Ambiguous Name: Distressed Damsel

Okay, I'm not sure what to label this, but... Why isn't this titled Damsel in Distress? I think the redirect should be swapped with the current title.

Distressed Damsel works, yes, but Damsel in Distress is by far the more prominent phrase in popular culture. Wikipedia has an article titled "Damsel in Distress." There are movies that play on the phrase "Damsel in Distress" in their titles. It'd be like having a page titled "Overlord of Evil" instead of "Evil Overlord"; yeah, it's a minor switch, but one version is much more ingrained into the cultural mindset.

It's not really a high priority switch, but it just feels irksome; when I first found the page, I just assumed that it was a variation on the Damsel in Distress idea, since it sounds like a snowclone-style shift.

edited 18th Jun '12 1:16:56 PM by Scardoll

Fight. Struggle. Endure. Suffer. LIVE.

There's... no reason not to switch to Damsel in Distress.

Yep, rename to the common term.

We could just have a redirect.

I'll have to go and say that I got the same impression as Scardoll when I first saw that trope name. Really, switching the main title to Damsel in Distress and making Distressed Damsel the redirect would be both simple and more intuitive. If we're going to use pre-existing terms and phrases (which we should be doing more often IMO), it would be better if we just left them in their original, immediately recognizable form instead of trying to be needlessly "clever" and retool them like that.

edited 18th Jun '12 9:31:11 PM by HibernoBrony

"Shepard raids Kai Leng's hideout. Eats his cereal." - Crimson Zephyr

The one reason I can think of to oppose this is that it's a lot easier to tweak Distressed Damsel with wiki markup then it is Damsel in Distress (for instance, the former can be converted to a plural form with nothing but {{ }} markup).

But that's not a major issue, so I'm inclined to support this.

edited 18th Jun '12 9:24:42 PM by nrjxll

Distressed Damsel found in: 3143 articles, excluding discussions.

Says to me we need a lot more than just "I like it" to justify a change here. Fixing all those wicks is going to be a massive effort! And if you say, "they don't need to be changed", well, the same argument applies in reverse. Damsel in Distress is a redirect, and if you prefer it, you can just use it. In fact:

Damsel in Distress found in: 829 articles, excluding discussions.

Speaking words of fandom: let it squee, let it squee.

The majority of examples use the trope name because it's the trope name; many tropers are unfamiliar with the concept of redirects. You don't even get the redirects listed at the top of the trope page unless you use one of them.

Distressed Damsel just isn't a common phrase like Damsel in Distress is. This isn't debatable. Searching for "Distressed Damsel" doesn't even get a single entry in the urban dictionary except for a verb form of "Damsel in Distress". Wikipedia's entry on "Damsel in Distress" includes no mention of "Distressed Damsel" as a variant phrase.

We don't need to rename any other examples of Distressed Damsel on the wiki. We just need to change the title and switch the current title to a redirect. The benefits? Our lingo isn't unnecessarily obtuse and actually reflects the popular vernacular.

edited 18th Jun '12 11:21:44 PM by Scardoll

Fight. Struggle. Endure. Suffer. LIVE.

I think the resistance is because technically, that's the same as a rename. I understand that practically it isn't.

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

Gah, is that supposed to be some sort of argument for anything? Honestly, that almost makes me prefer Distressed Damsel.

But really I'm neutral. I just don't see the point in the massive effort a rename requires. Anyone who types in Damsel in Distress will be taken to Distressed Damsel. It's not the stereotyped phrasing, but it's two perfectly valid, ordinary, obvious English words that will mean Damsel in Distress to anyone who sees them. Yes, if this were many years ago, and we were just now picking a name, I would have strongly voted for DID, but it's not, And I don't believe we're sacrificing a single bit of clarity with our current name. It's just...less common. Frankly, I think we've got enough real problems throughout the wiki without wasting our time on trivial non-problems like this.

But I'm not objecting—just not supporting.

Speaking words of fandom: let it squee, let it squee.

I don't see a problem with renaming this trope to its more common name and leaving the wicks as they are. If they still point to the same page, I'm fine with it.

The Internet misuses, abuses, and overuses everything.

Agreeing with the above posters that this rename makes only sense if we leave the wicks alone; otherwise, it's just a huge waste of manhours.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

If we use Google to judge how the terms are normally used, "Distressed Damsel" gets 42,800 hits. A lot seem to be directly relaated to TV Tropes and the number is greatly inflated by a band named Damsel that released an album called Distressed. This is frequently written as Distressed: Damsel. "Damsel in Distress" gets 3,340,000 hits, almost two orders of magnitude more. It's pretty clear what the usual term is and we should respect that.

edited 19th Jun '12 1:11:07 AM by AceOfSevens

Seconding what several others said before me: Let's just make the official title "Damsel in Distress" and leave the wicks as-is. It will cost practically nothing, and we have the commonly-used term as a trope title.

Crowner glued to thread.

Waiting on a TRS slot? Finishing off one of these cleaning efforts will usually open one up.

Bumping to get more votes and to see if it's enough to switch. We're at 13 yes's, zero no's right now.

edited 21st Jun '12 10:11:51 PM by Scardoll

Fight. Struggle. Endure. Suffer. LIVE.

I think damsel in distress traditionally refers to the character who needs to be saved and gives the hero a Smooch of Victory. Distressed Damsel is any character who needs to be saved. It reminds me of the Hercules quote, "I am a damsel, I am in distress. I can handle this. Have a nice day." He does save her because she really can't handle it.

I don't think that distinction is meaningful for the defintion or the examples.

The Internet misuses, abuses, and overuses everything.

Yeah, let's not try to come up with a distinction between the two names. It doesn't make sense.

If we did have ourselves a trope distinct from Damsel in Distress, we'd have to name it something unambiguously different.

edited 24th Jun '12 1:57:19 AM by Routerie

So, anyway, the crowner is currently at twenty to one in favour of swapping, and it's been some four days.

Wait until after the weekend to call?

The Internet misuses, abuses, and overuses everything.

Sounds like a plan.

Calling crowner: swap with redirect, do not change the wicks.

Waiting on a TRS slot? Finishing off one of these cleaning efforts will usually open one up.

Did the swap, with the indexes (and a link to the TRS in the discussion page. No YKTTW archive though)

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman