husband, Kurt Cobain miserable, even her daughter hated her!
Edited by LordGro on Feb 9th 2020 at 11:41:12 AM
Let's just say and leave it at that.
Short-Term Projects herald
![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_up_emoticon_3268.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
NRLEP-ing Bitch in Sheep's Clothing. Also, please throw that example out. Last but least, the grammar could use some work.
The Draftsman of Doom
NRLEP BISC.
It should go on the crowner, but I cannot comprehend why any troper would say examples of RL BISC should be kept.
Edited by SkyCat32 on Feb 9th 2020 at 11:22:40 AM
Rawr.
So, are you telling me we can skip the crowner vote and make BISC NRLEP straightaway?
Let's just say and leave it at that.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
It should probably still go on the crowner, but I agree with making it NRLEP regardless.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Added to the crowner; I presume it'll get the votes.
Let's just say and leave it at that.
Crown Description:
Vote up to either forbid all real life examples (No Real Life Examples Please) or forbid real life examples for specific subjects (Limited Real Life Examples Only); vote down to Keep Real Life Examples. To add a trope to a No Real Life Examples Please index or the Limited Real Life Examples Only index, its crowner option must meet the following criteria:- Stable 2:1 ratio needed for NRLEP or LRLEO
- Must have been up for a minimum of a week
- If the vote is exactly 2:1 or +/- 1 vote from that, give it a couple of extra days to see if more votes come in.
Despite calling to keep RL examples for La Résistance, there has been discussion on the No Recent Examples, Please!note thread that the trope is rather subjective in real life, and should be made NRLEP. Perhaps we could override the decision to keep RL examples?
Edited by FridgeGuy2016 on Feb 5th 2020 at 5:22:24 AM
Limpin' with the bizkit.