Misused: Overshadowed By Controversy

Overshadowed by Controversy has several examples and entire sections, particularly under the Fan Works, Webcomics, and Web Original folders, that seem very private and not 'big' enough for the scope of the trope. Some examples of this are a single deviantart user who made a webcomic, or fanfic authors who did this or that regardless of how 'big' their work was. I'm concerned that by troping it that way, especially for larger fandom works, we'd draw unwanted attention to both the works and this site for chronicling every fandom disaster under a microscope. (A similar thing happened with the Wrestling and Sports folders.)

The media folders, such as Anime or Western Animation, could also use a look, as some entries deal with shows while others actors, fans, or creators. Additionally, some of the entries are not controversial anymore or are not known enough to overshadow the show completely, and still others seem closer to Never Live It Down. Some examples even point out that the controversy was debunked or died down eventually, which doesn't seem to fit this trope, as well as examples saying things like "time will tell if [x] can recover."

I propose a wait period before adding new examples, similar to the Broken Base and Base-Breaking Character consensus.

What do you guys think?

Edited by lalalei2001 on Nov 7th 2018 at 7:41:20 AM

The Protomen enhanced my life.

I think this OP needs a bit of work. The solution proposed is at odds with the problems described, and setting a metric for "controversial enough" sounds like a big waste of time. Imma open but set a clock on this.

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

Anyone have other ideas/input? I had previously asked about it on the Real Life cleanup thread but was told the issue was with the trope itself. Maybe a cleanup thread would be better?

Edited by lalalei2001 on Nov 7th 2018 at 1:45:41 PM

The Protomen enhanced my life.

Well, the self-contradicting examples definitely need to be cleaned up, and Examples Are Not Recent seems to cover cutting the "time will tell" entries.

The issue of scope seems to be a "TRS-level" problem, but unless there's a wick check demonstrating these other issues are on the rest of the wiki, I think a simple clean-up could cover them, right?

Specifically, the controversy is supposed to overshadow the work, so if it doesn't do that it shouldn't count as a valid example. The scope of the fanbase or work's popularity, however, seems like a waste of time defining (so I agree with Septimus there).

Look at all that shiny stuff ain't they pretty

Makes sense. I'll try a cleanup thread in short-term projects. Mods, feel free to lock!

The Protomen enhanced my life.

I added two examples to the Fan-Works section because they are relatively well-known amongst the respective fandoms. But that then brings to issue what counts as well-known enough or not.

If I were you, I'd rather add a strict set of criteria for this trope and set up a Long Term Projects thread to police examples.

What sort of criteria do you have in mind?

The Protomen enhanced my life.

Do we really need a policing thread? Why shouldn't it just be a clean-up thread?

Look at all that shiny stuff ain't they pretty

I agree that a wait period would be good. I remember when BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle announced its Downloadable Content plans, there were massive amounts of Internet Backdraft and many fans thought the game would never recover from it. I also added the game as an example of this, but by the time the game came out, most people stopped caring about it, so I think I should remove it.

Resetting clock.

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

I have one issue with the original question, and that is the idea that things should be deleted if they are no longer controversial. That is not how tropes work on this site. You can DISCREDIT the trope, but cannot overrule it.

That's very much how things work on this website. If a work is Not An Example, then it should not be listed as an example. A lack of significant controversy means that the work is not Overshadowed by Controversy. A trope cannot be discredited by a work, that is an aggregation of works that overall decide not to use the trope.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

1. There is a good point to be made concerning our policy that "Examples Are Not Recent." That is, once a trope is present in a work (say, "The First Edition"), it's there regardless of whether it "disappears" or suffers from Bowdlerization in later versions of that work (say, "The 50th Anniversary Edition").
2. There is precedent on this wiki that such examples of tropes would remain, rather than be deleted.
3. However, Overshadowed by Controversy is decidedly Not a Trope, as it is a YMMV article.
4. Though, if the controversy did in fact overshadow the work for some notable length of time, then the example could be listed as having been in effect. And thus OBC should still be listed.

I mentioned that the scope of the fanbase and the scope of the work's popularity aren't important. However, I do believe that the scope of the controversy is necessary for this YMMV to have any meaning. That is, after all, in its very name (i.e. overshadowed). "Length of time X is/was controversial" pertains to such a scope.

I think thatsnumberwang was talking about when there was a controversy that no longer significantly overshadows the work. Obviously if there's no controversy at all then it doesn't count. That isn't a point of contention. The issue they mentioned is when the "problematic" thing is "no longer controversial."

I was going to outline why Overshadowed by Controversy is not a Discredited Trope, but I think the Trope Trope's page itself says everything we need to hear on that matter. OBC is not discredited. That all said, I think the former quote is talking about examples rather than the trope itself. "You can discredit the example, but cannot overrule it" makes more sense, is all I'm saying.

And also, examples are frequently discredited, like when it turns out they are Not An Example when put under a critical lens. In that case, we would "overrule" it and delete it — or find a better trope for it to be applied to.

Look at all that shiny stuff ain't they pretty

That better fits Hanlon's Razor. Since "overrule" is not a term commonly used and "discredited" has a more specific meaning here, what I considered the obvious interpretation of the sentence is probably incorrect and I offer apologies for the sharp tone used.

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That's questionable. Was the work truly overshadowed if it escapes the controversy? Bah; that's why I tend to stay away from Audience Reactions. There's a saying that all publicity is good publicity, and controversy is free publicity. To really harm a work, the controversy would have to last years, unless there was a limited run (movies in theaters, for example, are affected by a timeline of weeks to months).

Edited by crazysamaritan on Dec 13th 2018 at 1:35:59 PM

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

Clock is up; locking for inactivity.

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