Ambiguous Name (follow-up crowner March 2, 2020): Lame Excuse

This trope is about faking an allergy to get out of doing something, but it just sounds like I Need to Go Iron My Dog. There was a previous Repair Shop thread, and it was clearly in favor of a rename, but it bottomed out.

“Now! Let us engage in the art of deduction!”

Sorry for the wait, ~Tales of Under.

Upon discussion with the staff, going ahead and giving this thread a chance.

Courtesy link to the 9-year-old thread.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report

I think Lame Excuse, I Need to Go Iron My Dog, and I Have to Wash My Hair should be reorganized into more distinct concepts.

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At the very least this needs to be renamed into, say, Fake Allergy Excuse or Fake Illness Excuse.

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I Have to Wash My Hair, I Need to Go Iron My Dog, and Lame Excuse are all distinct, well-defined concepts. The problem is that the names don't make clear the distinction at all.

• I Have to Wash My Hair: Character makes up an unconvincing excuse in order to turn down an invitation to a future event
  Bob: Do you want to go see a movie with me tonight?
  Alice: Sorry, I have to wash my hair.
• I Need to Go Iron My Dog: Character makes up an unconvincing excuse in order to suddenly leave a situation.
  Bob: Where do you go at night? Why do I keep seeing fur all over your car?
  Alice: Uhh, sorry, I just remembered, I need to... go iron... my dog! Bye!
• Lame Excuse: A character uses illness or physical disability, usually a made up or irrelevant, to get of doing something. Closely related to Playing Sick.
  Bob: Do you want to go see a movie with me tonight?
  Alice: Sorry, I can't, I'm uh, allergic to velvet.

The problem is that I Have to Wash My Hair and I Need to Go Iron My Dog sound pretty much the same, leading to confusion, while Lame Excuse sounds like it should be a supertrope to all of these with the definition "bad excuse". Yet another Pun-Based Title that doesn't work.

There've been a number of threads about this on various parts of the wiki, so I suppose I support a rename, though I have a certain fondness for all these names and fear they'll be replaced by yet another boringly literal name.

"It's just a show; I should really just relax"

I mean, the only one I personally find too ambiguous is the already-boring Lame Excuse, though one could argue the others should be changed anyway as Stock Phrases.

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I fail to see a difference between your examples for I Have to Wash My Hair and Lame Excuse, but I think you mean something like the following for Lame Excuse:

I think it might be best if we stick to one trope at a time. Don't threads that get stretched out too thin go stale quick?

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Also I finally see the pun after looking at the old thread's suggestion of Lamed Excuse. You're faking some illness, like faking being lame. "Thanks I hate it." The concept is more accurately called Malingering, though pre-existing terms aren't always the best rename options.

I do support a rename, as the current name is too clever by half. Some possible names might be Stepping Out For Cough Syrup, Faux-Illness Excuse, or Literal Malingerer.

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I know, I was just saying that if those tropes need to be renamed as well there's at least some basis for doing so.

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I think Lame Excuse covers both getting out of something current (I Need to Go Iron My Dog), or something in the future (I Have to Wash My Hair). It's not super clear from the description though.

"It's just a show; I should really just relax"

First thought that popped into my head, before I read the any of the three, upon the mention of allergies as an excuse, was a scene in Monsters Inc. When Mike is startled by Randell, he denies it, saying he wasn't scared and has allergies. A poor excuse, yes, but in denial, not to get out of a situation. Doesn't really fit any of the three as they are. Tropes are flexible? Or plain doesn't belong?

The name is very ambiguous, having made the mistake of making a pun using a word that's much more frequently associated with the pun itself rather than the intended meaning of the phrase. I'd advocate changing the name, at very least, to something more clearly descriptive.

I don't think that getting out of a future invitation is meaningfully different from getting out of a current event.

So I don't see the need for Lame Excuse to exist as a separate page. It should probably redirect to I Have to Wash My Hair.

(edit) or vice versa, yes.

Edited by Spark9 on Feb 25th 2020 at 4:02:09 AM

Rhetorical, eh? ... Eight!

It would be easier to move wicks from I Have to Wash My Hair to Lame Excuse and use the latter name for the merged trope, with the description being changed as necessary, based on the wick counts.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Feb 25th 2020 at 6:01:21 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.

Would "Ill Excuse" be a better name? (Assuming you go through with renaming instead of merging the page)

Lame Excuse sounds in name like a supertrope to I Need to Go Iron My Dog and I Have to Wash My Hair. Should this be an option on the crowner? The classic "do nothing" is also missing.

To me, there is sufficient difference between suddenly dashing away from a situation with a bad excuse, and coolly turning down a date with a bad excuse to keep the two separate.

"It's just a show; I should really just relax"

Yeah, honestly there may be a missing supertrope here...

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We can add those in. The crowner's still got plenty of time.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report

So if Lame Excuse is turned into a supertrope to the other two, how is it actually distinct from the supposed subtropes that is not The Same, but More Specific?

And, I don't see any meaningful difference in "using a lame excuse to get out of a current vs. future event", either.

Wow, that wasn't in my head at all. The difference I saw was "character uses a socially-acceptable excuse to avoid a situation" and "character gives a ridiculously unbelievable excuse to avoid a situation".

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

To be honest, that’s probably a more tropeworthy distinction. Not sure if it’s born out by the descriptions though.

"It's just a show; I should really just relax"

The phrase "I need to wash my hair" strikes me as a form of Not Even Bothering with an Excuse, in that it's an obviously-fake excuse and the general meaning is "no, I don't want to do that". The phrase "I need to iron my dog" is the same but Played for Laughs.

(these two tropes don't necessarily match these two phrases, though; hence the distinction between "current" and "future" event).

Rhetorical, eh? ... Eight!

Honestly, I more thought "Wash My Hair" was about that specific excuse; and "Iron My Dog" about nonsensical excuses like, well, "I need to iron my dog".

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I Have to Wash My Hair: unconvincing excuse for future event v. I Need to Iron My Dog: unconvincing excuse for this moment, but more blatantly unconvincing?

And Lame Excuse is any excuse of varying credibility where illness/injury is the "reason"

The reason I brought up the supertrope thing is the possibility that we just need a general "lame excuse" trope; but the other two seem broader than I'd thought.

That or we merge all of them.

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